There are some decent comments here overall with stuff I bet would help you. But it sounds to me like you have lost the appreciation and rewards from life and the world around you. I would wonder if you have undiagnosed anxiety.

This isn’t going to sound great probably, but the problem isn’t the world around you, it’s just you. The good news, ‘you’ is the only part of this you can fix. The rest, totally outside of your control.

You need to retrain your brain. Slow down to appreciate the smaller things. Even the tiniest things. Read up on the raisin technique. I think raisins are kind of dumb, but apply it to everyday things. Go slow. Examine. Savor. Eat slowly. And with each bite think of the process that got that very thing into your mouth. From growing the ingredients, raising, milking, whatever. The process and storage, maybe inspection, transporting it to the store, you buying it and cooking it. The skill it took to do that and the history of you cooking to get there. It’s an awful lot packed into each bite. Do that with as many bites as you can. Be mindful. Repeat it. You don’t need a different thought every time. Just keep thinking it through. And apply that to more things throughout your day as you’re able to. It’s not an overnight process but it’s much faster than you might think to regain the value, passion for things. Do this people as well. Forgo the NPC thoughts, and delve in. How they got to be who they are. Ask questions over time and build a mental roadmap.

That’s pretty much it. I could have easily written your post word for word a decade ago. With therapy and general learning, fighting anhedonia was a process. And still is. But I do appreciate things and I look forward to things. I often look forward the most to me not being me tomorrow but a slightly better version of me.

Huey Lewis and No Noise…

I’m going to special hell, I know.

$6.50/dozen for the regular eggs. Surprisingly, only $10/dozen for free range 18pack. This is in Idaho at Albertsons (not the cheapest but not a high end grocery store)

I have proximity unlock and my car is parked (at home) just close enough to my catch-all tray where I store my keys to constantly lock and unlock. It usually teeters on lock/unlock so closely that a person walking between the two will trigger it. So, to prevent a dead battery or stolen car, I keep my fob in a faraday bag.

I’ve seen it twice. In two people who are prone and had some mental instability issues. I am almost certain a mentally healthy person would never have any kind of an issue.

I’m not a doctor or scientist, but here is what I saw and what I believe happened.

Their mental health decline caused them to increase their intake by a decent amount. I think untreated, they would have had the same outcome in less than a year. But the weed sped things up a great deal. What should have taken months happened in just a couple/few weeks. One of them ended up standing on top of a police SUV downtown after giving away pretty much everything he had to homeless people. Including his wallet with his ID, social security card and debit/credit cards. It was the safest and quickest way to get him help so it ended up being a good thing. I tried everything I could in the days before that. Delusions of grandeur, constant tinfoil hat shit, thought he was being directly targeted by the government alphabet agencies because of what he knew.

They’re both fine now. But I do believe the increased potency in modern weed negates many previous studies on the effects it can have. I’m not against it in the least. But definitely more wary.

California is on fire. Enjoy your avocados while you can (admittedly, the fire I don’t think is near any avocado farms, but we’ll see)

Timberborn. 4,677 hours. I enjoy my beavers.

You absolutely can. You can send the US military directly in to finish the job. Or private military contractors. Or stop giving what aid is currently being sent. What doctors are currently there. It can and will get worse with direct involvement.

He doesn’t have to. He doesn’t have to do much. Though since he now has unfettered opportunity, I think he will. The groundwork is laid for theocrats to run everything down to the dark confines of the womb.

Holy hell. 5:30am nose licks come really early. It’s only an hour but it’s an important hour.

I’ve been doing the same. Koolada and extra sweetener are just the bane of my existence. I wonder if there’s an e-juice community on Lemmy… I should check.

I don’t think your information is quite right here. A nice (nice as in kind of the best that I’m aware of) pod style vape is about $30. A bigger box mod is under $60 for the ones I like from Vaporesso or Voopoo. Juice is let’s say liberally, $40/mo (120ml). I have been handing down vape mods for almost a dozen years. My buddy vapes a lot and he’s been using my hand-me-down vape for two years and it was 5 years old when I gave it to him. I only buy new because they get a little worn and I like the shiny screen and buttons. Absolutely all still usable. Best I can tell, disposables are about $10 for 3-4 days (according my partner who is annoyingly using disposables for “convenience”). You can get a nice mod and juice every month for the price of disposables from the real world numbers I’m seeing.

In the US, you’re lucky if you get paid for the hours you work. And many don’t get all of their hours paid.

No but it was competing with Digg and Slashdot until Digg screwed the pooch. It’s been a while, but reddit really owes its size and popularity to Digg 2.0 and the fiasco of bad decisions driven by investors.

I can’t figure out the objection to this either. I see it as a huge step forward for tinkering and tinkerers.

Same here.

She was probably a bit overzealous I’m thinking, yeah. But that is a thankless job with low pay and little success. I give social workers a ton of latitude. I’m glad you stayed calm in the face of things.

Oh yeah, I totally get the lifestyle. Done enough overloading to really appreciate the lifestyle. But I’m trying to explain things from their point of view. Even if now, you are in control and everything is going according to your plans, they see trouble in months if not years when those plans abruptly change. They know how most people got from point A to point B and are now sleeping in shelters or dark corners of “civilization”.

Living in an SUV is often the first step to really needing their help. Housing insecurity is a quick road to pretty rough living. If you are in their system, in their eyes, they can actually act quickly and help you when the likely next step happens. Not being in the system is pretty slow to get help in most places.

You’re right. I guess it just feels like painting a bursting dam to me. And the shootings are weighing heavier on me. I’m glad we’re doing something positive. It’s just hard to appreciate when my mental image of a school is fear and tragedy. It’s probably a me thing