• Rethinking the "NPC" Label:
  • In modern culture and gaming slang, being an "NPC" (non-player character) is usually treated as an insult denoting a lack of autonomy, merely existing as a background extra in someone else's narrative.
  • The author reframes this concept positively as an antidote to "main character syndrome" and the pervasive pressure to be exceptional, visible, and extraordinary.
• Rejecting Toxic Productivity and Ambition:
  • The essay challenges the cultural compulsion to constantly optimize, pursue side hustles, or prove one's worth through unrelenting career ambition.
  • It advocates for clocking out and doing nothing after work if one chooses, or pursuing interests purely out of curiosity rather than obligation or personal branding.
• Finding Joy in the Ordinary:
  • Living an "NPC life" is presented as choosing contentment, peace, and routine over performance and external validation.
  • The author acknowledges that this perspective is essentially a contemporary framing of ancient philosophical ideas like Stoicism, which emphasize living quietly and focusing on what is within one's control.

Hacker News Discussion

• Parallels to Ancient Philosophy:
  • Many readers drew direct parallels to Eastern philosophy, highlighting Zhuangzi's Taoist fable about preferring to be a live turtle dragging its tail in the mud rather than an honored dead relic in a royal temple.
  • Commenters also debated philosophical nuances, noting that the piece mirrors Epicureanism (seeking simple pleasures and a peaceful private life) and Stoicism more than passive apathy.
• Escapism vs. Authentic Living:
  • Skeptics argued that romanticizing an "NPC life" borders on escapism or low stress tolerance, warning that entirely avoiding duty, challenge, or human responsibility can breed depression.
  • Defenders countered that the article is not about neglecting life or family, but rather shedding artificial corporate expectations, LinkedIn "hustle" culture, and performative overachievement.
• The Reality of Responsibilities and Chores:
  • A central debate emerged around daily adult maintenance: some pointed out that adult life and family inherently involve endless tasks and chores.
  • Others argued that many modern chores (such as obsessing over manicured lawns or pristine car exteriors) are merely performative habits done to satisfy societal judgment, which one can happily discard.
• Cultural and Artistic Counterparts:
  • Several commenters recommended art and media that explore similar themes, notably Wim Wenders' film Perfect Days (celebrating a Tokyo toilet cleaner's quiet, meaningful routine), Pixar's Soul, and the Talking Heads song Heaven.

• The author dispels the cliché that "renting is throwing money away" by outlining the substantial hidden expenses tied to homeownership.
• Settlement and mortgage loan fees can be incredibly steep; the author shares a personal breakdown from 2011 totaling $12,777.92 in upfront loan-associated closing costs.
• Initial mortgage payments are heavily weighted toward interest rather than principal; the author notes that less than 21% of their first $2,329.92 monthly payment went toward reducing loan debt, meaning roughly $1,847.28 was pure unrecoverable expense.
• Ongoing structural expenses like homeowners insurance and property taxes consistently increase year-over-year, and Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) adds an extra burden if a buyer cannot supply a 20% down payment.
• Maintaining a home requires significant capital; general wisdom dictates saving 1% of the home's value annually, but neglected or aging properties often demand major unexpected expenditures for roofs, windows, siding, and plumbing.
• Utility costs are inherently higher due to larger square footage, and local electricity rates can skyrocket drastically—the author notes a 42% spike over just two years due to rising grid demands from regional AI data centers.
• Transactional costs when selling a property can drain up to 10% of its overall value through commissions, county excise taxes, and title fees, which can result in net financial losses if a home is not held long-term.
• Ultimately, buying a home should be viewed as a quality-of-life and lifestyle decision (offering more space and privacy) rather than a guaranteed financial win.

Hacker News Discussion

• The Time and Labor Burden: The most upvoted commentary emphasized that homeownership is primarily a massive time investment; managing regular maintenance, researching reliable contractors, and executing DIY projects frequently consumes entire weekends.
• The Handyman Dilemma: Users debated the viability of hiring a jack-of-all-trades handyman versus licensed professionals. While a versatile handyman is highly efficient, commenters noted they are increasingly rare and legally restricted due to modern, stringent trade licensing regulations.
• DIY Risk vs. Contractor Rates: Commenters discussed how high contractor fees push everyday homeowners to attempt dangerous electrical or plumbing work themselves, which often leads to poorly executed "landlord-style" quick fixes and hidden structural defects for future buyers.
• Vetting through Referrals: A segment of the community discussed how to source dependable labor, debating whether to rely on real estate agent recommendations (which some warned can be plagued by biased kickbacks) or trusted neighborhood word-of-mouth networks.

Failure of venous insufficiency ulcerations to heal is most often due to inconsistent use of first-line treatment methods. Ongoing control of edema is essential to prevent recurrent ulceration; the use of compression stockings following ulcer healing is critical, with recurrence rates 2–20 times higher if compression stockings are not used

Watching this now, I am reminded that I really want to read more. To become erudite.

Perhaps useful for later too, when I have the income.

Potentially useful for later? If I can overcome my fear of needles

Ultrahuman has some interesting other gadgets for optimizing one's health and life. Worth looking into later when I live on my own and have enough income.

https://www.youngw.ca/

for - paper

paper - title: Carbon Consumption Patterns of Emerging Middle Class - year: 2020 - authors: Never et al.

summary - This is an important paper that shows the pathological and powerful impact of the consumer story to produce a continuous stream of consumers demanding a high carbon lifestyle - By defining success in terms of having more stuff and more luxurious stuff, it sets the class transition up for higher carbon consumption - The story is socially conditioned into every class, ensuring a constant stream of high carbon emitters. - It provides the motivation to - escape poverty into the lower middle class - escape the lower middle class into the middle class - escape the middle class into the middle-upper class - escape the middle-upper class into the upper class - With each transition, average carbon emissions rise - Unless we change this fundamental story that measures success by higher and higher levels of material consumption, along with their respectively higher carbon footprint, we will not be able to stay within planetary boundaries in any adequate measure - The famous Oxfam graphs that show that - 10% of the wealthiest citizens are responsible for 50% of all emissions - 1% of the wealthiest citizens are responsible for 16% of all emissions, equivalent to the bottom 66% of emissions - but it does not point out that the consumer story will continue to create this stratification distribution

from - search - google - research which classes aspire to a high carbon lifestyle? - https://www.google.com/search?q=research+which+classes+aspire+to+a+high+carbon+lifestyle%3F&oq=&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqCQgGECMYJxjqAjIJCAAQIxgnGOoCMgkIARAjGCcY6gIyCQgCECMYJxjqAjIJCAMQIxgnGOoCMgkIBBAjGCcY6gIyCQgFECMYJxjqAjIJCAYQIxgnGOoCMgkIBxAjGCcY6gLSAQk4OTE5ajBqMTWoAgiwAgE&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 - search results returned of salience - Carbon Consumption Patterns of Emerging Middle Classes- This discussion paper aims to help close this research gap by shedding light on the lifestyle choices of the emerging middle classes in three middle-income ... - https://www.idos-research.de/uploads/media/DP_13.2020.pdf

I have experienced this firsthand for many months, until my laptop got away and I failed to stay productive due to my own limiting beliefs and stupidity... Now it's hard to get back into the lifestyle of the great again.

• for: health, David Sinclair, longevity tips, adjacency - lifestyle choices - diet - climate crisis - biodiversity crisis

• SUMMARY

  • The main tips for staying healthy from a lifetime of longevity research on this video.

• adjacency between

  • lifestyle choices
• personal diet
  • climate crisis
  • biodiversity crisis
• adjacency statement:
  • Promoting this kind of diet and lifestyle can have enormous benefits on climate crisis as well.
  • One could write a paper about the crossover benefits to climate and biodiversity crisis.

• for: Kevin Anderson, transition, climate equity, climate justice, climate justice - Kevin Anderson, carbon inequality - Kevin Anderson, life within planetary boundaries, lifestyle within planetary boundaries - elites, climate crisis - Kevin Anderson

• summary

  • Kevin offers a picture of what a world within the stable climate planetary boundary would look like for the wealthy of the planet.

• for: staying within 1.5 Deg C - elites - lifestyle changes - property and building

• example:

  • Vancouver, B.C. has artificially inflated property market
  • Local Vancouver city government does not want to change bylaws that advantage elites
  • Climate change equity issues need to become part of the argument

• reference

  • https://www.straight.com/city-culture/why-did-city-council-vote-to-keep-shaughnessy-for-mansion-owning-elite

• for: elites - lifestyle change, great simplification, worldview transition -materially-excessive and wonder-poor to materially- sufficient and wonder-rich, awakening wonder, Deep Humanity, BEing journeys

• comment

• possible way to have more than one home
• a group can co-create and mutually invest in a regenerative timeshare
  • an example is to co-invest in a regenerative local community economy based around a regerative agroforestry system which has community owned and supported agriculture with year round Regenerative work and sustainable accommodations
  • Deep Humanity BEing journeys can play a role to re-awaken wonder

je länger ich drüber nachdenke, desto mehr hasse ich alle leute, die irgendwie mit drogen zu tun haben.

ich meine, klar, legalize all drugs, legalize all guns, fuck the police, ja ja, bla bla. ich war selber auch schon 3 jahre im knast wegen cannabis-anbau in bayern, also erzähl mir was neues.

das problem ist, drogen ticken ist controlled opposition. euer scheinbarer "gangster" lifestyle ist zeitverschwendung.

die leute, die eine blutige revolution führen sollten gegen dieses scheiss system, die sind beschäftigt mit scheisse verkaufen, weil die brauchen das geld... shekel shekel rules the world...

und dann? schwuler normalo lifestyle, also frau ficken, kinder kriegen, sesshaft werden, sich erpressbar machen vom jugendamt, am schluss auch noch steuern zahlen, weil "liebe deine feinde".

zeitverschwendung. potenzialverschwendung.

ihr wollt das system ficken, aber bleibt hängen auf diesem kindischen pseudo-rebellen trip?

wird zeit dass die taliban übernimmt... mal sehn wie weit die kommen, bevor auch die wieder den schwanz vom system lutschen

• for: carbon emissions of the 1%, carbon inequality, carbon emissions - artists, high carbon lifestyle
• comment
  • top tier entertainers are conditioned to a high carbon lifestyle. This is a challenge to overcome.
  • example given
    • DJ who flew to perform in four different EU cities in the same evening!

This reminds me of the article "Wikipedia and the Death of an Expert" how there are also so many volunteers running the wikipedia page. I inserted an article that mentions how many active editors there are on wikipedia so we can really compare the similarities in contributors.

• Comment
  • this statement epitomizes the crux of the matter
  • that demonstrates the entanglement between
    • a collective of (bottom-up) individuals and
    • top-down, system level actors
  • This is why the often-repeated mantra "individual actions don't matter" is not accurate
    • the contribution of individual actions DO matter, but only if it is supported by:
      • policy
      • ubiquitous 1.5C infrastructure
      • affordable 1.5C technologies and services
    • There is a MASS of people wanting to make the change
      • but that cannot happen unless it is
        • behaviorally and
        • economically pragmatic to do so
  • the real question to ask
    • in order to mobilize a bottom-up 1.5C lifestyle shift is
    • where are the leverage points for bottom-up actors (we individuals) to impact the top-down actors?

• Title: What a 1.5C lifestyle actually looks like
• Summary
  • Many people want to participate in the transition
  • to a regenerative, low carbon future
    • but the existing high carbon infrastructure
    • makes it very challenging to do so
  • This article features interviews with activists who are trying to live a lifestyle
    • that is consistent with a 1.5C world
    • WITHIN infrastructure that is not yet consistent with a 1.5C world.
    • It is challenging, to say the least!
      • and demonstrates the lock-in feedbacks,
      • a chicken-and-egg situation
      • that creates the challenge holding the masses back
  • From a Stop Reset Go (SRG) perspective
    • this illustrates the entangled relationship between
      • the individual and
      • the collective
    • and how each has an important role to play
      • to influence the other.
    • As an organization working on helping accelerate a bottom-up movement, this brings up the question:
      • what are the leverage points for citizens to accelerate top down actors such as
        • government to establish new policies and
        • manufacturers to create affordable regenerative products aligned with a 1.5C world?
• Interviewee:
  • Carys mainprize
  • Rosalind Readhead

Unlutabak, B., & Velioglu, I. (2021). Examining Children’s Questions and Parents’ Responses about Covid-19 Pandemic in Turkey. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/v78c6

The highest potential for demand side reduction among lifestyle change are: mobility, cooling setpoint adjustments, appliance usage, and diet.

Muth, A., Vermeer, A. L., Terenzi, D., & Park, S. Q. (2021). The impact of diet and lifestyle on wellbeing during COVID-19-lockdown. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/erta5

Kale, S. (2021, November 11). Chakras, crystals and conspiracy theories: How the wellness industry turned its back on Covid science. The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/nov/11/injecting-poison-will-never-make-you-healthy-how-the-wellness-industry-turned-its-back-on-covid-science

See the annotated Oxfam report: Linked In from the author: https://hyp.is/RGd61D_IEeyaWyPmSL8tXw/www.linkedin.com/posts/timgore_inequality-parisagreement-emissionsgap-activity-6862352517032943616-OHL- Annotations on full report: https://hyp.is/go?url=https%3A%2F%2Foxfamilibrary.openrepository.com%2Fbitstream%2Fhandle%2F10546%2F621305%2Fbn-carbon-inequality-2030-051121-en.pdf&group=__world__

and the annotated Hot or Cool report: https://hyp.is/KKhrLj_bEeywAIuGCjROAg/hotorcool.org/hc-posts/release-governments-in-g20-countries-must-enable-1-5-aligned-lifestyles/ https://hyp.is/zo0VbD_bEeydJf_xcudslg/hotorcool.org/hc-posts/release-governments-in-g20-countries-must-enable-1-5-aligned-lifestyles/

Individual behavior and systemic conditions are entangled. We cannot say one is not important but the other is. System transformation is required on both sides simultaneously. Positive changes in one will create pressure in the other to change. We can leverage these positive feedback effects for system transformation.

Good terminology- space of flows, denoting the necessity of (carbon intensive) travel to move from one place to another. Seen from the 19th century, even the average car-driving citizen of the 20th century is elite. A 100 hp car, which is now almost an average power rating of most internal combustion engines, is the power equivalent to the 19th century analog of maintaining 100 horses.

The Deep Humanity challenge then, is to achieve an education program for these super-elites that shift aspirations from the extremely high carbon footprint lifestyle to a more frugal, within-planetary- boundary one. Without the context of a dedicated trans-disciplinary Human Inner Transformation (HIT) protocol, a scalable approach may prove challenging.

Antonova, Elena, Karoly Schlosser, Rakesh Pandey, and Veena Kumari. “Coping With COVID-19: Mindfulness-Based Approaches for Mitigating Mental Health Crisis.” Frontiers in Psychiatry 12 (2021). https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2021.563417.

Coronavirus and vaccine hesitancy, Great Britain—Office for National Statistics. (n.d.). Retrieved 12 July 2021, from https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/healthandwellbeing/bulletins/coronavirusandvaccinehesitancygreatbritain/26mayto20june2021

Can self-nudging help you make better choices? (n.d.). TODAY.Com. Retrieved June 20, 2020, from https://www.today.com/health/what-self-nudging-simple-trick-make-healthier-choices-t184571

H, Yu, Yang J, Marziano V, Deng X, Guzzetta G, Zhang J, Trentini F, et al. “Can a COVID-19 Vaccination Program Guarantee the Return to a Pre-Pandemic Lifestyle?,” February 9, 2021. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-200069/v1.

ReconfigBehSci {@SciBeh} (2020) The pandemic proves we all should know ‘psychological first aid.’ Here are the basics. /lifestyle/wellness/pandemic-psychological-first-aid-anxiety/2020/09/21/7c68d746-fc23-11ea-9ceb-061d646d9c67_story.html?tid=ss_tw. Twitter. Retrieved from: https://twitter.com/SciBeh/status/1308461925785837573

Riding out the pandemic: How COVID-19 turned Europe into a cycle superpower. (n.d.). World Economic Forum. Retrieved October 12, 2020, from https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/10/covid-19-cycling-investment-europe/

COVID-19 and the Labor Market. (n.d.). IZA – Institute of Labor Economics. Retrieved October 10, 2020, from https://covid-19.iza.org/publications/dp13569/

Triggle, Nick. ‘Is It Time We Learned to Live with the Virus?’ BBC News, 21 September 2020, sec. Health. https://www.bbc.com/news/health-54228649.

Lange, Ann-Marie G de, Tobias Kaufmann, Daniel S Quintana, Adriano Winterton, Lars T. Westlye, and Klaus P. Ebmeier. ‘Risk Factors Associated with Loneliness, Social Isolation, and Neuroticism in the UK Biobank Cohort’. Preprint. PsyArXiv, 21 September 2020. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/q8kjv.

Mercier, M., Vinchon, F., Pichot, N., Bonetto, E., Bonnardel, N., Girandola, F., & Lubart, T. (2020). COVID-19: A Boon or a Bane for Creativity? [Preprint]. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/c3vsr

Marijon, E., Karam, N., Jost, D., Perrot, D., Frattini, B., Derkenne, C., Sharifzadehgan, A., Waldmann, V., Beganton, F., Narayanan, K., Lafont, A., Bougouin, W., & Jouven, X. (2020). Out-of-hospital cardiac arrest during the COVID-19 pandemic in Paris, France: A population-based, observational study. The Lancet Public Health, 5(8), e437–e443. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2468-2667(20)30117-1

Newhouse, J. P. (2020). An Ounce of Prevention (Working Paper No. 27553; Working Paper Series). National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w27553

Bristol, U. of. (n.d.). Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children | Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children | University of Bristol. University of Bristol. Retrieved July 18, 2020, from http://www.bristol.ac.uk/alspac/

Sugawara, D., Masuyama, A., & kubo, takahiro. (2020). “My satisfied life was locked down!” Change of life, fear of COVID-19, negative symptoms and present, future, and past life satisfaction [Preprint]. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/sndpm

Saiful Islam, Md., Sujan, S. H., Tasnim, R., Sikder, T., Potenza, M. N., & Van Os, J. (2020). Psychological responses during the COVID-19 outbreak among university students in Bangladesh [Preprint]. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/cndz7

Life protip

The nomadic lifestyle of the Ojibwe means that preachers must travel from house to house

Brilliant. A wealth of global observations.

Also starting to think about health/exercise monitoring software here.

Designs for the Pluriverse book review

This is likely do to the reduced carbohydrate intake rather than increased fat intake. Since carbohydrates generally insulin sensitivity, it's likely that this additional insulin resistance is acting as a confounder (as well as, presumably, a standard deviation widener). Thus, I would expect similar results during hypocaloric carbohydrate restriction.

life

test123

The rhythms of people's lives combined with the rhythm of boat arrivals and departures influences the ability to travel.