There’s a book series called The Hammer and the Cross about an English bastard child of a noblewoman that resulted from her being taken by a Viking raid and later escaping back to her home. Then the Vikings invade to avenge the death of Ragnar (his 4 sons are each powerful Viking Jarls).
The way it handled the two religions clashing, where each was powerful based on how many followers they had, along with it being the first time I’d seen where Christianity isn’t presented as the Underlying Truth but was just another thing. I realized that it was a metaphor for how religion actually worked. If enough people believe in something, it gains power. Christianity won through politics and warfare, not through truth. There wasn’t anything special separating Christianity from other former religions we largely now refer to as myth other than the one Empire that united most of Europe declared it to be the truth and people were slaughtered until they went along with it.
That’s when I stopped being a Catholic that just hated going to church and was an atheist at first, then later settled into agnosticism since who knows what’s going on beyond what we can directly detect with our senses and tools.
If enough people believe in something, it gains power. Christianity won through politics and warfare, not through truth.
These two sentences conflict with one another.
To make them match you’d either have to change the first sentence to:
If a thing gains enough power, people believe in it.
Or you’d have to change the second sentence to:
Christianity won politics and warfare, through being believable.
The correct pronunciation of “trilogy”
Lol this hits home, I was saying “triOlogy” for years before I actually slowed down to read the word letter-for-letter
I can learn everything I need to know about how to be a decent person from cartoons.
Cartoons have always shown me that being a friendly person, who is honest, do right by their friends and tries to do the right thing will guide me well through life. I needed to weed through the friends a little bit but that has held true thus far
I grew up watching Looney toons, and they taught me to be an asshole.
I did once try to drop my largest book on my dad’s head from as high up as I could get, my logic being that since it wasn’t an anvil, which was clearly artistic license, he’d probably be fine.
Bluey teaches me how to be a good dad
Rag doll!
After my nerve damage: there are some mistakes you can only make once.
Also: Life has no rewind button and shit can go south pretty fast.
Similar experience. Got in a bad accident when I was 15, entirely my own doing. That’s when I learned that some mistakes and their injuries are permanent.
If you put in the work upfront it will make the back half easier. If you slack on the front end you’ll need to sprint to the finish.
Mainly came to this conclusion in school with academics, but started applying it to everything. It’s not perfect—you can absolutely work hard and still not get the results because of forces of nature (or oppressive systems). But in general I’ve found it’s a good rule to live by.
There is no god and adults are assholes.
This
Actually as a kid I realized that what I was taught in the bible and church were metaphors and not things to be taken literally. I mean, a lot of it went against what we learned in school, and school actually made sense.
Only much later in my teens did I realize that many Christians do take the Bible literally. It was then that I decided to completely abandon my religion.
I have never understood the metaphor argument. When I was a believer I believed it all literally. If this stuff is a metaphor then what it is a metaphor for? Also if it is a metaphor how come (especially in the prophets) the Bible spends so much time listing metaphors and then explaining them? How come when the Bible self-references it treats itself literally?
Adam and Eve were the literal truth to Paul and he used it to create his theology of original sin.
Same, as a little kid I had no idea the adults actually BELIEVED what they were telling us, it just seemed like stories. I was so confused when I found out they believed it was all real. Then again when as a pre-teen I found out they thought homosexuality was against the rules - love? They thought love was wrong? I had gone to church for so long and that idea had never crossed my mind.
I remember having my first same-sex crush when I was around 11 years old. Unfortunately around 10-11 was also when I started to learn that “gay” was a slur and a shameful thing, and a bit later that it was a sin too. I would fall into deep self hate and internalised homophobia for the following 10 years…
I’m straight as a board, and it was the earlyish 1980s so a more backwards time but I still found it utterly shocking. I remember it so clearly. It was a youth group evening and they were talking about sex, when they started talking about homosexuality I absolutely anticipated they were going to talk about the issue of hate towards gay people, so when they went in the other direction I was floored.
Don’t apologize unless you actually mean it. Saying sorry when you didn’t really mean it, or you did the same thing again only devalues any future apology until it means nothing to the people you care about.
When I was a kid I heard people talking about how kids learn better than adults.
So I realized that the “way a kid’s brain works” is probably correlated with “the way it feels to be conscious as a kid” so I used my autistic super-memory to save a snapshot of the feeling of consciousness itself.
Then I instructed my brain to keep track of that, and never lose it.
Now I’m in my 40s, and I can still learn like a little kid.
Say what you mean; mean what you say.
No idea where I heard or read it, but preteen me internalized it and it’s become part of my creed to this day
Whatever the decision is, make it so you don’t have regrets about it.
Stay true to yourself and do what’s right for you and nobody else.
No one is gonna stick up for you and what’s right, you gotta do that yourself
You gotta be that squeaky wheel
Be the grease
…and if someone does, it’s because there’s something in it for them. They don’t do it for you.
Something always happens.
That nobody is a “grown up” and that everyone is faking it.
We’re all just kids having kids.
Yes, and now, anytime I’m trying to get to know someone better, I’m strategizing as to what childish/dirty joke or well placed cuss word will break through the “fake wall” and allow me to really know this person.
You should try an initiation ceremony. It could help you feel like an adult.
Walking
Looking forward to hitting the trails when it warms up :)
In school, I happened to notice exactly when some random topic went from “uh, I guess I kinda understand this” to having it actually “click”. That clued me off to the difference between e.g. knowing a bunch of shitty formulae, and actually understanding the topic to the point where you can actually use it for problem solving. Also, that all the teaching and books I received revolved 100% around the former.
I had that moment when learning to code. I had like 98% or what I needed to know. Then one day I came across some random SO post, learned something that I really should have learned a while ago (the difference between static classes and instantiated classes, yes really) and then everything just fell into place and I realised I could actually write proper code now. It was a fun moment :)
For me it was variables. I know it’s as basic as you can get here. But when I figured out that I could store data in a little box to get later I was like “oh, I can do anything with this”
Also, that all the teaching and books I received revolved 100% around the former.
This is true, because understanding comes from practice. The teacher and the books can never create that click of understanding. Only the student’s side of the effort can do that.
