Who are the happiest residents in SL?

But if you can choose to give up your plans to lose weight, then nobody is forcing you to lose weight. Force implies a lack of choice. If you are using your personal trainer or weight loss coach or whomever as a tool to help keep you on track - someone to hold you accountable - then that's a really great way to lose weight, but it still doesn't imply force.

If you said, "I choose to give up my plans to lose weight" and your trainer pointed a gun at you and then tied you to a chair and force fed you Slimfast and steamed vegetables until you lost weight, then you would be forced, but it's not what you chose - you chose to abandon the weight loss plan. As long as you can back out, you are not being forced.

I wonder if we aren't just arguing semantics here.

Here's some of how I look at things.

Last Friday, after wrapping up a week of boring work in a boring cublcle, tping boring papers and mailing other boring papers, I logged in and started to put together a garden. I built brick walls and topped them with concrete, all made of the finest prims I could rez. I put together literally hundreds of flowers for the beds.

Fighting asset server troubles, login failures, and a sim that was inaccessible for several hours due to the good old "expired_region_handoff," I laid out flower after flower. I worked on it. I was up to the wee hours, long past bedtime, particularly after it became clear that I had the wrong script from the scripter, and would have to go, piece by piece, through 1300 separate flower prims and replace them, click 1300 separate flower prims to activate the script, then take 1300 separate flower prims into my inventory one by one. This was almost my entire Sunday, and much of my Saturday night, too -- even with a small crew helping me.

But at the end of the night, I was able to sit back with friends, rezz a kool ade pitcher, and relax in a cool garden. I was able to show it off to friend and inworld family.

This is what it looked like, while I worked on it:
http://sluniverse.com/pics/pic.aspx?id=269325

Ya, that makes me happy, In spote of all the system troubles, in spite of all the trouble, at the end of the day, I have someting beautiful that I can (viurtually) point to and say "I made this."

That's a good feeling. It's not what one gets in some cubicle, I can tell ya!

Mari

A little more food for thought from a Buddhist...

I disagree BTW, that free will is a myth. Yes, we humans often don't live up to our aspirations, but then some do. In Buddhism, there is a positive good associated with forming higher aspirations, whether or not our aspiration becomes real in our life. Aspiring to be different than I am, often leads me change, even when the result is not exactly as I aspired.

At the same time, one of my favorite chants "the Five Rememberances" closes with "My actions are my only true belongings. There is no escape from the consequences of my actions. They are the ground upon which I stand."

Happiness, for me, is grounded in this balance of aspiration and action. No, I will never be all I aspire to be. My actions are all, and yet not all. I aspire, and in the aspiration, my actions become more..

Allegria

Now Trout rated!

Some act so overly happy and filled with joy with their brother man it's just nauseating to see.

This is always the argument, you are sooo desperate to cling to your belief that human belief can't be paradoxical that you claim to know what people are thinking better than those people do. Yet many people do continue to eat unhealthily while intending to lose weight, and they have rationalisations for this ("I'll start my diet tomorrow".



And there I disagree. If you offered them a minder who would physically preventing them from eating fatty food, they would accept it and would be happy after having been so prevented and having lost weight. That clearly shows the intention remains.

No. He is using force to deny me the choice of going ahead and eating badly while believing I'll start dieting tomorrow. If I state clearly my intention to abandon the whole plan, then he'll let me go ahead, but I don't have that intention. The force removes only my "choice" to make a self-destructive mistake, and that is a choice I am happy to do without.

I like you too. \(^_^)/

they enjoy the people and the connections... don't stress with the inevitable 'bleeding edge' concerns like outages and server downtime... how would you experience these connections WITHOUT sl?

personally, i've met amazing people and many lovely women with shining souls... amazing connections.... fallen in love... so sweet... had my heart broken... had it healed... astounding...

this is an astounding place...

LOL

/me gives Ricardo a big huggy and skips away.

Those who just sold their land and are about to leave for good?

I need to introduce you to the kid that walked up to me and peed on my leg.. and then asked me to adopt him. Sounds like you and him would be a perfect match. *grins*

.d

that's beautiful Mari! and i know what you mean.

I'm so happy here I make myself a little nauseous .

both could be the result of too much OTC cold medicine, tho.

Me, for one. And Cunundrum knows why

Being satisfied with one's real life is just a failure of imagination.

Yes, same here. I don't take SL to seriously. For me it's just a game. I'm not here for relationships or making money, just for fun. And I'm happy and enjoying the game.