handling failure is like handling success- you should always keep the momentum going

We're all more or less cut from the same cloth. The only difference between men (and between our better selves and definitely our lesser selves) is what we do when things look bleak. Do we succumb to the bleakness and spiral further into it? Or do we pull ourselves together and fight through it, finishing the story on our own terms?

It's not always a clear choice. You can have a "bad decade".

One thing I've learnt is to go towards what scares you rather than away from it.

To put it another another way, there is more pain in avoidance than in action.

To put it yet another way, when you come to a fork in the road, take the side that will grow your nads.

When a badinage about drugs triggers a personal rflection

There is a popular meme showing an IQ bell curve with dumb and smart people at left and right tail ends reaching the same conclusions about various topics.

The low iq character is a cavemanish brute, the high iq character is a cool, calm, collected looking stoic. Both use short, quick witted responses that defer to the metaphysical and immaterial to make a point.

The middle, the herd, is characterised with a weak looking herb visage, often shown crying, using hyper emotional verbal diarrhea making desperate appeals to science, group consensus, and faux morality.

I thought of this meme when hearing about an anecdote. Specifically, how humans make bad decisions and convince themselves that they are in the right.

Could sum up libertarians in a meme-intelligent people with high verbal IQ's justifying self destructive behavior.

Smart people have more in common with dumb people in some ways than they do with intelligent people.

living in a low-trust society is tiresome

Low-trust societies and division eat up our energy. I'm at a point of pruning info, ignoring things I used to discuss, focusing on my own sphere, let the world mostly pass me by, react if it's important enough, otherwise I cannot spare energy on anyone but my high-trust group, which is about 3 people big.

Butter isn’t unhealthy, is it?

 Everything in moderation.

Most keto/paleo diets call for fat to replace carbohydrates, but for folks with IBS [irritable bowel syndrome], fat [from butter or bacon grease or hamburgers etc] will tend to induce some really nasty diarrhea.

OTOH, for folks without IBS, fat tends to induce constipation.

Go figure.

As a man, your two most important nutrients are protein and calcium, for strong muscles & bones. Where I'm assuming you're already getting plenty of Vit C for Scurvy and Vit D for Rickets.

The single most important factor in the obesity epidemic is simply the calories themselves: Eat too many calories [in any form] and you gain weight; eat too few and you lose weight.

There's also a ton of evidence that fasting does wonders for your longevititty, and there was even a new study recently which held that fasting could slow the onset of Alzheimer's, and maybe even reduce it after the onset.

And as much SLEEP as you can possibly squeeze into a 24 hour day

A lot to be thankful for

There's a lot to be thankful for; every day is a gift. I was deep in prayer yesterday. Actually what happened was this, I started reading that book that someone recommended, and between that, and everything going on in the world generally, I felt I needed some serious spiritual communing.

So I went out to my favourite spot. And then ran a couple of errands, including one at a little craft shop in town that I love which was playing soft Christmas music. And what deep and powerful answer I felt washing over me? That this is absolutely not a time for bitterness, there is too much of that in the world now. We have a job, to combat hatred and bitterness and injustice with Joy.

I'm thankful that every year the amusement never gets old, when I ask myself, "why are they talking about Thanksgiving, that was a month ago."

To round off an amazing year, complete with a lot of fighting, faith and lessons, I have to finish an academic article coupled with a working Artificial Intelligence project, prepare for a certification test and an upcoming decisive contest. This is what I wanted and this is what I got. Is it a lot of work? You bet. Is it necessary? Rhetoric. I wouldn't have it any other way and I'm thoroughly thankful that I get to fight the good fight.

contending with a hard atmosphere

Half the day I'm literally biting my tongue to not shake some people by the collar and speak something I'll regret, so I've settled on doing the bare minimum of socialisation needed to get my job done and go home. I've built up a reputation of being one of the best workers in my department (as told to me by one of the men who have been working here for 20+ years), and my coworkers are cool with me, so I can probably get away with having at least one "wacky" belief. I’m at the point where if anyone who asks for my opinion on any matter of controversial portent, I'm just gonna be straight honest with them and say what needs be said. Any suggestions on how to Not Live by Lies in a more savvy way? Why, it feels like straight up ZFG is the only way forward now, reputation be damned..

Did cavemen have a religion?

Available archaeological evidence seems to indicate that they believed in a life after death and that they most likely practiced a form of totemism. Burials have been found with all the goods necessary to their way of life, indicating that they believed such would be necessary. Tattoos found on many mummified Ice Age persons indicate a belief in the power of some sort of spirit to protect and guide them. And there are those "Mother Goddess" statues and figurines cluttering up the Ice Age strata in Europe. You don't make stuff like that to represent real, live human females.

Oddly enough Jean Auel (of Clan of the Cave Bear fame), by using the best available scientific evidence concerning Ice Age Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons, does have the closest version to what was probably really going on in their spiritual lives.