messy room & messy mind

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Me: I’m sorry that you’re upset, friend. Do you need anything from me right now?

Child: …No I just wanted to tell you I’m sad. :(

Me: Okay, friend. Thank you for sharing.

Child: …I really like it here though. :( Everyone is really nice. :( I’m just sad right now. :(

Me: I’m glad you think so. I like it here too.

Child: I’m gonna just sit by you for right now though. :(

Taking time to validate kids’ feelings, even if they’re “silly”

Making a safe space for kids to express themselves, even if they’re expressing criticism

I took the cargo ops class at school but my teacher explained that it doesn't give a certification and I'd only be okay for ship's crane and the school forklifts. she said I could take an online exam and get my cert. I paid 60 bucks.

I'm googling and I'm seeing a lot of resources saying that the online programs cover the classroom part of the exam but not the in person practical aspect.

29 CFR 1910.178 (l)(2)(ii)

OpenAI scraped the entire web. All of which had been a labor of love from humans. Wikipedia is the backbone of a lot of LLMs, and that was volunteer human labor. They stole it and now they're selling it back to us.

You pass by a small crowd of hungry children, and decide you’d rather 455 apples go rotten than give them to some snotty brat who isn’t your problem.

It doesn’t matter how hard you’ve worked for your 500 apples, or that you aren’t the parent of any of those kids. in the moment you decide to walk away, it doesn’t matter why they’re hungry, or who owes who what.

You had the opportunity to help people, you had the ability to help people, you had the resources to help people. You had everything you needed to make a small, tiny little difference in someone’s life, and you decided not to.

If you go without it you feel unwell in a way that you never usually feel unwell. Sweating, tired, sleepy, headaches, irritable, depressed, etc. For example when I was in opium withdrawal I got incredibly depressed in a way that I’ve never been before or since. When you quit caffeine you might get super bad headaches even if you never usually get any headaches.

Thoughts of it regularly bother you and the thoughts go away once you’ve taken it but only temporarily. Unlike with a food craving which usually stays away once you’ve satisfied it or distracted yourself from it.

You find yourself rationalizing with yourself why you should break your own rules about how much you can take and how often. For example you might only let yourself drink alcohol every four days but start thinking that three days is actually close enough to four days, right? Especially if this happens regularly.

You’re using it so often that you feel the need to lie about how much you use because other people might think it’s concerning

If the substance or activity is nearby it’s genuinely difficult to not consume it or participate in it in a way that’s really frustrating.

You feel bad when you’re not on it and your brain tells you “if you just take the thing you wouldn’t feel this way”

You can only feel “whole” or “normal” when you’re on a substance even though it’s a recreational drug

if you see any of the signs listed above, you are likely still in the window of "i should reign this in", and it is very likely that if you decide to do so in this moment, you will succeed.

most people in active addiction don't figure it out until they are deep enough into it that the psychological aspect becomes too powerful, especially because they don't know how to recognize these signs. if education were more well-rounded, a lot less people would end up stuck in addiction because you genuinely can take control if you realize you've gone too far early enough.

my basic tenet is, if i start showing signs of addiction, i quit for six months. no matter what it is. six months is enough time to get through the detox, it's enough time to start putting my head into the right space and look at the situation less subjectively, and it's enough time to build a new ruleset if i decide to go back to using. this has worked for me multiple times, with several different substances.

however, if you find yourself in a cycle of doing this regularly, you're likely past the point of being able to regain control. nicotine has its grip in me because i let myself slip and stopped stopping when i saw it get unhealthy.