narcissism carelessness & other conditions of the mind

What is it about the human mind that makes reward make sense?
What makes things hurt?

Why did this hurt worse: A cheap person told me that they wanted (only a partial) refund on my ebook.

Than this felt good: A got another random check for hundreds of dollars in the mail.

I am told that the reward system is based on dopamine, but what really does that mean?

It seems anything I do means equal parts jack and shit at times. To me. Even without negative influence around.

I am convinced that I could be a neurosurgeon, find a cure for cancer, a cure for HIV, stop world poverty and still feel horribly incomplete or exceptionally shallow.

Is it better to be depresses or self absorbed? I feel those as my options. Perhaps now a person reading these pathetic words would view me as equal parts both.

Anything I do seems equally easy and frustrating. I wonder if I will ever find anything challenging and interesting enough to get me to really feel alive...

Behind the Bars, More from Dwight Correctional Center

A little bit of another letter from my sissy.

Well I had an officer here one day tell me about what you had put on the internet about here. I didn't know you had put my actual letter on there. But it's cool with me. Two weeks ago "crush" team came here to shake down two unts just because. (Thank God it wasn't the unit I am on) It was Rita's unit though. It was extremely horrible! They hand cuffed the whole unit and walked them to the visiting room / gym while they were marching with there sticks out. The made them stand with their foreheads to the wall and they couldn't takee it off, move or talk for 5 hours, then stripped them, and made them take a piss test. While everyone (the inmates) were going through that shit they were on their unit tearing it up. Rita's room was so fucked up! It took them several hours to get their rooms back in order. They were yelling at em with those sticks out and they had those helmets and shields & shit. I felt so bad for everyone on those 2 units. Several were crying and a few fell out within those 5 hours of having their foreheads glued to the damn wall.

Reading the news

"The development of a nuclear weapon in Iran is intolerable, and a program is intolerable. . . . Otherwise, they will be dealt with, starting through the United Nations." George W. Bush - don't you like how that statement almost implies the US is a force one level above the United Nations? Source

I don't even need to read this article to be discouraged by it. They found ways to mix female genes to make babies. I am excited to think of the day will be grown like plants, are you?

Article Title: "IMF: Africa poised for best growth in 30 years"
first words of article "It said sub-Saharan Africa should show a significant gain in its rate of economic expansion this year." source: cnn

notice how quickly the article shifted from Africa to sub-Saharan Africa. The real joke is not the article, but more how the IMF and world bank work to keep these countries poor to maximize the wealth extracted from interest and so they can create more wealth for themselves elsewhere.

South Africa is the world's #1 resource for platinum and gold. They have exceptionally high unemployment. how is that so?

Support Our Troops

When people say "support our troops" generally they are full of shit. Why should we support our troops? What does support our troops mean?

Wars are the issues. Sure the lives that are killed are important, but saying we support our troops will never bring back lost lives.

I got kicked out of the navy for using drugs. I asked for help before I got in trouble and my chain of command ignored me right up until they had to destroy their own records of my work performance. I couldn't even get a job bagging groceries because I tried to do something most people couldn't. I don't care what they say, you don't know the effects of no sunlight, low food quality, no control, negative environment, abnormal schedule, and low oxygen levels will have upon your mind until the evil people throw you in that environment.

It's nice to know that when you get out people no longer want to support our troops. Now my own story would be a bad example since the military blatently lied about my service to protect their own bogus justice system. This is not the issue at hand.

Let's talk about my friend Mike. He is one of the most intelligent people I have ever met. When he got out of the navy nobody wanted to support our troops. He could not get a job at radio shack or best buy. Being a nuclear reactor operator who knows a ton about electronics does not qualify you for a job working at radio shack or best buy.

I am not saying that he just deserves jobs because he lived through hell. I am stating that the "opportunities" that the navy opens are lies. People do not support our troops. He got nearly a perfect on his SAT's and could not get into the school of his choice. Hopefully somewhere out there someone will want to support our troops. Hopefully he can go to school somewhere.

As far as employment goes, he was unable to find a decent job. I farm work out to him. That is right, this horrible druggie who the navy attempted to destoy has spare work to hand out to others.

Lets take another look at the support for our troops. My roommate today just got the information back that he was not accepted to Penn State based on bad grades he got nearly a decade ago. Think of that for support our troops. He bought a place out here and now the school just says "sorry ...sucks to be you." Thousands and thousands of students go to school here. Few of them know the horrors of navy nuclear power aboard fast attack submarines.

Right now we are throwing out this bullshit support our troops motto as much as ever. And when you look at reality, there is no real support our troops. It's all bullshit.

It reminds me of my old roommates father. After returning from Vietnam he went right back for a second tour. When he came back here he stepped off the plane to the beautiful breeze of a beer being smashed across the back of his head. How is that for a welcome home?

When you join the service frequently you are viewed as a traitor when you get out. Many people come back to the world from a warped reality unable to fit back in. The suicide rate for vets is higher than the general populus for a reason. Many more die than those who paint the battlefields a vibrant autumn red.

I am going to sleep in disguist tonight. Please support our troops.

Saltwater Taffy

So I am chewing on saltwater taffy right now. Some people think it is gross, but I know it to be amazing. Each piece brings with it an exciting new flavor unlike the last. Part of the fun is guessing what flavor each color is.

It reminds me of when I was younger and the world was a bit warmer. When my mind was perhaps a little less poisoned. These are not the words of an angry bitter old man, jut the words of a kid who thinks everyone would be happier if they had saltwater taffy at least once a year...

In Defense of Another

The pornstar Darren James contracted AIDS and at least one other person has already be diagnosed possitive. The below excertps are from an article in AVN from James's best friend.

Anthony continued, "I've known Darren for seven years and over that time he's become one of my best friends. I'm very sad about this whole situation that's going on and definitely I want to go on the record saying Darren is a good guy. He doesn't drink. He doesn't do any drugs. He's not gay and he doesn't do anything with transsexuals."

Interesting how we all have our own little realities. His friend associated drinking and drugs with "bad person" while porn is "career" or "good."
Later in the article he comes to a revalation

"…My feeling right now is that I'm considering not working anymore, not in front of the camera. Definitely, I'd never do a scene without a condom again. I'm confused. I feel like it's not safe at all to work anywhere – LA, Brazil, Europe, Japan. At one point I thought it was fairly safe. Now I realize it's not. Being a porno actor is a high-risk activity."

Maybe he will find a different career field. Maybe he is fine, but many others are not.

"We're in really good shape as far as containment. This is early detection," said Mitchell, who worked in the industry for 25 years before earning a Ph.D. in human sexuality and helping establish the health center.

But that was little comfort to Randi Wright, an 18-year old North Hills woman who began appearing in adult films a month ago to pay college tuition. On Monday she filmed a scene with an actor who is on the second-generation list.

"I'm really upset. I'm angry at the person who brought it into the industry."

Wright said she has tested negative so far. She did not want to use her real name because her family does not know what she has been doing.

Other thoughts on the subject

Performer Gia Paloma, who was in the AVN offices a week ago to drop off a new title, Gia Has a Negro Problem – which has her on the cover with Darren James – said she won’t be working for a couple months.

"At least a couple months, if just mentally, because it fucks you up," she told AVN.com. "Is $1600 really worth cutting my life by 50 years? There’s no reason anyone should risk their life for a few bucks. You have to take a look at yourself and ask what you’re worth."

Paloma also noted that she is still being asked to work and that one company in particular had been particularly insistent.

source: Brian Flemming's Weblog

Pieces of the Mind (Where the Reeses go...)

brain stem - basic metabolic functions (suck in air, burger eat, pump blood)

limbic system - emotions and stuff...ties in current stimuli with past memories (fear love and joy...)
amygadala - creates pointers which makes fearful situations more memorable and alerts fear systems.
hippocampus
hypothalamus

neocortex - abstract & complex thoughts (what would happen if there were no burgers?)

A few more thoughts on the mind

So I am just about done finishing Mind Wide Open...a few more recap points

some people are amazingly gifted at using certain parts of their brains, others are simply gifted in the ability to well integrate the different inputs and uses.

To change extremely bad psychological damage thinking about the action does not work. The best way to deal with damaging activity is to ignore it or block it out for the fist little bit after it happens.

Each time you remember something you engrave a new memory of it based on the changes in your life and environment since you last remember that memory. You may, for example think that sex is bad because you are taught that way. You may be stuck thinking about it in that light indefinentally. Chances are though that even if your social connections are a bit broken eventually you will meet someone you can grow socially attached to. You will probably meet someone that you have really enjoyable sex with. Certainly I am not saying social attachment and sex are one and the same, but more that sex without any sort of social attachment is somewhat numbing...it cheapens the value of something that is intended to be great (by some super natural force or by evolution.)

So the trick is to slowly change you social relationships to where you make better friends, meet new people, and eventually you will have super enjoyable sex. Now I am not stating that everything in the world is based on the repressed desire for sex (Freudian thinking there) but that through smaller micro changes you can eventually make macro changes.

It starts with conditioning thought and memory to match something that is more appealing and good. Then eventually you can dwell on the possitive things that are associated with that memory if anything good ever happens. This is why and how psychologists work. They know they can not erase your memories from your amygdala (even people with amnesia still have proven to have active memory in this portion of the brain). What they can do is slowly reshape the bonds.

Once I finally have enjoyable sex (or I may have already done so :) ) I can associate sex in general with that good sex and then become a man whore...this is actually not my intention, but it just is an attempt to explain the micro macro thing. All of this example is based on my idea of creating a healthy relationship while assuming that it is much harder to do with a person that you do not enjoy humping.

Now my example was somewhat jokingly created based on me knowing that certain people read my blog, but I think I broke down what I was trying to say so that even my own mom would understand it...

Social Neurological Profiling

I certainly am not one who thinks birth determines our full fate. I know personally that just viewing more sunlight creates lush amounts of serotonin in my mind which was nonexistant when I was on the submarine.

To single out specific neurotransmitters and attempt to completely define a person by them is wrong, but they do help paint a picture.

Robert Cloninger created a three dimentional organizational matrix based upon serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine. This does not paint a complete picture of the mind since it is missing many other important neurtransmitters, but it can help give a good snapshot of a person.

serotonin come primarily from tryptophan synthesis which is strongly helped by B vitamins. Tryptophan can be taken as a suppliment which comes for Griffonia seed extract.

me and serotonin: In my estimation my mind is somewhat low in this neurotransmitter. I notice rapid changes (increase) in it's level when i exercise heavily or drink. When I was in the the navy (where there was no sunlight or summer) I was suicidally depressed.

serotonin and society: this is the neurotransmitter which is manipulated by Paxil, Prozac, Zoloft and the like. while being way cheaper than those, 5HTP is a natural alternative that is not regularly promoted by most doctors. When Prozac came out, tryptophan became illegal as a supplement but is still added to baby food today.

FDA has provided for the use of manufactured L-tryptophan for special dietary purposes. Manufactured L-tryptophan is a lawful and essential component of foods, such as infant formulas, enteral products and approved parenteral drug products - source: FDA

Some of the SSRI's have recently been associated with suicide.

What probably helped spur the suicide warning were secret studies undertaken by drug companies, made public last year. They show depressed children taking SSRIs were more likely to become suicidal than those on placebos. source: USA Today

people with low serotonin levels tend to be introverted, quiter, and sometimes depressed.

people with higher serotonin levels tend to be more outgoing, louder, somewhat like social butterflies.

recreational drug use: serotonin is directly effected by MDMA and is also manipulated by LSD. recently ABC did a piece saying that the federal government is full of crap in reference to their bogus reports on the negative side effects of MDMA (view Ecstasy Rising). I can say that there are legitimate short term negative side effects, though what legitimate research has been done on the subject (by German scientists) shows negligable side effects within months of stopping taking the drug. Many time the drug is cut or made through shifty practices (cooked off too quickly or improperly filtered) which cause it to include MDA and other amphetamines or other crazy boosting agents. These are proven to have extremely bad longterm side effects...thus even if ecstasy is not damaging, many of the pills that are sold as ecstasy are. This year only weed will be introduced to more Americans than ecstasy. The estimated number of new users this year is somewhat around 1.8 million.

diseases associated with serotonin: low serotonin levels can cause seasonal affective disorder and other depressive conditions.

serotonin effects: - this is essentially what amounts to the neurotransmitter related to self confidence. again I would view my levels as being below average. this is why I feel amazingly healthy when I work out to boost it, or if I take supplements such as 5 HTP. If you have way too much it is just as bad as not having enough. This is why some people who are wrongly prescribed SSRI's get electric zaps and have nightmares. Too much activity creates too much random firing...I could write pages on this neurotransmitter, but I have in the past and will again in the future.

Serotonin enhancing drugs can lead to eventual emotional numbness. The increasing serotonin levels cause a decrease in testostorone which leads to lower levels of dopamine. Dopamine is frequently associated with passion. Also the overly high levels of serotonin can make it harder for the mind to focus on any specific thing. This lack of focus and lower dopamine level can break up romance, as noted by some emails I frequently get about long standing marriages breaking up and throwing men into mid life crisises (from husbands of wives stuck on SSRI's).

dopamine comes primarily from L-dopa, from Tyrosine, which is created from L-phenylalanine.

me and dopamine: I am somewhat a creature of habit who rarely seeks out new things. I do; however, seem to place extremely high expections on activities prior to doing them...mostly to feel let down when they are over as I lose focus on what next interesting thing will keep me interested and looking forward to something. The lack of interest in the downside of events may be a large portion of why I am disinterested with dopaminergetic drugs like cocaine or other instant rush items such as roller coasters (of course the fear of roller coaster may just be based on childhood falls hiding in my amygdala).

I would say that my dopamine level is most likely higher than that of the average person and way more sensitive to change. Many times what would otherwise be a dopamine based urge is blocked by the fact that I have lower than normal serotonin levels.

Dopamine activity can partially be determined based on prior risky activity with little reward. Certainly as alchohol boosts dopamine (and serotonin levels off the start) I am far more likely to do things I otherwise would not.

People with food cravings are also shown to have lower dopamine receptor activity levels. I do not think my random overeating is associated with this so much as with the effects of serotonin, though I could be wrong. I have noticed when I excercise I eat substantially less food. The same also holds true when I take 5 HTP supplements.

In all honesty a single person can have high and low in dopamine activity as it plays different roles in the mind. Dopamine activities would be more accurately measured if separated out the way we separate out the components of attention.

dopamine and society: this is the neurotransmitter associated with seeking out new activities and interest in new things. it is also the neurotransmitter associated with reward circuitry.

Dopamine levels surge in anticipation of something good or when something more rewarding than expected happens. This is why an occasional "good job" goes a long way to make people feel good about themselves. If they hear good job way too often though it fails to tap into the dopamine system. When really pleasant experiences occur people might expect to see a 30 - 40% rise in dopamine levels. These rises are frequently tied to what we want vice just what we like. Crack or methamphetamine can raise dopamine levels many thousands of percent.

currently this is not as often medicated as a problem as neurotransmitters such as serotonin. wellbutrin is used to treat depressive symptoms in people who have depression which stems from a lack of proper reward circuitry activity.

L Dopa is used to increase its levels of dopamine for those who have parkinsons. Ritalin is known to elevate dopamine levles by blocking the reabsorption of dopamine into nerve cells. increasing dopamine levels evidentally is one of the ways of fighting ADD / ADHD.

schizophrenia fighting drugs tend to lower the activity of the dopaminergetic system.

One of my friends swears by BeCalmed.

people with low dopamine levels tend to be flightier and less focused.

people with higher dopamine levels tend to be highly organized, more focused, and have a sharper capacity to see / solve problems.

zyban is the anti smoking drug which increases dopamine and m

recreational drug use: cocaine and methamphetamine are known to manipulate the dopamine system, frequent abuse of these drugs QUICKLY burns out their receptors. Cigarttes are also known to bost Dopamine levels primarily through an MAOI effect. Zyban is a drug which helps smooth out the peaks and valleys to minimize the desire to smoke.
Caffiene is also known to have an effect on the dopamine system.

caffeine doses that reflect the daily human consumption, do not induce a release of dopamine in the shell of the nucleus accumbens but lead to a release of dopamine in the prefrontal cortex, which is consistent with caffeine reinforcing properties. - source

diseases associated with dopamine: Parkinsons, ADD / ADHD, depression, schizophrenia
dopamine effects: dopamine is somewhat similar to a rheostat for pleasure. vice measuring the pleasure of things specifically it is what measures them as compared to our expectations. it also works as a filtering agent helping to bring different stimuli into focus. if you always have overly high expectations, then it is easy to fall short and slide into a somewhat depressed state. if things are more pleasing than expected then dopamine can be extremely reenforcing.
some people who were being treated for Parkinsons diesease found new love for addictive behaviors such as gambling. If dopamine levels are overly high then people become exceptionally compulsive with things such as eating (dopamine and food), drinking, smoking, and gambling. Bipolar people who were given L Dopa were frequently found to go into manic bouts.

Wellbutrin is a treatment for depression for those who have their symptoms related to the dopamine systems (or primarily feel a lack of reward). Most depression studies of the 1980's and 1990's primarily focused on the serotonin system.
learn more about dopamine (59 minute audio)

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Norepinephrine comes from dopamine synthesis

some studies have linked increased norepinephrine to REM sleep deprivation

too tired to write a bunch about Norepinephrine. however, I may later :)

"Neither 5-HT nor NE depletion induced clinical depression in healthy subjects or worsened depression in unmedicated symptomatic patients with major depression. This finding suggests that the cause of depression is more complex than just an alteration in the levels of 5-HT and/or NE. For some patients, depression may be more directly caused by dysfunction in brain areas or neuronal systems modulated by monoamine systems. We propose that antidepressant drugs may enhance neurotransmission in normal noradrenergic or serotonergic neurons and, through a time-dependent but as yet undiscovered process, restore function to brain areas modulated by monoamine neurons. Future research should focus on understanding the adaptive changes that follow enhancement of synaptic levels of monoamines in neuronal circuits of the frontal cortex, amygdala, and hippocampus. Research investigating the neurobiology of depression may be more informed if the focus is shifted to investigating areas of the brain modulated by monoamine systems rather than the monoamine systems themselves. " - source

Laughing, Love, and Social Connection

So some people fight fear with the fight or flight system, whereas others are more empathetic in their handling of the situation.

Most of the fight or flight type responses tests have been dominated by male test subjects, whereas those which included sufficient females have proven their different response.

The fact that women bith children makes them more inclined to be empathetic and nurturing in situations of stress. Fight or flight does not work when you have a child to care for.

Further studies have shown parallels between sex, brest feeding, laughing and tickling. Apparently our oxytocin receptors are intertwined with areas which are heavy in dopamine receptors (within the nucleus accumbens).

While oxytocin does not directly cause pleasure, it's close intertwining with other parts of the mind show how the effects of a long gaze, drugs, humping, or a deep laugh cause the pleasureful sensations in our minds.

Laughing has also proven to be a strong social bonding situation. Think how rarely you laugh when by yourself and how much you laugh when near others.
The very act of laughter also improves our imune system.
I laugh you...ha

It's hard to laugh unless you have a vivid picture of a person and their words in your mind. Children still learn to smile and laugh instinctively because they feel the safety and warmth of another. While they understand very little, they understand the power of that social connection. Laughter shows how extroverted of beings we are. Sadly though my job which rarely gives me an excuse to leave the house makes most of my communications occur one key at a time.

Though as we get older it seems we are led to believe that we have less time for playing around. Yet another reason why corporate america can kiss my ass... lol...I know I am learning and will eventually find what I want though...

ADD ADHD

So some people have add or adhd and that is a problem.

In all reality my contention is that drug companies push this disease idea, although it does exist in some people. I am one of the. <--- just screwing with my mom here.

Attention is not a single attribute, but a collection of attributes with many layers.

focus
encode (most people run into a wall at about 7 items - this is the reason for the length of your phone #)
sustain
supervisory attention control
and switching between inputs

Also these differenet elements have different skill levels within different individuals by different senses. A person with high visual focus may not have a high audio fucus.

you can use feedback machines that monitor your theta level or other brain waves to help you focus or change mental states.

One other cool thing is that humans are better at visually tracking back data than remembering visual items in chronological order. (we want to know where danger is coming from)

CSS 3 columns

here is how

oh yea, make a table of contents sometime too...

the rest of this post has been edited so that my mother does not see it

Breakfast Pasta

I eat more food than anyone I know. I also have a crazy metabolism...so it is kinda ok. Not too long ago my roommate cooked up gallons of spagetti sauce. Pasta and me go good together. I coined the phrase breakfast pasta because I was usually done finishing off the pasta noodles I cooked up that morning when my roommate would wake. I would always ask him if he wanted breakfast pasta, but he has yet to say yes.

Yesterday I started a new trend. I have a couple windows near my computer. Many days of the week my own computer junkyness prevents me from seeing daylight. I opened the blinds to see outside. This is a very important move for me to make since this sunlight will aid my mind in its production of serotonin - which I can attest to as being a very good thing.

Seeing outside means I feel more human, a little less binary. Maybe the data I think or my actions show a greater depth when glancing beyond my desktop. Of course, this also means that my neighbors get to watch me eating breakfast pasta...which is probably a scary thing for them...

Fear, Cookie Monster, and The Easter Bunny

I am not afraid of the Easter Bunny. He brings me candy every year. This year his timing worked to where he delivered pounds of chocolate right as I was finishing up snarfing cookies. I am exceptionally similar to the cookie monster. Although he is titled a monster, he obviously does not scare me.

Where does fear come from?

Many of our greatest fears are driven from past experiences. The need for survival prevents fear from being enacted upon logically. Rather than going through the whole slow logic process our amygadala has the ability to quickly process fear responses and help store those memories.

Vice storing all those memories within the amygadala, the amygadala generalizes associations which activate fear and provide pointers to where this data exists within the cortext. The reasons for a generalization is that it wants to group similar ideas in with the one that triggered the response to provide a more effective fear response.

Basically the amygadala says "look quick...this could be bad."

They have proven that people with amnesia can still remember events that trigger pain, which shows they can still learn some things.

The fact that the fear responses are not processed within our concience shows why people can have such hard time with events such as post traumatic stress disorder. Some people believe that the mind revisits horrible ideas to help master it's problems, but the truth is this reentry is nothing more than a way to remind us of what happend. It helps provide self preservation.

daily news

Greenland is melting
my roommate lived could use this, we both lived there
AIDS in South Africa

also: ran 3 miles yesterday. brings yearly total to 11 miles. only 989 miles to go...

bush...bla bla bla...shh

Bush aims to push through new censorship bill which makes it illegal for nonprofit organizations to state their opinions about politicians running for reelection.

Exercise in Cookie Eating

Obviously I have much in common with the cookie monster. My mother sent me cookies today and well I probably ate over half of them in the last 4 - 5 hours. It is not even intentional...I just snarf them down.

I am wondering more about the exact role different neurochemicals play in certain diseases...for instance, austitic people lack the ability to read other people's eyes. They find other people hard to read.

When I don't exercise I am the same way. After my super cookie binge I went for a jog. It felt good. I noticed my vision sharpen in much the same way I notice after I have about 2 - 3 drinks. I sense my adrenaline rushing to convert that glycogen into glucose...with the rise in the dopamine and serotonin levels I start to notice more things.

I see girls staring at me that I normally would not notice. Certainly 2 miles down the road I am physically not a far different person than I was a few miles ago, yet I notice this empathetic sense of understanding...some extra awareness.

Then again perhaps I just knew there were more cookies when I got home... snarf snarf

thanks mom

Autism Test

Sometimes autistic people are viewed as dumb. Sometimes they are viewed as being really smart. Autism essetially is the trait defined by the lack of ability to see inside the mind of another.

At a young age most people develope the ability to understand how people around them think. Tracking eyes from near birth and absolutely possessing the skill to predict external mental behavior by the age of 4.

Since the brain is modular and weaknesses often offset our strengths it is very common for autistic people to be mathematically strong and exceptionally weak at communicating. I did take the college level entry exam after doing good on a math test in 5^TH grade.

While I am not outright 100% autistic, my lifestyle is / was certainly one which would progress the situation...and I was really good at math when I was a kid. Most of my social interactions occur through words I read or the letters I type. As a kid I had few friends.

Anyway the autistic test ranges from 1 - 32 with an average person being a 16.4. The higher the score, the more likely a person is to be considered autistic. Fully autistic people usually score about a 35. I took the autism test and had the following results

Agree: 4,7,9,12,16,18,19,22,23,26,33,39,41,42,45,46: 1 point
Disagree: 1,10,11,24,27,31,38,47: 1 point
Score: 24

My autims test scores are probably slightly off due to my recent engagement to learning in a book and my slight understanding of neurology.

As one continues to read through Mind Wide Open, Steven Berlin Johnson talks greatly about eye tests and how some can instinctively read the emotions of another just by a glance at the eyes. Non autistic people have their amygdala light up when they try to figure out what emotions another set of eyes portray. If one goes with their innitial reaction they are right a majority of the time. Second guessing and over analysis almost indefinitely leads to the wrong answers.

Autistic people do not have this same activity within the amydala and are forced to use the neocortex to derive pattern recognition in others - to realize what different things mean. The problem is that this is the very action which provides incorrect results for others.

This lack of empathetic feeling points exactly to why I did illegal things which offset some of my own psychological states. For example, the effect of alchohol deadens the over analytical portions of the brain. It prevents me from over analyzing things. In addition alchohol temporarily boosts serotonin levels, which increases a sense of empathy between people.

When I drink a little (but not too much) I have this rare sense that I know exactly what other people are thinking based on their body language. This feeling is exasperated exceptionally well because of it's lack of existence within my own mind from day to day. It does not necissarliy mean that I understand people more than other people do, or that I even understand other people more than I normally do. What it means is that based specificially on physical attributes in that state I believe I can read people better than I normally can. When I first meet new people this is not one of my strong natural attributes.

Thus the effects of my own lushness were the exact opposite of everything I knew...no analytical reactor, no weeks without sunlight, no weeks of crying myself to sleep. It provided a connected sense of empathy which I could only get artificially for brief periods of time...and so I did.

Dumb People

I met some really stupid people yesterday.
For example:

• Why doesn't our site rank good. Normally I offer a few suggestions and really try to help people. These people had no way to really order their product. It was unproven. It was expensive. They had no tesimonials. Their site looked like they pulled it out of their ass. I was nice and I explained a few things to them, but they wanted more. They stated my "free" review was inadequate. They forced me to be not nice and tell them how crapy their site really is.
  
• Search engine marketing does not work. I met this guy yesterday too. He does interactive marketing and believes that search engine marketing and his limited understanding of search is more than adequate to say that search engines do not work. Somewhat interested in raising his own rankings with no investment, but doubts that search engine marketing really works. Believes that at 20% open rate and a 3-4% clickthrough rate from high end op in email lists predefines user interest more than them actively enaged searching for real information. Also does not believe people from big companies spend money on search since it is unproven in his own closed eyes.
  
• You are unethical. This kid was a real ass. My branding angle was "the only current bla" and there is another company that updates their bla information once a month (i will update much more frequently). The other company sells their bla for over double what I do, does not offer free lifetime updates, and makes a way more agressive sales pitch than I do. This low level ludite that saw my site thinks I should explain their product and I should have an asterisks near my branding angle and then describe that another competitor has an ebook that they update monthly. he ~ Moron!

To: Smokers

I remember when I was in seventh grade and only 1 single damn girl in the entire gym class was slower than I. That was embarassing.

Even cooler was the week afterward where I was hacking up green shit because smokers decided my lungs did not matter or they thought it had little effect on me.

Anyway, here is to smoking and the selfish pleasures it brings.

Kurt Cobain

Kurt Cobain died ten years ago. Some people say that his great fortunes (or misfortunes) were due primarily to timing. Others could care less about him, other than an attempt to still make a buck off his death.

When I was younger I did not understand all the fuss. What the hell is this I thought? I since went through years where I wanted absolutely nothing more than I wanted death. Of course some power beyond my own control propelled me through that bleak naval existance. I now understand what he was singing about...at least on some level.

While Kurt's music is cool, he is just like many of my other favorite musicians...dead. All in all is all we are.

MTBI Test Results

taken tired after many hours awake...most likely am more introverted, but hide it by ACTING extroverted...that coupled with tiredness probably threw the test off...

Your personality type is ENFP.

Extraverted (E) 50% Introverted (I) 50%
Intuitive (N) 86% Sensing (S) 14%
Feeling (F) 85% Thinking (T) 15%
Perceiving (P) 77% Judging (J) 23%

I wonder what my mom is? TAKE TEST HERE

If I am ENFP

People of this type tend to be: enthusiastic, talkative, and outgoing; clever, curious, and playful; deeply caring, sensitive, and gentle; highly innovative, creative, optimistic, and unique; adaptable and resourceful but sometimes disorganized.

The most important thing to ENFPs is freedom to see possibilities, make connections, and be with a variety of people.
Jobs
Advertising account executive
Career / outplacement counselor
Management consultant
Developer of educational software
Actor
Journalist / magazine reporter
Graphics designer
Art director
Copy writer
Corporate team trainer
Residential housing director
Psychologist
Inventor
Human resources profession
Child welfare counselor source

If I am INFP

People of this type tend to be: quiet, reserved, and kind; deeply passionate, sensitive, and easily hurt; loving and dedicated to those close to them; creative, original, and imaginative; curious and flexible in small matters; nonconforming.

The most important thing to INFPs is their deeply held beliefs and living in harmony with their values.

Psychologist
Human resources professional
Physical therapist
Researcher
Translator/interpreter
Legal mediator
Employee development specialist
Religious worker
College professor: humanities
Massage therapist
Social worker
Librarian
Fashion designer
Holistic health practitioner
Editor/art director (web site)

Mentally Weak

So many people wonder around and even eventually get placed on prescriptions which prevent them from using what intelligence was granted to them.

Metally weak, they do not know that they are. They have no frame of reference. Everything is normal and baseline, it's what they know.

Almost discouraged. At the other end of the spectrum I am "mentally strong." I have seen some real bullshit. It has tried to destroy me. I defied it. Now I seem to face the day, unchallenged...bored.

Socially introverted. Quiet. I almost never talk to others unless I am charging them by the hour. Is it phone sex? Maybe. What is the difference? I try to help them achieve bullshit goals usually driven by greed.

Does that make me good? Doubtful. Change is not external. Most people fail because of their own laziness and closemindedness. I am a fool if I think I can change that, though I try.

ALSO...

I met a person who said he was one of the Vanderbilts today. In my eyes he was a complete scumbag. He felt compelled to tell me that he has a good bit of cash in the bank. As if that mattered, as if that made him important, as if he earned it.

I think if I would have saw him brag like that out in a place a little less public I would have punched his teeth in so he could have spent a bit of his excess cash fixing his mouth.

The Problem With Automated Messages

So today I got my happy 1 year anniversary letter from the headhunter that placed me at the job that I quit about 5 months ago.

I know this message is automated not only because I know that they know I quit that job, but also because they have sent other employers my way to offer me jobs I am not interested in.

Automation - it makes no sense to me...but it's worth a post. I do find it ironic that I started that job on April 1st...