sprigatito_bread

joined 3 months ago
 

Being a really emotional guy is wonderful! I love how much joy I can find in the smallest things. I adore how much warmth and goodwill I feel towards people I barely even know. And it warms my heart knowing that I strongly wish to spread love and joy, be there for friends in need, and offer gentle, compassionate support. My whole being yearns to connect deeply with others and show them great affection through my words and actions.

I was put on this planet to be a sweetheart, gosh dang it! That's just who I am, and I'm not going anywhere!

I didn't always feel that way, though...

I grew up in an abusive household, and I was taught by everyone around me, at home and at school, that being emotional was a terrible thing. I was bullied because it was so easy to make me cry. Boys weren't supposed to be emotional, they would tell me. Eventually, I believed them. I hated myself for years, convinced that I didn't belong in this world and nobody would ever like me. Believing that social interactions were harmful and would erode my identity, I retreated into perpetual isolation. I only spoke when necessary and kept interactions impersonal and distant.

But it only took the kindness and compassion of one person to change my life.

As much as I tried to hide who I was, people could still kind of tell. One day at work, I made a silly, harmless mistake, and my coworkers all laughed. As I became flustered and apologized, one of them, who was a couple of years older than me, emphatically said, "Oh my god, you're adorable, you know that?"

In the moment, I was utterly confused, having just received a compliment that fundamentally clashed with my idea of masculinity. I couldn't stop thinking about it. Did someone actually like my soft side? Was that possible? The next day, I mustered just enough courage to talk to her about it. And I mean JUST enough courage. I was so nervous and shaky that I could barely speak, which drew immediate concern from her as I practically choked out the words explaining my plight.

She affectionately reiterated my adorableness, describing me as a sweetheart who lots of people would really like if I opened up more. I was in disbelief, citing the fact that I have often heard the exact opposite regarding those who break male gender norms. "Don't listen to those people," she said. "They are miserable and will only drag you down with them." At the end of our little impromptu therapy session, she added, "By the way, is anyone here telling you this? If so, tell me who they are so I can kick their ass." She was wonderful.

After being burned countless times, it was hard to accept that anyone truly liked me as a person. But my curiosity kept me coming back to her, because I had to know if I was wrong. She became something of a mentor to me, and every time I confided in her, she would say or do something genuinely helpful that nudged me in the right direction. I was filled with doubts and cognitive distortions, but she never once lost patience with me, gently redirecting me each time they showed.

"I promise there are people, like me, who genuinely like you and enjoy talking to you!" She wrote in a text message. "I think once you learn to let go of your worries, you'll learn just how awesome you really are and how much people will want to be your friend."

Blinded by my desperate attempts to cling onto my old belief system, I didn't immediately internalize her message. This was in part because I couldn't be friends with her in a conventional, reciprocal sense due to how emotionally unstable I was. In a message explaining the purity of her intentions and the joy she felt in helping me, she affectionately wrote, "You're like a little brother to me." While this is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me, it also gently implied that I wasn't an equal friend, which complicated my feelings at the time.

But while she wasn't the kind of friend I wanted at the time, she was exactly the kind of friend I needed. She single-handedly dismantled the foundation of my self-hatred and provided irrefutable evidence that I had been lying to myself the whole time. She went so far above and beyond that I could no longer explain her actions with anything other than genuine care. With my core harmful beliefs severely compromised, it was inevitable that the sophisticated mental construct that tormented me for years would finally collapse.

I feel so lucky to have met my coworker, and I am forever grateful for the irreplaceable role she played in my life. Although I was far from healed, she was the one who gave me the tools I needed to take myself the rest of the way there. And for that, she is my hero. While I may never get the chance to properly thank her, I wish to follow in her footsteps and use kindness to change lives in her honor, just as she did for me.

Now that I'm a bit older, I know that the takeaway from this story isn't all sunshine and rainbows. I wasn't completely delusional; there was a very understandable reason for me to develop the insecurities that I did—people who hate soft guys are everywhere. Traditional male expectations are deeply ingrained throughout much of society. But what's critical is that she provided concrete proof that not everyone believes in them and I have the agency to choose who to surround myself with.

The truth is that there are no rules. The social landscape is a decentralized web of connections where no single authority dictates what is or isn't acceptable. The people you're with and the contexts you're in influence the subjective sense of what's normal, common, and acceptable. Is it weird to wear a Spider-Man costume? Well, it depends. At your local coffee shop? Probably. At a comic book convention? Probably not. Are the majority of people geeky introverts? Generally, no, but at your local book club? Quite possibly!

And that's where the power lies—you can rig the odds in your favor by being intentional about which social settings you choose to engage with. This way, you can more easily find people you vibe with and who will love you for who you are. And because of that, there is great hope.

Each one of us has millions of people out there who would hate our guts if they knew us. But we also have millions of people who would sincerely care for us and cheer for our happiness and well-being. I don't know about you, but I'm going to be focusing my efforts on finding people from the latter camp.

I know for sure that I've found at least one!

[–] sprigatito_bread 13 points 3 months ago* (last edited 3 months ago) (1 children)

Thanks! (I feel so dumb now lol)

Definitely wouldn't be the first time I immediately jumped to scripting instead of finding an easier way to do something!

 

Recently, I've been trying to find ways to manage my time better. The biggest problem is that I would get stuck in YouTube binge-watching sessions that I couldn't pry myself away from. I would constantly be looking for the next thing to click on that was just interesting enough to keep my attention.

As I became more and more disillusioned with my situation, I began to realize just how severe the problem had become. I spent most of my free time just watching videos. Not socializing, not making anything cool, not learning any new hobbies. Just YouTube. Was this the life I really wanted? How many of those videos do I even remember anyway? Oh god. Thousands of hours of my life are being lost forever... I HAVE to stop this. How?

Analyzing my behavior quickly revealed the culprit — YouTube video recommendations keep tempting me with content that I never planned on watching. My eyes would always be drawn to the wall of titles and thumbnails for me to click on next, and that kept me in a vicious cycle. Click on a mildly entertaining video, look for another mildly entertaining recommended video, click. Rinse and repeat.

What if instead of doing that, I threw it all out and only chose a select few really good channels to watch? Oh wait, that's called the subscription feed!

I went through all of the channels I subscribed to over the years. Disturbingly, I found that I didn't actually care about most of them. It was cheap, mass-produced content to make the creator lots of money, and it was just barely entertaining enough to keep my attention.

I removed 95% of my subscriptions and kept only the best channels. These were often beautifully presented, thought-provoking STEM content, which prioritized quality over quantity. Now, instead of a binge of 30 videos, my subscription feed for the day had... just three. That's it. After those three videos, I would be done for the day.

There was only one thing left to do now — delete the recommendations.

I wrote a hacky script that simply removed the recommended video column and end screen, and finally, I added the YouTube homepage in a webpage blocking plugin so I only looked at the subscription feed. Just like that, I had fixed YouTube. There were no more distracting recommendations. The choice of what to watch was back in my hands.

It only took 20 minutes before I grew completely bored and wanted to do something else. But that's not a bug; it's a feature. That sense of boredom is there to push me to do something meaningful with my life — make something, pick up a new hobby, or meet people. The fact that I felt it so strongly meant that my plan was working. All of those things I always wanted to do... now I can actually do them. As long as I never allow endless scroll feeds and recommendation algorithms to rule my life again. But knowing the damage they've done to me, I never want to go back.

Because to be free, I ultimately need to make the Internet boring again.

What about you? Do you have measures to prevent the Internet from taking away all of your free time?

[–] sprigatito_bread 3 points 3 months ago

Haha, yep! Sure sounds like it!

I'm guessing that there are many, many people who like reversed roles but suppress that desire because of social stigma.

I had to fight through so much insecurity and confusion to get to this point. I was raised in a deeply conservative environment and harassed by family and classmates for being emotional. As a young teenager, I had to seek outside information (via the Internet) without anyone knowing to free myself from the echo chamber and develop a progressive belief system.

It took many years of deprogramming, self-reflection, and meeting some truly wonderful people to become confident in who I am. I feel like I got lucky and escaped a cult, and I feel a sense of sadness for all of the people who are still trapped within.

I think if the world continues to become more progressive, we'll see a lot more people openly expressing their true romantic desires and attracting wonderful partners who they absolutely adore.

A world filled with cute happy couples of all kinds is a world I want to live in.

[–] sprigatito_bread 18 points 3 months ago

I fucking love this thank you so much

 
 

Credit: @NachozArts

[–] sprigatito_bread 9 points 3 months ago

Definitely. I didn't want to make the post too long, but during my daydreaming phase, I began to shift my thinking towards practical concerns. I concluded that being overly idealistic is a hazard; being open-minded and willing to compromise is key. It actually makes me feel warm and fuzzy to think about how relationships are inherently imperfect because we are inherently flawed, but we can still find a way to make them work anyway. I want to compromise for my partner because I would love her so much and want to be a wonderful boyfriend for her. I think making the relationship work is a very beautiful thing.

Ultimately, the fantasy I described is just one data point. I think there are more types of potential partners for me than the one I described. My goal is to minimize the number of preferences I have while still defining a distribution of people I'd be excited to have as a partner because that casts a wide net. For example, I don't think my future partner giving me cute nicknames is a hard requirement. It's just nice to think about.

It's lovely to hear about your relationship! I'm happy for you and your husband!

[–] sprigatito_bread 8 points 3 months ago

For me personally, I determined that it was in my best interest to be open-minded to maximize the number of potential partners.

I'm not going to go down the path of defining a million traits that my future partner should have because nobody in the world will match all of them. Instead, my goal is to minimize the number of preferences I have, while still being excited about a relationship with someone within the distribution defined by those preferences. So, for example, I don't care what hobbies my partner has as long as we can make the relationship work. If we share hobbies, great! But if we don't, that's fine too. We can find other things to do together.

Even the fantasy I mentioned is likely not the full story, just a data point. I'm likely to be more flexible. There is probably no label that perfectly describes what I want my relationships to look like. While labels can help me find like-minded people, I also shouldn't let them limit my thinking.

Also, I avoid thinking about aggregate numbers, e.g. "What percentage of people have these traits?" and instead think "Which settings and contexts maximize my odds of meeting someone like this?" It helps me recognize that I have agency to shift the odds in my favor and this isn't a complete lottery.

 

Hi! I (21M) recently developed a lot of tender feelings towards the idea of a particular kind of relationship lately.

For many years, I knew that I was heterosexual, but I never felt any romantic spark that made me want to actually pursue a relationship. Eventually, I assumed that I wasn't interested, but a part of me always wondered if I was wrong.

One day, I got bored and tried to imagine a hypothetical relationship that would feel wonderful and natural for me, irrespective of societal norms. After hours of roleplaying hypothetical scenarios and writing down what made my heart the most happy, I finally settled upon a coherent vision for a theoretical partner.

She'd be really sweet and loving, but the twist is that she'd often take lead over me. She'd be on the confident and assertive side and would totally break my brain. She would often initiate affection unexpectedly, and I'd get all flustered and totally melt for her. She would adore my softness instead of expecting me to suppress it. She would call me cute nicknames like "Cupcake" or "Pumpkin", and I would feel very comfortable and safe with her.

This blew my mind because it went against everything I thought hetero relationships were. And yet, I responded so strongly to it. I began searching to see if anyone else felt this way and I found "role reversal," a term referring to the inversion of traditional heterosexual relationship dynamics. I found a role reversal community and it had the most adorable art I've ever seen and perfectly encapsulated what I wanted. (Some of this content can be found on Lemmy at [email protected]. I love this post in particular. Honestly, I'm thinking of reviving it and posting content there myself!)

A day later, I woke up with constant euphoria and a nonstop firehose of vivid romantic fantasies. It lasted all day, every day. For 10 days straight. My feelings were so intense that I barely ate anything and only slept for 3-4 hours a night without getting tired.

Those fantasies not only showed me how wonderful a relationship would feel, but also that I myself would want to be very affectionate and adaptive to my partner's needs, not just my own. I was enamored with the idea of being the sweetest, most loving boyfriend I could be for her. It wasn't long before I wanted a relationship like this more than anything else.

In retrospect, perhaps it's unsurprising that my ideal relationship would be nontraditional. After all, I have spent my whole life fighting masculine gender expectations. I'm super outwardly emotional, I love to make people happy, I'm very gentle, I love adorable things, and I make myself look cute, nerdy, and non-threatening. I loved it when some of my female friends called me adorable and gave me cute nicknames, and I was full of admiration and gratitude when one of them physically protected me.

I feel like the phenomenon of role-reversed relationships is likely more common than the actual usage of the term. But perhaps I'm still a bit of a unicorn. So, what do you think? Have you seen relationships like this in the wild? Have you known about these dynamics, or are they unfamiliar to you? I'd like to know your thoughts!