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Apr 11

my synthesis here is that smoking, seed oils, microplastics, etc. etc. etc. are all themselves different forms of chronic stress; it all seems like kinda the same playing field to me

Prose and Khans

Apr 11

That's somewhat like comparing a marmoset to a gorilla and going "but they're both primates it's all the same". My brother in tweets, no. One can rip you in half.

Apr 11

by “same playing field” i don’t at all mean same magnitude, i mean you can reduce your chronic stress by cutting out chronic stressors of any kind

Prose and Khans

Yes, but many will feed the gorilla with the corpses of the marmosets, so I can't earnestly recommend marmoset hunting until the gorilla is dead.

i've lost track of the metaphor here. can you give an example? i have no idea which of these things you think is the gorilla

Prose and Khans

Chronic mental stress is the gorilla. Lots of neurotic people try to cut out smaller external stressors like junk food and cigarettes, and in doing so increase their chronic mental stress enough that they're even worse off.

ah gotcha, that makes sense

yup the junk food and cigarettes are load-bearing coping mechanisms. I’m increasingly suspecting that focus on them is actually mistaken and even harmful

similar to “if being hard on yourself worked, it would’ve worked by now” — if attacking symptoms would’ve resolved the root problem, it would’ve worked by now

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@visakanv

and

4:35 AM · Apr 12, 2022Twitter Web App

the men's group i was in had a two-pronged approach to this i really admired; there was a dopamine detox where we quit our addictions for 2 weeks, *and* an open offer to support the men in all the uncomfortable feelings that would bring up that the addictions were keeping away

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and

it's the support that makes the quitting possible i think, otherwise you just go back because you need it and it's the best option you've got. if the support is good enough it becomes your new best option

this sounds so wonderful

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and

yea this is also why Act 2 of Introspect, which is the longest and most comprehensive act, is All about building up skills and confidence *before* we get to entering the labyrinth and confronting the minotaur. Without that you just get pwned