Hi again Vunil, glad you started this thread
I'll never have the pleasure of just surrendering to the wisdom of someone's words (without this little voice inside telling me to find out if what they are saying can be trusted, and if they can). When I meet religious people who have fundametalist views, it's like meeting space aliens to me. But part of me envies them their ability to give in to something like that.
Recently I’ve been wondering why I look for people to look up to, to learn from, to admire. And when I find people I think are interesting (like authors), I listen and read until I find something I disagree with – then – I want more. I’m deflated. I want answers! Now I’m beginning to accept that some of the answers lie in the differences: not ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ but ‘different’. And accepting the differences as interesting and okay. Maybe trusting myself more too?
They were always very confident about their opinions.
What is this thing we call ‘confidence’? Self-confident. Like they have the answers and we want to know? I’m not confident
in my terms because perhaps like you, I don’t think I ever have all the answers about anything. It’s always a fudge of some sorts (this person is a better bet for the country than the other, but none of them are really any good).
Confidence comes from having fixed ideas and beliefs about reality – which I think can be a very harmful way of being. God on our side and so on. And also, when unpleasant reality hits (like Vietnam) that self-confidence can be temporarily shattered. Isn’t it better to be continually ‘not sure’? Always learning?
I don’t know why society admires ‘confidence’. Is it because we’re all lost really? (Fundamentalist religion is a great way of not thinking about life’s uncertainties. A cop –out. It might be cosy, but it’s a cosy prison.)
No wonder it's tough for me to just settle in and believe things on first glance
I think this is a gift! A trait to be celebrated!
What does this conversation mean? Why am I here? What is motivating all of these weird interactions? Why do I feel so incredibly uncomfortable?
Yep, me too. It was horrible. It was destructive, life-draining. Crazy-making. Cue drink and drugs to escape.
(they were feeding themselves off of everything including me and that's why I didn't feel like I was there-- to them I wasn't! Not in a way apart from them. I was just food.)
big *sigh*, I’m sorry Vunil, it’s awful, I know. Like we just don’t exist as separate thinking beings.
I mean it's just human to expect something that looks kind of like normal interaction!
Yes! This is what an interaction looks like to us? Maybe it looks different to others. My mother likes to monologue at me. Maybe she likes monologues. And I guess if you do, that’s okay. But monologues don’t require two people, just one. And maybe a pet, or a photo to talk to.

Cruel perhaps, but true to me. (Is it better to be kind or honest? Honest for me, at the last analysis, tell me I'm dying, I want to know.)
Bunny:
IMO truth is more of a shared agreement about reality. And honesty is being open with one's knowledge or information.
I like that about truth. I might go further. I might agree that your internal truth is true to you (delusions, hallucinations) but it’s not true to me. But that doesn’t make it true or not true in external reality……like seeing religious visions…I’d love to subject those milk-crying statues to scientific study. But then science is very limited. So truth is too. Absolute truth? – we’re not equipped to know it, if it exists. We are made (constructed) to live with uncertainty (partly because we perceive uncertainty)….if we weren’t here to perceive uncertainty, would it exist?...ha ha…sorry… getting ‘up myself’. (The second-order religious conversion comes when we think: uncertainty is only in my head, therefore certainty must exist externally, therefore God exists….nonsense, dangerous stuff). Less seriously, I like to think of my truth vs your truth (both are valid).
but here's the crux of the matter-- why did I choose them? And did I sort of like competing with them and sometimes winning?
Maybe because you’re hopeful of finding some absolute truth? You want the answers? I think that’s okay, striving for answers. But with a little balance – taking time to
protect yourself against people who want to feed off you and also learning how to enjoy life as well, sod the truth kind of thing, just enjoy the colour of the sky without thinking about how it isn’t really, actually blue…
Hey and I want to say, maybe I sound entrenched in my views(?), and what I want of course, is disagreement, other opinions, more learning. It may not appear obvious so I’m saying it? Honesty also exists in saying this is my opinion now and I’m happy to hear other opinions and maybe change my mind…best, P