Moving Forward

Deleting cuz, fuck it.

gl

Hey RiKD,

Just randomly opened liquidpoker and your blog and somehow felt that I need to comment. Good luck on your new journey. There are more ways to help people than being a political activist.

Meaningful work is hard to come by but it can be done. Besides, it is really subjective what meaningful is. I do photography because I believe it is meaningful compared to most jobs. Most people would disagree, and return to their jobs doing something which is not relevant the very next day. Meanwhile, photographs gain value over time, forever. Great art lasts forever and is admired by millions of people. Something which "left brain" people can't comprehend. I know it because I was one of them in the past.

Nowadays, I do have a technical day job as well and I think it is a good balance + I love both.
Art is not easy, high risk, high return, it is good to have a plan B.
You know, treat life like a poker game, except it is a set of different games. Your goal is to win in all of them. You are a poker player, treat life like that. Learn rules of each game you want to play in and then play it. When you lose, check if you have a winning strategy, adjust and play again.

This applies to every part of your life you want to succeed in, whether you want to get a job/start a family/ build a company/ become someone.

Don't worry about the future, worry only about being better in life than the day before. This is where your control is and this is what you can learn. Give yourself the best odds to win in life same as you did in poker. Nothing else matters after that.

Aim at something, like you aimed at poker. You want to win a set of games in life.

I made the transition from poker into "real life" quite a while ago and love it. Stopped playing video games. Realized, I want to win in life instead!
Started a family, have a career, doing photography and still have a ton of ideas for life.

BTW. you are right about family and friends https://www.ted.com/talks/robert_wald...s_from_the_longest_study_on_happiness
TED is also a good place if you want to start exploring different topics on everything you can think of, it helped me a lot to discover a lot of different ideas. I know you probably know TED but maybe don't pay much attention to it.

BTW2. http://hrnasty.com/ - one of the best blogs on the internet about getting a job and moving up the career ladder once you have it. Thanks to it I got a job at a Fortune 500 company despite being uni drop out and not working in the industry for 10 years.

Good luck!

Time keeps on slipping slipping slipping into the future.........

When I was sitting in a bar with my sister, brother, and brother-in-law the live band was playing that Steve Millers Band song. It always gets me thinking about the future, how time works, and how I am getting older. It seems a little ridiculous to be living with my parents at 34. It's kind of brutal because one of the first questions people ask me is why I moved to Charleston and the answer is because I was living with my parents and they retired here. I think it is impossible to be confident about a thing like that. I may be the lowest status guy at the wedding. You ever go to a wedding and get the idea you were the last cut? That's how I sort of felt last night. It doesn't help I was in a room full of lawyers, doctors, corporate guys, et al. One of the bridesmaids was hitting on me quite aggressively but I think that is just her nature. Not that I could do much about it. My anti-anxiety medication gives me ED. How do I know this? I did a trial to some bad JOI porn when I got home and it wasn't quite where I would like it to be. It wasn't as bad as after a night of heavy, heavy drinking but as a man I want a really hard dick. Females also want a really hard dick inside of them. I mean I'm not going to fuck a woman after 10+ units of alcohol anyway stone sober. That's just bad. We went to a bar after the dinner which was kind of fun. It was a really cool bar and I kind of miss that. It was really loud though and difficult to converse. I got a little squirrelly at one point and thought about taking about 5 shots to the face to end the tension like I used to. That was about the time to go. I really do miss the sexiness of the atmosphere. All the women dressed up in their sexiest outfits, the eye contact, the music, the dim lit atmosphere. I had some women playing with their hair and smiling at me. That brought me a good feeling. My initial thought was "I still got it" but I never really had "it" in the first place. I was never as sexually promiscuous as I thought I was or thought I could be or thought I should be. My Tinder usage has gone up again. Being in that bar it is SOOO much easier to match in that setting. One bout of hair fondling or smile and it's a match. Then one can just go up and talk to the woman. Boom! Instant date. Oh well, I shouldn't dwell here for too long. I am just a bit lonely at the moment. I will only grow lonelier as the wedding moves forward but I am really happy for my friend. The future wife seems like a great gal. I am pleased that I got the invite.

On June 23 2018 15:24 nlloser60 wrote: Hey RiKD, Just randomly opened liquidpoker and your blog and somehow felt that I need to comment. Good luck on your new journey. There are more ways to help people than being a political activist. Meaningful work is hard to come by but it can be done. Besides, it is really subjective what meaningful is. I do photography because I believe it is meaningful compared to most jobs. Most people would disagree, and return to their jobs doing something which is not relevant the very next day. Meanwhile, photographs gain value over time, forever. Great art lasts forever and is admired by millions of people. Something which "left brain" people can't comprehend. I know it because I was one of them in the past. Nowadays, I do have a technical day job as well and I think it is a good balance + I love both. Art is not easy, high risk, high return, it is good to have a plan B. You know, treat life like a poker game, except it is a set of different games. Your goal is to win in all of them. You are a poker player, treat life like that. Learn rules of each game you want to play in and then play it. When you lose, check if you have a winning strategy, adjust and play again. This applies to every part of your life you want to succeed in, whether you want to get a job/start a family/ build a company/ become someone. Don't worry about the future, worry only about being better in life than the day before. This is where your control is and this is what you can learn. Give yourself the best odds to win in life same as you did in poker. Nothing else matters after that. Aim at something, like you aimed at poker. You want to win a set of games in life. I made the transition from poker into "real life" quite a while ago and love it. Stopped playing video games. Realized, I want to win in life instead! Started a family, have a career, doing photography and still have a ton of ideas for life. BTW. you are right about family and friends https://www.ted.com/talks/robert_wald...s_from_the_longest_study_on_happiness TED is also a good place if you want to start exploring different topics on everything you can think of, it helped me a lot to discover a lot of different ideas. I know you probably know TED but maybe don't pay much attention to it. BTW2. http://hrnasty.com/ - one of the best blogs on the internet about getting a job and moving up the career ladder once you have it. Thanks to it I got a job at a Fortune 500 company despite being uni drop out and not working in the industry for 10 years. Good luck!

Thank you for the well wishes and the links. I am not looking to climb the corporate ladder and I have to be careful with becoming a continual improvement machine. I like that Mark Twain quote from the TED talk. There is not even enough time for love so there is only time for love. That is a good perspective. I approached that dinner last night with fear, nervousness, anxiety, ego when it could have been all Love. It should have been all Love. Tonight, I can be in a place of all Love. We are all just in this thing called life. Existence. It is merely a blip. Blip... b l i p. All I've got is my soul and my unhurriedness. How is my soul today? I got 10 hours of sleep and woke up to my cats cuddling me. That wasn't so bad. My soul feels strong. I love my college roommates. I need to act like it.

Sometimes looking at this Monet above my computer and reading David Foster Wallace just makes me feel better. Takes me to a higher place. Nurtures my soul. Alcohol and drugs never nurtured my soul. It just closed me off from what is important in life. It was like being hit in the head with a blunt object. The blunt blunts consciousness. At least it did for me. That is what I was looking for. Existence can be sharp with sharp edges. Let me feel everything. Bring it on.

I get by with a little help from my friends.

Learn how to climb ladders you want to climb, then it is a beautiful journey through life to the things you desire. It could be argued, that the most important ladders should be so high so that you never reach the top. These things then are greater than you and keep you going until you die. You will always have a reason to keep going.

Existence is a blip and we are all-in in it. Do you have anything better to do than to strive to enjoy this blip and maybe help others enjoy it as well?

I have chosen to enjoy the ride, the option on the other end does not seem to be good at all.

On June 23 2018 16:57 RiKD wrote: Sometimes looking at this Monet above my computer and reading David Foster Wallace just makes me feel better. Takes me to a higher place. Nurtures my soul. Alcohol and drugs never nurtured my soul. It just closed me off from what is important in life. It was like being hit in the head with a blunt object. The blunt blunts consciousness. At least it did for me. That is what I was looking for. Existence can be sharp with sharp edges. Let me feel everything. Bring it on.

What Monet are you looking at ? I fell in love with impressionists back in the day, I have seen some of his work in the National Gallery in London. I really liked it, want to eventually combine photography with impressionism a little bit along with my own vision. Problems impressionists had was that because they were mostly plen air painters, the lost details. In photography, details are captured instantly but they lack impression. This is what I want to add in photoshop to make the photographs more real (paradoxically).

Moving forward would be to stop blogging on here. To me, you are junkie clearly addicted to receiving comments on this blog. I had a job in sales once and they would call someone an "energy vampire" if they were sort of not getting sales or whatever and were sort of energy sink holes in the break room. I feel like this is pretty relevant to what is going on here.

Others have made the argument that it's your blog and you can say/do whatever... I don't agree.This is a smaller forum and there are alot of long time users. When you spam blog posts like you are doing, it becomes kind of a burden/drain on alot of people...something that some users have already pointed out. Yet you keep spamming post after post, without any regard for others on this board. It's really hard to simply ignore your posts. I mean when you talk about stuff like how big of a rut you were in and your past mental issues, its hard not to feel empathy towards you. Do you expect people to just say "fuck it" and ignore someone who is crying for help? Alot of people come on here as part of their routine. Imagine you had a favorite park, and some guy decided to start streaking there every day while playing snare drums. Would that be an ok thing to do? Just FYI the past 80% of blog posts have been made by you.

On June 23 2018 17:29 nlloser60 wrote: Show nested quote + On June 23 2018 16:57 RiKD wrote: Sometimes looking at this Monet above my computer and reading David Foster Wallace just makes me feel better. Takes me to a higher place. Nurtures my soul. Alcohol and drugs never nurtured my soul. It just closed me off from what is important in life. It was like being hit in the head with a blunt object. The blunt blunts consciousness. At least it did for me. That is what I was looking for. Existence can be sharp with sharp edges. Let me feel everything. Bring it on. What Monet are you looking at ? I fell in love with impressionists back in the day, I have seen some of his work in the National Gallery in London. I really liked it, want to eventually combine photography with impressionism a little bit along with my own vision. Problems impressionists had was that because they were mostly plen air painters, the lost details. In photography, details are captured instantly but they lack impression. This is what I want to add in photoshop to make the photographs more real (paradoxically).

It's one of his lily pad works. A bright one. It brightens up my day.

That project sounds like a fun project.

On June 24 2018 04:56 hiems wrote: Moving forward would be to stop blogging on here. To me, you are junkie clearly addicted to receiving comments on this blog. I had a job in sales once and they would call someone an "energy vampire" if they were sort of not getting sales or whatever and were sort of energy sink holes in the break room. I feel like this is pretty relevant to what is going on here.

I am currently not in sales though. LP is not a sales team. Ok, so I am technically marketing and selling myself to potential employers but it's not like these blogs take all day. It's hard to explain but they help me. You realize the "energy vampire" thing is just a way to manipulate and control the salesmen. You can call me an "energy vampire" all you fucking want. I don't give a fuck.

Others have made the argument that it's your blog and you can say/do whatever... I don't agree.This is a smaller forum and there are alot of long time users. When you spam blog posts like you are doing, it becomes kind of a burden/drain on alot of people...something that some users have already pointed out. Yet you keep spamming post after post, without any regard for others on this board. It's really hard to simply ignore your posts. I mean when you talk about stuff like how big of a rut you were in and your past mental issues, its hard not to feel empathy towards you. Do you expect people to just say "fuck it" and ignore someone who is crying for help? Alot of people come on here as part of their routine. Imagine you had a favorite park, and some guy decided to start streaking there every day while playing snare drums. Would that be an ok thing to do? Just FYI the past 80% of blog posts have been made by you.

I don't think I even post one blog per day. I may post more than that within the blog but I don't see what the big deal is. It just stands out more because no one else is posting blogs. There is a big difference between someone posting blogs on a website and someone going to a public place to streak and play snare drums. One of the biggest differences is you have to come to this website and then click on my blog. No one is coerced into doing that.

Anyways, I am feeling a little blue at the moment. I just didn't really get a good feeling at the wedding last night. I mean I did during the wedding portion and some of the reception but it's tough. My best friend from high school could be a problem drinker and his wife was kind of bringing that up and then looking at me to do something. I just brought up that when the side effects start to outweigh the medicinal benefits then you start maybe looking at some other options. Most alcoholics go far beyond that point. So, I think it was just a little awkward between us. Then another good friend of mine we barely spoke. He was in the wedding party but I just got this idea that he was slighting me. I didn't get invited to breakfast this morning. It could just be because they were all in the same hotel and it was a wives and girlfriends type of thing but I still felt dissed. We had such a good time when I visited him in Asheville, NC. I generally just felt pretty alone at the reception. We went to a bar afterwards which was a bit better. The music wasn't too loud and we could sit down and have conversations. The two friends mentioned previously didn't say good bye to me and just left. Now, they were pretty drunk but not that drunk. Again, I felt dissed. Now, the question is am I going to carry these resentments or am I just going to let them go and move forward? I've never been the best at just letting go. Do I even want these people in my life? It feels like yes but if I never saw them again I don't think it would be a tragedy. There's some honesty. I feel like I relate to David Foster Wallace more than anyone I know IRL at the moment except for maybe my brother and two sisters. I think I was always a bit of an outsider with my Warcraft 3, Diablo II and poker and just being a little different in university. I think that has grown maybe not exponentially but it has grown geometrically. The teacher seemed miserable to me. He says he just completely half asses his job and then drinks a 3rd of a handle a night. The groom hates his law firm job with a passion but writes on the side and recently a director bought a screenplay from him. It sounds really fucking awesome. It's an adaptation of Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle." I am deeply happy for him and also deeply jealous. My friend from Asheville which I feel keeps dissing me is some sort of regional manager for a corporation and he says he hates it. He would get out of that job ASAP except he would have to pay back moving expenses. It's how those fucking corporations get you. My other good friend just seemed to be doing well. Has a more or less chill sales job and just seems to be doing well. This post feels like it's getting into big wall of text zone so I will click post.

On June 24 2018 15:58 RiKD wrote: Show nested quote + On June 24 2018 04:56 hiems wrote: Moving forward would be to stop blogging on here. To me, you are junkie clearly addicted to receiving comments on this blog. I had a job in sales once and they would call someone an "energy vampire" if they were sort of not getting sales or whatever and were sort of energy sink holes in the break room. I feel like this is pretty relevant to what is going on here. I am currently not in sales though. LP is not a sales team. Ok, so I am technically marketing and selling myself to potential employers but it's not like these blogs take all day. It's hard to explain but they help me. You realize the "energy vampire" thing is just a way to manipulate and control the salesmen. You can call me an "energy vampire" all you fucking want. I don't give a fuck.   Others have made the argument that it's your blog and you can say/do whatever... I don't agree.This is a smaller forum and there are alot of long time users. When you spam blog posts like you are doing, it becomes kind of a burden/drain on alot of people...something that some users have already pointed out. Yet you keep spamming post after post, without any regard for others on this board. It's really hard to simply ignore your posts. I mean when you talk about stuff like how big of a rut you were in and your past mental issues, its hard not to feel empathy towards you. Do you expect people to just say "fuck it" and ignore someone who is crying for help? Alot of people come on here as part of their routine. Imagine you had a favorite park, and some guy decided to start streaking there every day while playing snare drums. Would that be an ok thing to do? Just FYI the past 80% of blog posts have been made by you. I don't think I even post one blog per day. I may post more than that within the blog but I don't see what the big deal is. It just stands out more because no one else is posting blogs. There is a big difference between someone posting blogs on a website and someone going to a public place to streak and play snare drums. One of the biggest differences is you have to come to this website and then click on my blog. No one is coerced into doing that.

I am currently not in sales though. LP is not a sales team.
-dude it's an analogy

You realize the "energy vampire" thing is just a way to manipulate and control the salesmen.

-Wow man I didn't realize that. Thanks for helping me on that. ¡Viva la revolucion!


There is a big difference between someone posting blogs on a website and someone going to a public place to streak and play snare drums.

-That might be fair enough. How about another analogy. Maybe some dude at the park that has a microphone and just talks about random shit in his life every day at the park in a really annoying way. Or maybe there is some communal bulletin board that isn't all that popular, but used by several people in some complex and some dude just floods it with random information about his pet dog, buster. I don't fucking know the list can go on indefinitely. Point is you are spamming shit that alot of people get annoyed by.

One of the biggest differences is you have to come to this website and then click on my blog. No one is coerced into doing that.

-I can't not look at XYZ(title) RIKD in the Poker Blogs tab. I have to look at that no matter what if I want to come to this website. When some formerly suicidal dude posts a blog every day long ass depressing posts it kind of raises alarm bells. Is that so unreasonable of a thing in your world? It's never as simple as you put it. Your just deluding yourself into thinking that to feed your addiction. Whenever there is some tipping point, you just deny things or nitpick on some technicality. "What's the big deal?" "I don't think I post all that much" "I don't feel like I'm entitled" "You can just not click on it" etc etc. I mean have you never looked at a car accident while passing by driving on the road? Have you never looked at the homeless guy on the street?

I still don't quite understand why you are getting mad at me and complaining about HAVING to look at my blog. I mean I understand it but more so I think the criticism is a unreasonable. I hesitated to even respond but here I am in front of my computer responding. Why does it annoy you so much? I don't even know if I want the answer to that question. My goal here is not to pander to the people. I just write what I feel. It is a coping mechanism. I have gotten to the point where people get annoyed or whatever but it helps me feel better. It may be a vice and it may be annoying to some people but it is better than abusing substances.

I mean really what is going to happen here is I am most likely going to continue to post blogs. The content is going to be up in the air. I am sorry if it isn't pleasurable or entertaining. There are a lot of other avenues for that sort of thing.

I also don't see how I am entitled. The only way I see it is that I believe in a better health care system and a universal basic income. Other than that I don't see it. How am I entitled?

I can see how I could come off as pompous but I don't think that is quite the word. I believe I am solemn in terms of deep sincerity but not the other definitions. I am most certainly self-centered but I don't believe that I am self-important. Feel free to correct me if you think differently.

That's the crux of my problems. I am self-centered. I get bitter about things and I am fearful. I have anxiety and I get depressed. Existence is a bear. I am a scared, scared human being just trying to survive man.

Maybe stop creating titles that give away the fact that you're crying for attention though you claim the opposite

Moving Forward
Vacation Reflections
Father's Day
Sex Ideal

Sex Ideal could be considered rather provocative but the others seem pretty vanilla to me.

I'm supposed to name them Gorgasborg IV?

XYZ 8458?

June 24, 2018?

It just seems like you guys are bored and come on here and say stuff and then I am bored and come on here and say stuff. It's kind of silly. The blogs are likely not going away anytime soon. I only see a therapist once a month. I only talk to my sponsor maybe 1-2x / week if that. I am not socializing as much as I probably should be. Even if I am socializing that gives me ideas I want to write about. If you guys want to throw around labels like "blog junkie," whatever, that's fine. It is unclear to me if the consequences outweigh the benefits so clearly I am not going to stop. It is a rather benign addiction if it even is one. Sometimes by expressing something it becomes "real" when in "reality" it was just a half truth or a distortion. The half truth or distortion becomes more "real" as it is expressed. I can write "I am a scared, scared human being" and now I actually believe I am more scared after hitting the keys on the keyboard. You can write "blog junkie" and now we are in a negotiation. It's a great gambit. Especially, since I can not take the position that I abstain from blog writing or that I am even moderate in blog writing.

So, what's the truth? Sometimes there is a magic that happens on this message board where I get to jump my development further. It's like a giant frog leap instead of scuttering about shuffling my feet in a rather confused, disoriented way. That is what I crave. It can only happen through discussion. So, there is an end-in-itself in writing these blogs. I am writing them for the sake of writing them BUT there is the chance that I can gain something. I am not sure if I see it happening here but I never really can call it. So, I am like a guy who loves watching the roulette ball spin but am also in a free roll situation to hit a 1 in 10 or so shot of starting a good discussion. This would be the way that I am looking at it in the moment. I would be happy to just watch the roulette ball spin for a while but hitting a decent thread is a delight. I would say it happens more in the general forum than my blog but whatever. It's uninteresting to defend myself against people who click on my blogs to disparage the blogs and myself but I still do it. There are a lot of hours in the day and I am currently not the most prudent with my time. I just got back from a 2 week vacation and am taking a day of rest on this Sunday. I spent most of the day reading which is one of the most worthwhile activities one can engage in. I just ate dinner and have to let my food digest before I can lay down and read some more.

Whatever Dude
À chacun son goût

Let's all go on a hike in the forest sometime.

There is no "i" in RiKD...oh wait...

I never said I wasn't self-centered. I could probably be out helping someone right now but I am here typing away. The other night I was feeling lonely, not apart of, less than in a loud bar. I left and ran into a homeless guy. All he wanted was about $7 for whatever reason. He didn't want food he had just eaten. I didn't have $7 and was just wondering how I could be helpful. He just wanted $7+. I asked if it was for drugs or alcohol. He didn't like that question. I realized I had overstepped some boundaries. I just wanted to be helpful. I was a bit down in the dumps and just wanted to be helpful and I ended up probably being a bit domineering towards a guy who doesn't need that shit.

I slept 15 hours last night. Maybe I needed it after a week of toddler interrupted sleep on blowup mattresses and foldout beds. Up until 2am or so and woken up by my nephews at 7am. I think cuddling in my comfortable bed with my cats beats applying for jobs. That is probably my mindset as well. I could also be trending towards depression. I am trending towards depression if I don't do something about it. I applied to two jobs today so far. That feels pretty good. I don't really know what my goals should be or what my overall strategy should look like. I had a therapist tell me one time to just make sure I apply to one a day. I don't know if that is too little. If one is good enough and I applied to two that feels pretty good. There is still tomorrow and the next day and the next. It gets harder as the week goes on.

good luck with the job hunt