I never was a social smoker - I was only ever interested in marijuana medicinally, like so:

List of conditions for which I find cannabis helpful:

• Chronic pain and stiffness in back and neck, especially in the morning. Can't elongate spine.
• General stiffness in muscles and joints. Pain in knees and ankles from excess weight and injuries. Relaxes tissue enough to stretch and strengthen.
• Posture correction - enables me to stand straight for short periods of time without pain and retrain the weak muscles causing the pain.
• PMS cramps (severe)

MOOD

• Lifetime history (since puberty) of severe depression, periodically suicidal.
• Lifetime history of anxiety, social anxiety, autistic over-stimulation/melt-downs, hyper alertness, irritability, panic attacks, phobias, nervousness, and obsessiveness. Improves concentration and focus in some areas. Major improvements in functionality, motivation, and productivity.
• PMS - intense manic mood swings, hyper alertness, aggressiveness, and poor impulse control.
• Possible PTSD from childhood physical abuse, bullying, rape, and other interpersonal trauma.
• History of violence, rage, abuse, and assault.
• Cigarette cravings (smoked 17 years 1989-2006)

ENERGY

• Blood sugar (?) symptom suppression (weakness, exhaustion, dizziness, nausea)
• Obesity/weight control - helps with appetite suppression when I don't need to eat
• Chronic fatigue
• Lifetime chronic insomnia (trouble getting to sleep, not staying asleep)
• Decreased coordination/clumsiness/accidents/personal injury
• falling up/down stairs
• falling off bicycle, bus, curb, level ground
• walking into walls/posts/trees/corners/counters/furniture/pretty much anything
• increased burns and cuts in the kitchen
• "mystery bruises"

I used to keep a teensy tiny bit around in case of emergency. Thing is, I've since found that it works better (for me, anyway) as a steady supplement than as an on-the-spot medication. Some uses are immediate, yes - but others seem to have more of a cumulative, long term effect. Rather like any other "normal" medication or supplement, it works better if I have a steady trickle in my system at all times.

BDSM is a blanket acronym that includes diverse areas of interest such as Bondage & Discipline, Sadism & Masochism, Domination & Submission, and maybe something else that I can't quite remember. But at any rate, it covers a wide umbrella of activities and interests.

Confusion results when people from one group try to talk to people in other groups but they all use one term to mean many different things. Particularly, people seem to want to equate submission with masochism or bottoming, which it is not. In the interest of clearing up some of this confusion, I offer the following individual term definitions which I would love to see spread like herpes:

Topping and Bottoming describe the physical act or position.

Top = gives sensation, Bottom = receives sensation

Sadism and Masochism define what sort of sensation (pain).

Sadist = gives pain, Masochist = receives pain

Sex is another sort of sensation (pleasure).

Person on top = gives sex, Person on bottom = receives sex

Domination and Submission describe attitudes or roles.

Dominant = in charge, Submissive = supportive

Master and Slave denotes ownership.

Master = makes rules, Slave = obeys them

Dom/Sub and Master/Slave always involve power exchange - but Top/Bottom, SM, and sex by themselves do not. Neither do fetishes.

Power exchange is an attitude, not an act.

Acts do not equal attitudes.

Thank you for listening. This has been another free broadcast of the Sunshine SM Awareness System. Be sure to tip your BDSM provider on the way out the door and always remember that if it don't make your dick hard or your pussy wet - don't do it!

I decided to take advantage of the break between classes and start dating again.

One nice side effect I didn't expect is that I'd be making friends. Of course, it seems obvious, since I'm all about the whole "friends first" thing, but the unexpected part is that even the ones that get disqualified for whatever reason are actually people I enjoy talking to and hanging out with, even if the whole dating thing doesn't really work out.

And that's nice. It's good to make friends. I didn't realize how lonely I'd been until I started having these uncharacteristically long conversations with some of these fellows. I'm having a really good time.

In a sense, I rather approached this in a masculine manner - focused directly on the sex and less on the human being behind it. Now as I actually step forth, I'm finding myself delighted anew to discover the people.

Q. Does a Gender Double-Standard of Sexuality Still Exist? Discuss, based on your own experiences (direct or indirect), including in your own microculture. You can discuss this with friends or family if you wish.

My microculture with regards to sexuality has been a bit of a moving target, but I'd say that yes, it has pretty consistently displayed a double standard in which I wanted to act like a boy but was treated like a girl. I'm still kind of stuck in that zone. I deeply admire gay men's sexual freedom and hope to someday achieve that level of liberation myself, but I'm still having trouble getting past my internalized slut programming.

My nuclear family's microcultural expression of sexual variability was excessively traditional. My dad worked and my mom stayed at home with me. Super religious, they taught me that the human body was shameful and should always be covered up. I never saw my parents naked and I never looked at myself in a mirror naked until I was an adult. They never taught me anything about sex other than that it wasn't something I should be doing. Good girls don't. End of story.

In junior high, I discovered MTV and Madonna and started dressing provocatively. I quickly got a reputation around school for being a slut, even though I hadn't even kissed a boy yet. My parents started treating me differently, too. We got into more and more fights, even to the point where I started hitting back. When I did discover sex, there was no putting that cat back into the bag. They had lost control completely. And that's what it was all about. Control. Of me. Of my sexuality. I left home shortly thereafter.

The positive side of a sexual double standard is that one can use it to one's advantage at times. Being homeless as a young white female is not exactly a difficult proposition if one isn't too picky about the sort of offers for help one accepts. A blanket for sex isn't such an outrageous proposition on a cold night, nor is a place to stay in exchange for possible companionship. Except that women aren't actually allowed to sell the one thing that truly does belong to them â?? their bodies, which is probably the most obvious example of the double standard I can think of. Men buy sex, but women are punished for providing it. By men, or by the â??goodâ?? women at home - to keep alive the Madonna/whore duality?

I suppose ever since I busted out tits and had to reconcile myself to living in the world in a female body that I learned to take advantage of the double standard when and where I could. It's really the only currency an uneducated woman has, to use the tools of the enemy against them.

People never expected me to be smart. They saw hot, young, and available. I was pretty naïve, but I eventually always caught on when someone was trying to game me for sex. I'd let them play their hand then I'd find a way to maneuver out of the situation. I did a real good â??dumb blondeâ?? act, where I could just literally pretend to be too stupid to know they expected sex for all those drugs. Even though I kind of was, pretty much every time, too. For being smart, I sure was a slow learner.

Through my teens and twenties, I got more grief for my sexuality from women than anyone else. Because I have been sometimes accused of â??exudingâ?? sex, they obviously felt threatened that I would take their men. It seems like any woman that truly enjoys sex (and lets it show) automatically becomes a target for other women, perhaps merely in retaliation for breaking gender role.

In later years, it has been my experience that it is more men who are scared of women who are â??tooâ?? sexual. I guess it somehow threatens their masculinity along with challenging their gender role conceptions and need to prove themselves best and manly and all that. In fact, the only time I've ever had males consistently pursue me for sex is when I've been denying them just that. On the other hand, if I'm into it, their enthusiasm is much cooler. All of which makes me think maybe desire is more about what you can't have than what sort of genitalia you happen to have.

I don't have much time because I am seriously behind, but I couldn't resist sneaking in a comment on Kuhn. Been reading selections from his "Structure of Scientific Revolutions" and I keep getting distracted by how easily applicable it is to normal life. To hell with science, he's describing the way people learn and change, too.

Most especially I keep thinking of religion. Talk about being stuck in a paradigm. I know that I've been the recipient of a tremendous paradigm shift in recent years - one that came to me through a bizarre combination of science and "The Secret".

Kuhn's point is that as scientists learn new ways of looking at the world after a scientific revolution, or paradigm shift, they begin to see things differently in the world; so much so, in fact, that he says they could just as well be said to literally be working in a different world. It's a radical claim, and a poetic one, but I think he's got it right. Perception and belief do rather dramatically shape and limit the way we view and interact with the world, scientists or not. We simply cannot see that which we are not prepared to accept. Not in science, not in religion, not in life.

Today I am thankful for all my science and philosophy texts, professors, and long dead lecturers. The more I learn about this world, the better world it becomes to be in, both for me and all whom I affect. Viva la revolucion!

I quit believing in sin years before I quit believing in God.

Or so I thought. Apparently I still have my own internal concept of sin, one that has chosen this moment to resurface and apply itself to a whole new set of behaviors independent of traditional religious context. Morals don't require religion, I don't think. I'm pretty sure other people have use for them too, and that the monopoly of them by the church leadership has been entirely unnecessary.

What is this new sin I've discovered within my own behavior? I shit you not - the consumption of plastic. Not so much the consumption of plastic (since that would be a bit upsetting) as much as the wanton disposal of plastic. It tears at me every time I have to throw a perfectly usable container away because there are simply just too many of them, more than I'll ever be able to use. Ever. So I throw them out, but I feel guilty when I do it because tossing potentially useful items is the most senseless and wasteful thing I can think of.

I mean, really - what is trash?

All right, so you can obviously tell I'm back in the Philosophy department when I start debating the great meaning of debris, but seriously - think about it for a moment. Trash may be one of the most important concepts of modern humanity. Not only because we're running out of places to put it but also because it says something about our values.

A friend sent me an article the other day about all these container ships sitting idle off the coast of Malaysia. Capitalism is crumbling. People are pulling back, spending less money on stuff. And this is supposedly helping make the economy implode. But it's hard to cheer for the cure when it means adopting the entire value system of consumption and disposal (not to mention exploitation) that holds it all together. It's a pretty sad state of affairs when our economy is built on the purchase of stuff. "Disposable" stuff at that.

Let's take another look at that word, 'disposable'. That means we can throw it away, right? It was MADE to be thrown away. It's PURPOSE is to be thrown away. Allow me a moment to step back and just say, WTF? Where does it go? Where is this mythical 'away' that we speak of? Nothing in nature is made to be disposable, that I know of. I could be wrong, and I welcome you to correct me. But it seems that most everything has a natural lifespan, after which it reenters the cycle of life in another form by decomposing or transforming into something different, like dinner for something bigger.

Except for all this 'disposable' plastic trash. It just kind of sits there. Or floats there. Or hangs there, depending. And it never goes away. Nothing ever goes away. It's always here, in some form. Some more obvious than others. And it's no good for dinner because it's poison. But we eat it anyway because we're choking ourselves with it. It's everywhere and we can't get away from it. Not only do we store our food in it, but now it looks like it is getting into our food itself directly via ingestion.

Sometimes I think about the movie Waterworld (gee, if only I had a nickle for every time I'd started a sentence that way!) and picture a similar future; not one in which we're scavengers floating on endless oceans of blue water but rather on endless oceans of trash. Whole occupations and industries will spring up around the retrieval and creative recycling of our collective I-don't-give-a-fuck-it's-convenient-let's-toss-it-out-and-get-another-one madcap spending spree.



One of these days, someone is gonna have to clean up this mess. I wonder how they'll do it?

Waste - I propose it to be the 8th deadly sin. Frankly, I'm surprised the churches haven't jumped on this one already. It goes well with the traditional protestant work ethic and all those values emphasizing thrift and modesty. Waste not, want not. These ideals used to rank pretty high in this country. After the last Great Depression, that is. Funny how the more things change the more they stay the same.

Here's the thing that's literally keeping me up at night - I'm scared that I would resent my future children for having it so much better than I did. And I'm not a big enough person to not feel that way yet. Maybe that's where therapy could be helpful.

I don't like being this honest, but I know it would happen. Many parents feel this way, but I think I would feel it more than most. Already I feel resentment towards people like my boyfriend and my best friend, people who had parents who were educated and had money and food and clothes and opportunity and stuff. I love them both but sometimes the bitterness just eats me up inside. I know that it would be even worse with children, beings whom I was actively involved in doing everything I could for but that didn't appreciate it one fucking bit. The very prospect fills me with something like a queasy rage.

Ungrateful little brats. It's practically the definition of kids. "You kids don't know how good you have it." Every parent says this. Including mine. Worse, they mean it. My mom had it way bad, possibly even worse than I did. Her dad was an extremely abusive drunk. I'm sure she did the best she could and probably even did better than her parents did, but it still wasn't enough. They had no fucking business raising children.

Our kids would have a much better shot. There would be money and sanity and no cloud of religious hoodoo making everything a choice between going to hell and living in hell. The fields of psychology and child development have grown tremendously since and there are now lots of parenting resources available. We would want to do everything right, and we'd try. We'd do pretty good.

But the kids won't appreciate it. They'll take every last bit of privilege for granted. They'll be whiny, spoiled, lazy, and entitled. And that last one would drive me to consider infanticide. I'd want to show them what a hard life really was, what it really was for life to suck, to be abused. And that's not right.

People who've never gone through any serious hardship sometimes make my stomach sick. I have disgust and distrust for them. I know it's not their fault that their parents weren't fuck-ups, but this isn't rational. This is me feeling bitter and angry and hurt because it just isn't fair. I didn't do anything wrong to deserve the life I had and they didn't do anything right to deserve the life they had. It's just dumb, shitty luck.

Parents always want their children to have a better life than they did, but are seldom emotionally prepared to deal with how that will make them feel. Lots of parents are jealous of their kids. I don't want to be one of them.

It seems like my boyfriend has everything. If we had kids, we could give them everything. But I don't have everything. It's not mine to give. No one's ever given me everything. He's the first one to even come close. In a lot of ways, my friends have been better parents than my folks were. They're certainly more dependable.

See, I just don't have a place of happy wholeness to stand from. I really, really need to feel complete in my own life and happiness first so I'm not filled with this unreasonable hate and resentment towards people who haven't had to be as strong as me. I hate them. I really do. I've had to work so much harder, and for less. And they'll never know or understand.

This is why he and I will always have tension over political beliefs. To me, he's in the la la land of the rich where nothing ever goes wrong, people never go hungry, and people don't just die for no good reason or because they don't have enough money or medical care. Disputes aren't settled with violence, possessions are rarely in danger of being taken away, nor personal liberty and freedom. Things more or less seem to work, and people more or less seem to be good. That's a nice world to live in, if you can make it. But most of us don't have that luxury.

The world is different when you're ignorant and poor. It really, really is. Those who haven't experienced it just have no idea. And no matter how much I write or try to explain, they never will. It's like that guy on that post apocolyptic reality show, the one who'd been in prison. He had a completely different view on their reality, one that not only was more accurate in some ways, but one that also sabotaged him in many other important ways. He got that violence was right around the corner in a way that no one else did. But he also couldn't free himself from his violent patterns of behavior to engage in more civilized ways of communication.

We are products of our circumstances, to a large degree. I really resent mine, even as I do everything I can to rise above and overcome them. I don't want to resent my children. The only way I can see around it is to foster such an attitude of abundance and joy in my own life and situation that the attitude disappears. I need to have the best life I can so as to not begrudge others theirs. Generosity comes from a place of feeling full, meanness from scarcity. I need to stop feeling like I'm not good enough, that I don't have enough, that everything is going to be taken away, etc.

My current relationship gives me lots of security, stability, and comfort. That helps a lot. In a lot of ways I feel like a wild cat that's been taken indoors. I'm slowly gentling, getting domesticated, peeking my head out from under the bed when I think no one's around, and even daring to stretch out in a sunbeam once in awhile. Eventually I'll stop being skittish, once enough time has gone by that I figure out I'm not gonna get kicked.

With enough strength, love, and support; I think I can do anything. I'll be an incredible woman. But I obviously do still need to do some healing. I wonder what would it take to find a really great therapist who could help me get through some of this class rage and resentment; cuz it's looking like that might be kind of a big deal for me, maybe...

Currently examining the problem of induction in my philosophy of science class. Geek on.

Induction is loosely defined as the process of devising general principles from specific events. The problem of induction is that we never really know if things are going to continue working in the ways in which we have observed.

part I - Hempel

According to Hempel, the claim that â??all jalapeños are hotâ?? could and should be tested. Testing, however, does not guarantee conclusive establishment of the claim, even if the results are positive.

To test the proposition, let's say that:

If (H) all jalapeños are hot, then (i) my mouth will â??burnâ?? when I eat them.

So, I eat lots of jalapeños. My mouth burns every time. Can I therefore conclude that all jalapeños are hot? Not according to Hempel.

If (i) is true, it does not logically follow that (H) is therefore also true, only that (H) has not been proven false. On the other hand, if (i) is false, then we know with certainty that (H) is also false.

Just because every jalapeño I ate burned my mouth does not conclusively prove that all jalapeños are hot. It only proved that eating hot things burns my mouth.

Perhaps just those particular peppers were hot and my test cases were simply coincidence. Maybe it is all green colored peppers that are hot and if I were to find a red jalapeño perhaps it might not be hot. Perhaps it is only jalapeños of a certain size. Maybe baby jalapeños or dried jalapeños are not hot. Perhaps something in the soil or local growing conditions made these particular peppers hot. It could even be leftover chemicals from pesticides or fertilizers. Maybe my tongue was just particularly sensitive that day and the peppers weren't hot at all.

I can test for all these variables if and as I think of them and each positive test increases the possibility that my hypothesis that all jalapeños are hot might be correct. But it does not guarantee it.

Beyond all that, it may not even be the peppers themselves that are hot. Perhaps it is merely only the skin or even the seeds within the peppers. But merely eating peppers would not present that possibility to be tested, except were it to occur to the tester to separate out the flesh, the stem and the seeds and eat them each individually.

Testing of general hypotheses like these from individual experiment is helpful only in that if we were to find a jalapeño that was not hot, then our hypothesis would be proven incorrect with certainty. However, no matter how many hot jalapeños I find, I will never prove with certainty that all jalapeños are hot, although every test does increase the likelihood of that hypothesis being true. The only certainty found in this kind of testing is the negative case â?? it only takes one exception to prove the theory false whereas an infinity of positive results can never conclusively prove that the original hypothesis was correct, only that it hasn't been proven incorrect yet.

part II - Popper

Popper thinks that the problem of induction can never be resolved but that it isn't a problem for the scientific method because in his view, â??nothing resembling inductive logic appearsâ?? in the method he says science actually uses to arrive at its conclusions. What science actually does is put forth and test theories, and Popper proposes a deductive method of testing to accomplish exactly that without the use of induction.

In Popper's deductive method of testing, the scientist first puts up a hypothesis or tentative theory which he devises by whatever creative means strike his fancy. He then tests this theory in the following four ways. First, is the theory itself consistent internally? Do the conclusions relate to each other logically? Second, is the character of the theory scientifically substantial or merely clever wording? Does it propose to solve or discover any truth in the actual world or does it simply play on words? Third, how does it relate to other hypotheses or theories â?? does it fit in or contradict existing knowledge? Does it have the potential to further advance knowledge? Last, does the theory stand up to empirical (deductive) testing of its predictions?

Predictions (singular statements easily proved or disproved by experiment) should arise from the theory itself and predict results that either agree with or contradict the theory. Note that it only takes one contradiction to completely disprove the theory but that no amount of corroborating evidence can ever conclusively â??proveâ?? it or render it â??trueâ?? or even â??probableâ??, but merely â??corroboratedâ??. A theory long standing without being disproved can only be considered to have â??'proved its mettle'â?? by not being knocked down yet to date.

It bothers me that Popper decries the use of inductive theories yet in step three (comparison with other theories) of his deductive method of testing allows â??the help of other statements, previously acceptedâ?? to deduce predictions from new theories. In his view, that these previously accepted statements were at least partially drawn from induction matters little, because he does not believe them to be proven, merely corroborated. And, apparently, that's enough to go on since he only seeks to compare possible truths, not prove them.

It seems weak to me, though. His third and fourth steps seem very much like they involve induction to me, although he says they do not. But I don't see how he avoids the loop of apriorism if we assume other theories to be acceptable in order to compare and contrast them with the new one. How can we ever isolate variables to make new predictive statements without trusting the reliability of the theories we tend to think of as constants?

I suggest that the problem of induction is still present in Popper's method, as we can never build upon existing statements without making some pretty big assumptions about the validity of the same. We must accept induction to some degree, if even only as a starting point. He grants this point in hypothesis creation, but abandons it thereafter.

Induction never proves anything. It can't. Past results cannot guarantee future performance and all that rot. But it is useful nonetheless because without it we would be dead in the water without being able to at least tentatively base our predictions (and not just our hypothesis) upon past performance of those prior statements, â??previously acceptedâ??.

I always used to make jokes about testosterone poisoning. Now it seems I might have been on to something. This writer examines firsthand the effects of testosterone supplementation on his body and human behavior in general.

http://www.nytimes.com/library/magazine/home/20000402mag-testosterone.html

The central biological difference between adult men and women, then, is not that men have testosterone and women don't. It's that men produce much, much more of it than women do. An average woman has 40 to 60 nanograms of testosterone in a deciliter of blood plasma. An average man has 300 to 1,000 nanograms per deciliter...At conception, every embryo is female and unless hormonally altered will remain so. You need testosterone to turn a fetus with a Y chromosome into a real boy, to masculinize his brain and body.

Typical "male" behavior, in other words, corresponds to testosterone levels, whether exhibited by chromosomal males or females....testosterone is not synonymous with gender; in some species, it is the female who has most of it.

I always suspected I had a bit more testosterone than my womanly allotment. Now I can't help but wonder what would happen if I deliberately took more. I always did want to be a boy. It would be nice if I could take enough testosterone to grow a penis but I'm sure it's already about 30 years too late. I'd love to have more energy and confidence, even though I suspect I already have far too much "for a woman".

A 1997 study took testosterone samples from 125 men and 128 women and selected the 12 with the lowest levels of testosterone and the 15 with the highest. They gave them beepers, asked them to keep diaries and paged them 20 times over a four-day period to check on their actions, feelings, thoughts and whereabouts. The differences were striking. High-testosterone people "experienced more arousal and tension than those low in testosterone," according to the study. "They spent more time thinking, especially about concrete problems in the immediate present. They wanted to get things done and felt frustrated when they could not. They mentioned friends more than family or lovers."

I'd be willing to stake serious money that my baseline (it fluctuates) testosterone level is already on the higher end of the scale. My sex drive and passions are off the chart compared to most "normal" people. Don't even get me started on frustration about not being able to do things. Yikes.

...there is also physiological evidence of very early mental differences between the sexes, most of it to the advantage of girls. Ninety-five percent of all hyperactive kids are boys; four times as many boys are dyslexic and learning-disabled as girls. There is a greater distinction between the right and left brain among boys than girls, and worse linguistic skills. In general, boys are better at spatial and abstract tasks, girls at communication.The behavioral traits associated with testosterone are largely the cliché-ridden ones you might expect. The Big T correlates with energy, self-confidence, competitiveness, tenacity, strength and sexual drive.

Testosterone is clearly correlated in both men and women with psychological dominance, confident physicality and high self-esteem. In most combative, competitive environments, especially physical ones, the person with the most T wins. Put any two men in a room together and the one with more testosterone will tend to dominate the interaction.

It is also suspected that autism may be caused by excessive testosterone in the womb. I've always liked that theory. With the exception of sexual drive (in men), many of these testosterone traits listed above are also ones I've noticed and come to associate with adults on the autistic spectrum, particularly the tenacity bit. Especially the tenacity bit. I also see lots of energy, strength, confidence, and competitiveness in areas of personal competencies. Not so much in areas perceived to be weaker, like social ability and cooperation.

A modest solution might be to give more women access to testosterone to improve their sex drives, aggression and risk affinity and to help redress their disadvantages in those areas as compared with men. This is already done for severely depressed women, or women with hormonal imbalances, or those lacking an adequate sex drive, especially after menopause. Why not for women who simply want to rev up their will to power?

[caption id="" align="aligncenter" width="400" caption="a year on testosterone"][/caption]

I love how he used the phrase "will to power". A few semesters ago it hit me very strongly while a teacher was speaking about Nietzsche that his will to power was nothing more than testosterone, and my professor couldn't disagree. Since then, I've also had a very strong tendency to associate Nietzsche's Superman with the high functioning autistic who forges his own path because he has no other choice. An accidental "superman", there is no place ready for him in the world because the world doesn't know what to do with him. Rather, he must rise above the status quo and make a new world and a new place, one that makes sense to him and follows a certain internal logical consistency. It is the obstinate success of being right, of "knowing" that one's own way is the best, and disposing of all that tries to get in the way.

https://www.msu.edu/user/bradle45/nietzsche.htm

The superman is someone who in discovering himself (306) also discovers that it is in his best interests to reject any outside notions about values, trusting rather what he finds within himself. He creates his own good and evil, based on that which helps him to succeed or fail. In this way good is something which helps one to realize his potential and evil is whatever hampers or stands in the way of this effort. Since to Nietzsche everything in the world, including good and evil, is transitory (228) everything is being continually reinvented. The superman embraces this idea of change which to him appears evident, he understands the fact that since there is nothing in the world which is permanent whatever exists must eventually be overcome by something else which comes along. Seeing himself and his values in the same light he knows that these aspects must also be overcome by something stronger if not by him than by someone or something else. So in order to keep up with the times he continuously reinvents himself over and over always building something stronger, more powerful, on top of what went before. The superman therefore is the ideal of someone who has mastered the practice of overcoming himself.

The source of his strength lies in the cherishing of the same natural desires restricted in Christianity. Sex for him is, "a great invigoration of the heart", the lust to rule a "gift giving virtue" (in that it allows new ideas and life to ascend to those "pure and lonely self-sufficient heights" which "should not remain lonely and self sufficient eternally"), and selfishness is "blessed, wholesome [and] healthy" (301-302). He sees these insatiable desires as the best of all possible good since they act as the driving force behind his insatiable need to overcome, they spur him on always seeking their ever demanding satisfaction.

It is from the example of the superman that we are intended to see how much is actually attainable in the world. The values he creates he continually tests himself always refining them to be better and better still. In this way they rise above the values of the masses (the weaker, the unwise) until they arrive at the top and being superior to any other they serve as the guidelines for the rest of society. They remain on top until another superior system of values comes along and usurps it. In this way a society is created which, by allowing the stronger to prevail, promotes strength. Nietzsche deems this a healthy society as it always strives to heighten its potential and is founded upon the attributes of the healthiest individual who exists. It is a macroscopic version of the same sort of overcoming which occurs in the superman and is labeled healthy because weakness is discouraged in favor of a medium in which strength and superiority are pushed to the level of utmost importance.

Testosterone. Autism. Gender.Choice. Power. Potential.What does it all mean? Am I strong, passionate, willful, aggressive and risk-taking because I have excess testosterone or because I'm autistic? Are these bad qualities? Do I want more of them or less? I don't want to be more feminine, but at this point I've gotten used to being a woman and nurturing my passive, pretty, perky personality. Maybe I do want to be more masculine. I like those traits in me. They don't get me dates, but they make me feel alive. And I like that. A lot.

Got testosterone?

So here's the thing. I'm totally okay with talking about fucking guys in the ass and fantasizing about sliding my big rubber dick in and out of their horny little brown holes. I love the idea of watching big burly guys get bent over by chicks with dicks, other guys, or really anyone else and cheering them along madly as they bounce and buck and get soundly fucked. Yeah.

But I really don't want to be the one wielding the implements of his ass destruction. I don't want to wiggle my fingers in, or my mouth, or my cock. And it's not just guys; I don't even really want to play with girl butts, either, even though they somehow seem cuter and cleaner in my admittedly biased and irrational opinion.

I get that people like it. I get that it feels good and is really hot and taboo. I like it, too. God, do I like it. I love, love, Love, LOVE having my butt licked, fingered, and fucked. But at the end of the day, the truth of it is that licking, fingering & fucking other people's butts doesn't do much for me. Try as I might, I just can't seem to summon up any enthusiasm for backdoor exploration. And I've tried. Lord, have I tried.

The theory doesn't bother me. As mentioned above, I can talk about it for hours. I'll be the most supportive woman in the world about your need to be anally reamed, right up to the point where I'm expected to help. Then it's like my sex drive completely turns off.

Part of me wonders if it's just simple squeamishness. After all, I have similar issues with oral sex and kissing. Giving head used to squick me out something fierce and I still haven't managed to entirely embrace cunnilingus. Rimming isn't exactly at the top of my to-do list, either. It doesn't help that I bite my nails into bloody snarled stubs. That gives me all sorts of issues about where I put my fingers.

A lot of it depends upon partner, I'm sure. I tend to only engage in oral with people I'm way head over heels in love/lust with. It just often feels too intimate for anything else. Rimming is even more so. You can guaranfuckintee that if I've got my tongue stuck up someone's butt that 1) they've recently had a shower and 2) that I'd practically sell my soul for a chance to get closer to them.

I haven't had successful girl on boy butt sex yet with someone I love and respect. I've had a couple failures that fit that category, and a couple successes with people I couldn't give a shit about. Thing is, I'm not sure I can overcome my strong revulsion to the particular gender role reversal implicit in this activity enough to get past it with someone I love and still continue to respect them in the morning.

It didn't work with my ex husband. I lost several degrees of respect for him after I encouraged him to express his butt toy loving side and he oh so enthusiastically did. Sure, it was cool with me that he liked putting my little pink vibrator in his happy pink pucker place, but something about him writhing around with it sticking out of his big round tush begging me to fuck him with it still manages to bring me to to kind of an unhappy looking to escape place. That's not what I signed up for. I'm not sure exactly what I thought would happen. All I know is that I wanted him to be free to explore his fantasies without judgment. And then I couldn't deal with it when he did.

Damn it, maybe I'm just selfish. I want to be the one writhing on the bed begging to be fucked. Maybe I'm jealous. Maybe that's what all this is about. Maybe that's what it's always about. Maybe I just resent the living fucking hell out of all these guys who are so entranced with their new found sensuality that they completely ignore mine.

I admit it, I want to be the center of attention. I want to be the happy slutty party toy with every happy hole filled and fucked. Just like everyone else does. Maybe if I ever let my inner slut out all the way again, it will free me up to help others with theirs. I find it hard to be giving when operating from a position of perceived scarcity. Or maybe I just don't like butts.

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Just the other day, one of my co-workers remarked,"For someone of your size, you sure can eat a lot." It took me a minute to figure out what she meant by "someone of my size". At first I was prepped to hear it as "for such a big girl", just like I'd been hearing for years how flexible I was "for a fat chick". Then I realized she meant that I didn't look like a fat girl at all, but that I sure did eat like one. Ouch.

Well, she's got me there. I've been eating like a pig this summer, and it shows. Not only have I gained over ten pounds, but it seems like my waist has swollen to twice its size. Europe didn't help. We ate out twice per day every day for three and a half weeks. We were staying in hotels and walking around a lot, so leftovers weren't really practical. Therefore, I practiced my plate polishing skills, the art of which I'd long since perfected as a kid with seemingly "hollow" legs. 'Cept when I hit puberty, when the darn things filled up and started spreading to my hips and boobs and butt and belly and everywhere else.

Even though I've never walked so damn much in my life, I didn't lose a single pound or inch in Europe. Instead, it was everything I could do to not gain more than 5 pounds. Everything would have been okay had I gone right back to my normal routine when I got back, except that then my beloved went in for eye surgery. As was prearranged, I stayed home to take care of him for the following two weeks. That's when it really got bad.

Once more with the two meals a day. Home cooked. With love. Lots of love. And butter. And bacon. And bread. Plus I was sort of trying to impress him, just a little bit, and mostly at first. I never get to cook for him. This was my big chance. He's also got a hearty appetite and specifically requested meat. So I made sure to deliver, as best I could. This wouldn't have been so bad if not for the way I was plating things.

Since his eyesight was impaired, I was literally making plates instead of doing more of a "serve yourself" buffet style service. Since the fridge was much fuller than usual, I was also doing everything I could to avoid leftovers. But I wanted to make sure he was full and that there was a good, attractive variety of food available at each meal. Anyone see where this is going?

Yeah, so picture some really big plates of food, much like we'd been splurging on in Europe. Lots of meat. Lots of bread. Lots of everything. Not only that, but I was making the portions more or less exactly equal. Which would be fine in theory if not for the fact that he outweighs me by about 50 pounds and a good foot in height. You'll notice that he didn't put on any weight this summer. Not a single pound. In fact, I think he even lost weight.

Excuses, excuses, excuses. The truth is, I was stressed. A lot. When I get stressed, sometimes I eat to cope. Especially if the things I normally do to cope aren't available, like weed and sex and stuff. It's not like I don't know I'm doing this. I can even feel the frantic desperation, the futile defeat, the hope and a prayer and willful ignorance that I'm gonna have to pay for this later. And I am.

It ain't so bad as all that, though. I finally have some time to myself and have cleared my schedule so that I can take the time to readjust my appetite through a series of mini switchel fasts. Once upon a time, I used to fast for 24 hours once a week but I find that for appetite reduction it works just as well to liquid fast daily through the morning and into the late afternoon, then eat sensibly after that. Already my appetite is going down, my waistline is disappearing, and I've lost a couple pounds.

More importantly, I feel lots better. For one, I don't hate myself and feel that lurking sense of shame at being out of control of my feeding urge. For another, it's about that time of month again. Not for the first time, I notice the connection between how much I eat and how heavy my flow is, or isn't. Not eating delays and lightens menstruation and cramps. Binge eating increases both, especially when I've already been eating heavily throughout the month.

Overeating just makes me feel heavier and lethargic, a cycle which just gets worse and worse the longer it goes on. Whereas intentional caloric deprivation literally makes me feel lighter, in not just a physical but spiritual way. I feel good. I feel optimistic. Vibrant. Healthy. Happy.

They say that the only proven method of life extension is dramatic calorie reduction. I find that not hard to believe at all. It seems like all this digestion stuff really does take a bit of work for the body to process, work that leaves the remaining systems sluggish and lethargic. At the end of the day, I don't think it's so much what you eat as it is how much you eat. At least as far as weight control goes. For general good health, it's important to eat nutritious wholesome food versus all those toxic corporate "foodstuffs" manufactured with profit vs health in mind.

All that said, I really hate dieting. I can't diet. I won't diet. Oddly enough, I don't consider these fasting episodes of mine to be dieting at all. I don't really look at them as detoxing, either. Instead, I look at it as just another tool - a mechanism I can use to remodulate my appetite and eating habits. It's not that I'm denying myself food, but that I'm intentionally fasting right now. It's its own thing, an experience in the now. Very zen. If I think about eating, I can easily ignore temptation by telling myself that "Oh yeah, I'm not eating right now. Maybe later." Then I drink some more switchel and the urge goes away. Pot helps, too.

Loving this blog post from Steve Pavlina on How Selfish Are You?

Like all his work, it's a good thought provoking read. This bit especially rings true, and expresses something I've been trying to sum up myself for quite some time - years, in fact:

The greediest thing I do for myself is to work on my own personal growth ... The most service oriented work I do is to help others grow. If I can give someone a perspective shift or teach them a new skill, it has the potential to change them for life.

...I realized that there would be tremendous synergy between working on my own growth (greed) and helping others to grow (service). The more I work on my own growth, the greater my capacity for service. And the greater my service, the more it feeds back into my own growth.

He concludes that growth and service, instead of being diametrically opposed, are ultimately the same thing. By growing, we enhance our ability to serve others. In serving others, we grow.

For several years, my main focus has indeed been my own personal growth. Sometimes I feel selfish for this. Lots of times I get the "but what are you going to do with your life" look or speech. I try to explain it as best I can but it always sounds like a trite military recruitment ad: "I want to be the best I can be, and help others to do the same."

Doesn't sound like much, does it? But it's important. It's really important. Not just to me, but to you, too. Sure, I could remain stuck in my self hating miserable existence and make sure you all hear about it on a regular basis. Or I could do something about it by making small, positive, and consistent life changes. And hey, if I can do something about it, anyone can.

The better person I become, the better I can help those around me. I'm not really seeing the downside here. I'm not out to change the world, just to inspire it. One bitter,depressed, angry, lonely person at a time. Cuz that's what I relate to, yo...

Life doesn't have to suck. Practical advice & happiness coaching: tsunshinelove.com/talk/coach

Currently reading a beautifully brilliant essay on 10 reasons why you should never have a religion by Steve Pavlina. I'm quickly growing to be a big fan of his site and writing in general. In this piece, he doesn't attack any one religion in particular but rather questions the effects having one at all has upon one's growth and spiritual development.

Having been raised with more than my fair share of faith and the belief that religion is the single most important thing in life, I find his logic enlightening, comforting, and liberating all at once.

It's a bit long, but the whole thing really is well worth reading from beginning to end if you have the time.

Meanwhile, I've extracted my very favorite bits for your quickie thoughtful pleasure:

1. Spirituality for dummies.

Religion is the off-switch of the human mind.

Classic. Blunt. Beautiful. Couldn't have said it better myself. One could almost wonder if this use of religion is intentional, but Steve doesn't leave anything to wonder but continues on to spell it out in starkest detail.

I especially love section #3, quoted here almost in its entirety:

3. Engineered obedience training.

Religions are authoritarian hierarchies designed to dominate your free will. Theyâ??re power structures that aim to convince you to give away your power for the benefit of those who enjoy dominating people. When you subscribe to a religion, you enroll in a mindless minion training program. Religions donâ??t market themselves as such, but this is essentially how they operate.

Religions are very effective at turning human beings into sheep. Theyâ??re among the most powerful instruments of social conditioning. They operate by eroding your trust in your own intellect, gradually convincing you to put your trust into some external entity, such as a deity, prominent figure, or great book. Of course these instruments are usually controlled by those who administrate the minion training program, but they donâ??t have to be. Simply by convincing you to give your power away to something outside yourself, religion will condition you to be weaker, more docile, and easier to control. Religions actively promote this weakening process as if it were beneficial, commonly branding it with the word faith. What theyâ??re actually promoting is submission.

Religions strive to fill your head with so much nonsense that your only recourse is to bow your head in submission, often quite literally. Get used to spending a lot of time on your knees because acts of submission such as bowing and kneeling are frequently incorporated into religious practice. Canine obedience training uses similar tactics. Now say, â??Yes, Master.â??

Have you ever wondered why religious teachings are invariably mysterious, confusing, and internally incongruent? This is no accident by the way â?? itâ??s quite intentional.

By putting forth confusing and internally conflicting information, your logical mind (i.e. your neocortex) is overwhelmed. You try in vain to integrate such contradictory beliefs, but it canâ??t be done. The net effect is that your logical mind disengages because it canâ??t find a pattern of core truth beneath all the nonsense, so without the help of your neocortex, you devolve to a more primitive (i.e. limbic) mode of thinking. Youâ??re taught that this faith-based approach is a more spiritual and conscious way to live, but in reality itâ??s precisely the opposite. Getting you to distrust your own cerebral cortex actually makes you dumber and easier to manipulate and control. Karl Marx was right when he said, â??Religion is the opiate of the people.â??

I'm not sure if I buy that this is intentional, but there definitely does seem to be a point of no return on puzzling out certain religious inconsistencies and improbabilities.

6. Incest is best.

Religions frequently promote inbred social networks. Youâ??re encouraged to spend more time with people who share the same belief system while disengaging from those with incompatible beliefs.

This us-vs-them prejudice is totally incongruent with conscious living. Itâ??s also downright moronic from a global perspective. But it remains a favored practice of those who pull the strings. When youâ??re taught to distrust other human beings, fear gets a foothold in your consciousness, and you become much easier to control.

When you join a religion, your fellow mind-slaves will help to keep you in line, socially rewarding your continued obedience while punishing your disloyalty. Why do they do this? Itâ??s what theyâ??ve been conditioned to do. Tell your religious friends that youâ??re abandoning their religion because you want to think for yourself for a while, and watch the sparks fly. Suddenly youâ??ve gone from best friend to evil demon. Thereâ??s no greater threat to religious people than to profess your desire to think for yourself.

My dear mother can apparently overlook any and all non conformist behaviors of mine right up until this one. She deeply, deeply wants me to believe in her God. So does my father, for that matter. And I can't. I can believe in what I tend to think of as the philosophical equivalent to God, but it ain't quite the same thing. And they really, really want me to believe in the same thing.

Stalemate.

8. Inherited falsehood.

Even the central figures in major religions didnâ??t follow the religions that were spawned in their names. If they didnâ??t swallow the prevailing â??wisdomâ?? about gods and spiritual leaders and such, why should you? If you want to be more like the people you worship, then follow their lead by striking out on your own.

I always wondered why more people didn't notice this. I think it goes back to point #3 in that trying to make sense of it just shuts down the logical portion of the brain in helpless defeat.

9. Compassion in chains.

When you externalize compassion into a set of rules and laws, what youâ??re left with isnâ??t compassion at all. True compassion is a matter of conscious choice, and that requires the absence of force-backed rules and laws.

The more religious a person becomes, the less compassionate s/he is. The illusion of compassion substitutes for the real thing. Religious people tend to be the most bigoted and non-accepting people on earth. Theyâ??re the least trustworthy and suffer from the grossest character defects. They pretend theyâ??re doing good, but theyâ??re really collaborators in a system designed to push people into unconscious slavery to a â??higherâ?? authority. They are slaves promoting slavery.

Historically speaking, religious people loved to fight each other. Instead of unconditional love, they practice conditional loyalty. The only unconditional aspect is their thirst for blood. If you disagree with them, youâ??re a targetâ?¦ either for conversion or destruction (both of which are really the same thing).

If you value the ideal of unconditional love, you wonâ??t find it in the practice of religion. Real compassion doesnâ??t arise from believing in God, from practicing various rituals, or from studying the concept of karma. Compassion can only result from conscious choice, and this requires the freedom to choose without the threat of punishment or the promise of reward. If youâ??re obedient to your faith, itâ??s a safe bet that compassion is absent from your life. You probably donâ??t even know what real compassion feels like.

I never could quite put my finger on this one. I'm glad to see it spelled out so concisely. I always thought the problem was money, but instead it's self righteous justification based upon isolationist dogma.

10. Faith is fear.

Religion is the systematic marketing of fear.

Religion will teach you to fear being different, to fear standing up for yourself, and to fear being an independent thinker. It will erode your self-trust by explaining why youâ??re unable to successfully manage life on your own terms: You are unworthy. Youâ??re a sinner. Youâ??re unclean. You belong to a lesser caste. Of course the solution is always the same â?? submit to the will of an external authority. Give away your power. Live in fear for the rest of your life, and hope it will all turn out okay in the end.

Those were the highlights. Enjoy the entire article here:

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2008/05/10-reasons-you-should-never-have-a-religion

Also reading some of his other articles, billed as self help for smart people or some such:

How to Stop Complaining

10 Reasons You Should Never Get a Job

It annoys me that some drugs are illegal and others aren't. Many of the drugs which are now illegal didn't use to be. They used to give cocaine to teething babies, for fuck's sake. Many of the drugs that are now legal probably ought not to be, especially the ones with side effects worse than the condition they're supposedly treating.

What is the purpose of drugs? The only allowable purpose in this society seems to be for medicine. Getting high doesn't seem to be an acceptable reason to take drugs, although it's certainly a popular one.

But what if your medicine gets you high? Well, that's okay then.

Kind of like the whole kinky sex thing - "normally, I wouldn't do such a thing, but he tied me up and tickled me and then I couldn't control myself and then I had an orgasm in spite of myself". Uh huh. See, in this culture we can do pretty much anything we want, just as long as it doesn't bring pleasure. That brings out the Pleasure Police. If pleasure is an unintended side effect of something constructive, then we can sneak it in. As long as we didn't intentionally seek it out. Because that would be wrong. Kind of like sex.

That's probably why rape fantasies are so popular, as they absolve us of taking responsibility for our own sexual cravings, desire, and release. We can have all the crazy wanton sex we want and then blame it on someone else, ourselves remaining pure and blameless as the driven snow.

Kind of like Rush Limbaugh (or Michael Jackson, or Elvis, or really any pop culture icon that fell afoul of the pharmaceutical path). He wasn't taking drugs. Those were medications. Blame it on the doctor. He didn't know better. None of us ever know better. None of us are capable of using restraint or moderation or self control. We have to cede those things to an outside authority, some all knowing guru who's been to the right schools and been paid by the right pharmaceutical company. And if that authority somehow fails us, there's always the nice folks at the local rehab clinic who will be more than happy to relieve us of all that icky self determination and control.

I suppose the thing that irritates me the most about Mr. Would-you-like-to-fuck-me? is the very question itself.

Enter cluebat. Swing hard.

No, I don't want to fuck you. I don't particularly want to fuck anybody. I want to get fucked.

See, there's two types of people in this world; fuckers and fuckees. Fuckers like to fuck, fuckees like to get fucked. I'm definitely a fuckee.

In gay sex, they call this topping and bottoming, respectively. Fuckers top, fuckees bottom. It's like the natural order of the universe or something. And there's nothing to say that one can't switch and do the other, because sexuality does tend to be fluid, but often there is a clear preference. Mine is extremely clear. I want to be fucked.

That means me on the bottom, you on top. You give, I receive. You pitch, I catch. You move, I moan. Get the point, or should I go on?

When a guy asks me if I want to fuck him, the first thing I think of is that he wants to be fucked in the ass. That would be me fucking him, right? Now in the case of this last fellow, I'm sure he just wants to lay back and have me ride and service his cock like some giggly demented cowgirl. Oh fucking yay. Joy and jazz and all that bullshit.

Again, be still my beating heart.

Nay. No. Nada. Not a chance in hell. One more time for the folks in the back of the room.

I want to be fucked. Me.

Me, me, me, me, me!

Me.

Fuck me.

All my life I've been attracting guys that think because I'm a confident, determined woman that I should be the dominant woman of their dreams, which apparently means that I should be on top. Well, fuck you, your lazy horny ass, and the horse you rode in on. But do it with somebody else's dick, because I just ain't interested. I've been fucking other people for far too long, and it ain't what gets my pussy wet. I need to restore some balance to my personal universe. More dick, please - and make it a double.

It's been in the news lately that women respond to being wanted, to being the object of desire. I can't speak for all women, but this certainly does ring true for me. I want to be wanted. I want to be desired, taken, consumed, and devoured. Obviously lots of guys want that too, and they all look to me to find it. Keep looking buddy - because the first rule here is, once again, me first. Unhappy woman equals no sex drive. No sex drive equals no cookie for you. Not that I don't give out cookies, but my fridge had damn well better be full first. And it ain't.

The balance in my force is way disturbed. I live, play, and work in the kink world. This makes me even more of a target for bottom cravers. Even more loathsome is when they masquerade under the name of "dom". Oh fucking please.

I'm beginning to doubt that any man is ever anything I would consider to be dominant. The general trend tends to be for women to be in control of sex, no matter the surface dynamic. Take me, for example. I'm not particularly into being "dominant", but I want to be fucked the way I want it when I want it. And I prefer to be on the bottom while doing so, with my face in the pillows and my ass in the air.

Is the man who fucks me the way I like to be fucked being dominant because he's on top or submissive because he's giving me what I want? The simple answer is "Who the fuck cares?" as long as he does it, and does it good.

Back to Mr. Real's approach above. "Do you want to fuck me?" is a ludicrous question. What am I, some kind of sex crazed man-eating predator who is so indiscriminate that she needs to harvest new dick from anonymous internet wankers? I think not.

On the other hand, what if his initial query had been something like "I want to fuck you"?

Still crude, still unsolicited, but yet it includes something vital that his actual communication did not.

Interest. In me.

Me, me, me, me, me.

Me.

See the trend?

Fuck me.