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Cake day: July 9th, 2025

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  • With age comes wisdom comes the understanding that control does not work with humans. It sacrifices part of them to get an outcome the parent wants. But the job of parenting never ends. In your 80s you will still want someone older who can show you what to do next. A parent that learns to support without controlling the kid will find themselves always able to parent their kid because the kid will always come to them for help.












  • The fundamental flaw in the premise is you cannot know what you’re doing “wrong” to not get it. If you’re not literally the other person, you can’t observe every string of thought that goes through their head. If they know how much you rely on their approval, their brain will automatically consolidate power over you, issuing approval and disapproval alternately based on how it will force you to maneuver in the course of getting their own needs met. The only thing a person can successfully control in a healthy way is themselves. So you’ll end up getting disapproval when they are tired or cranky or whatever without them necessarily even realizing what they are doing. No human other than yourself can be the never-ending source of approval you desire.

    If this is happening, it’s likely you’re locked in a toxic codependent relationship in which the other person is getting a LOT more out of the relationship than you.

    If this is about a boss (and this is where it gets exciting) you’re being managed in an oligarchy. You’re not allowed to be happy and feel constant approval because they are controlling you.


  • This dude is a litmus test for us as a society. Do we believe adding punishment helps something? He should of course never see freedom again, but give him a simple Scandinavian-style prison and let him play games or do crafts or whatever so he’ll shut up and we never hear from him again until his stable environment (with optional, no-reward-promised therapy) helps him want to talk about motives. Our prison system as it is does not rehabilitate or even meet basic standards of living, which is inhumane even when we will it upon the most inhumane.