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You make an excellent point.
Well, the biggest influence on my life would be someone no one actually knows. His name was Dave, and I worked with him at Jiffy Lube a few years ago (he since went back to school and got a better job). He was a HUGE influence on my life because he really opened my mind to a lot of things I would never think about. We would debate politics a lot, and I would lose every battle (basically, I thought I won some), and it opened my eyes to a new way of thinking. That's not to say I agree with everything he said, but he certainly pulled me out of my rigidity.
Recently there have been a lot of major influences that have really changed the way I view life, in general. The pick-up community has changed the way I view all social interactions. It changed my views about myself, too, and that's what's most important. I've been thinking about it a lot today, and yesterday for two reasons: 1) that guys and dolls video, and 2) my dad's friend offed himself today and he was kinda depressed, I have no idea what over, but that's not the point. I've been thinking that if more people were opened to the world I've been opened to, and have now embraced, their social and love lives could be so much greater than they are now. I'm not saying that I'm some sort of great pick-up artist/player/whatever you want to call it, what I'm saying is that it opened my eyes to the point that I realize that having a healthy social life is entirely within my grasp. It's up to ME, not other people. People are not the mean, hate-filled things that I used to think they were. The looks I get were not negative, and if they were, it was because of ME, not them. There are too many people in the community to name them all (that have influenced me), but if I had to point to one single source, it would be David DeAngelo's deep inner game (seriously, it's more about psychology than it is pick-up, and it's absolutely fascinating).
Those are probably the biggest influences I've had in my life up to this point, aside from the obvious one of my parents.
That's what I initially wrote. I could go on and on, that's really a rough summary of things.
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United States24814 Posts
and not just because he's muscular.
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It annoys me when people mix up "smart" and "smartass".
Bill Hicks was a smartass. He mixed unfiltered snark with fuzzy-headed mystical optimism.
This odd combination let him be viciously and relentlessly sarcastic without being utterly depressing, but it is still just a form of pandering to prejudice.
For the sake of concision, values are normally expressed in absolute terms, which should not be taken at face value. There is a tension between values which leads to superior judgement as their holder struggles to balance them. The superficial contradiction between formulaic absolute expressions of values does not have any bearing on the validity or practical applicability of those values. These contradictions should not be eliminated from our value systems, or the virtuous tension between values that guides us in making special consideration for complex circumstances would be lost. The contradictions give us flexibility within strong practical guidelines.
He made a career of being peevishly obtuse about the difference between forms of language used to express values, and the way language is used to make factual statements.
In the end, what he did was not much different from making puns: droll language misprocessing.
...which is why most people didn't like him, and his fans are mostly either social misfits who are constantly angry at the world's supposed hypocrisy, or superficial purveyors of snark like him.
An unfair attack on people's values can be an effective way of opening up their minds for something new, but after this guy tore a bleeding hole in his audience, all he had ready to pour in was hippy-dippy bullshit about how all we have to do is live and let live, and everything will turn out fine because the cosmos is a magical fantasyland of love and happiness, and the only thing wrong with it is human stupidity.
If you think he was funny, then go ahead and laugh. But if you think he was profound in a way that should guide your life, think harder.
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On March 21 2008 12:37 micronesia wrote: and not just because he's muscular.
SEIJURO HIKO
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On March 21 2008 11:54 LucidProphecy wrote:
victor martinez so beastly
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Kahlil Gibran and Milan Kundera.
Sure, there are his snappy quotes and rather intelligent observations on the world in referral to Gibran. Those are nice, and I'm sure many loved to prescribe to the all-encapsulating nature of them and his writings on the "unity of being". However, I was always fascinated by the growth of the movement and thoughts around him as much as his works himself. For someone who has always existed wondering if a fusion of mysticism and materialism and/or black and white is that tangible, his work was always very interesting.
He wrote The New Frontier generations before Kennedy's 1961 address after all and the whole body of his works had much more power than showmanship, after all.
As for Milan Kundera, he was the first writer I really intellectualized over who seeks to write each characters and even his entire body of as a fragment of his own personality and essentially as key characteristic segments of a greater thematic body of work. Hence, his material and in particular his views on intimacy has always had an aura I've found fascinating and something resonant with my everyday life.
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United States20667 Posts
Is this the part where I chime in with Reach and YellOw?
More seriously, I'd go with... well, let's go with literary influences.
1) Soren Kierkegaard. Especially The Sickness Unto Death. God that's such a good book.
2) Alexandre Dumas. OK, so his books are typical teenage male testosterone-filled fare, but that doesn't stop Le Comte de Monte-Cristo from being so damn amazing.
3) Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Love in the Time of Cholera operates on an incredible number of levels.
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Goku obviously.
vegeta! what does the scouter say about his power level?
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Russian Federation4235 Posts
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my dad, Friedrich Nietzsche, Thierry Henry, Baruch Spinoza, my grandpa
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noone. My parents arent really well rounded human beings, my teachers sucked. My friends are < me without false modesty.
I had noone to look up to. shit.
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Savior, my grandpa, and this quote, "So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear. Farewell remorse, all good to me is lost; evil, be thou my good."
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On March 21 2008 15:50 Last Romantic wrote:+ Show Spoiler +Is this the part where I chime in with Reach and YellOw?
More seriously, I'd go with... well, let's go with literary influences.
1) Soren Kierkegaard. Especially The Sickness Unto Death. God that's such a good book.
2) Alexandre Dumas. OK, so his books are typical teenage male testosterone-filled fare, but that doesn't stop Le Comte de Monte-Cristo from being so damn amazing.
3) Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Love in the Time of Cholera operates on an incredible number of levels.
Have you tried Albert Camus or Milan Kundera? I think you will like both
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On March 21 2008 23:05 distant_voice wrote:
Snorlax
ROFL
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EPT![[image loading]](http://www.uni.uiuc.edu/~ychiang/hiko.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/7817/441774381387toph1pk7.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://www.gransito.com/Immagini/Immagini%20Gallery/goku.jpg)
![[image loading]](http://ptwithchris.files.wordpress.com/2007/03/victor-martinez-winner-2007-arnold-classic.jpg)
