Been Played? Trust Again: Vulnerability, Growth, Healing
In today’s age of pervasive distrust, personal growth and healing depend on our ability to trust and display vulnerabilities. The lack of trust in relationships has led to a rise in infidelity and a decline in marriage rates and birth rates. To restore trust, we must learn to discern true friends from fake ones and develop our vulnerabilities as assets. Trust is essential for love and personal growth, and while it should not be given indiscriminately, taking calculated risks in trusting others can lead to a more fulfilling life.
Take Your Life Back, Own It
Professor Sam Vaknin discusses relationships and the importance of distinguishing between real and pseudo-relationships. He emphasizes the need for maintaining individuality and taking responsibility for one’s choices and decisions. He also provides seven rules for self-preservation and shares his perspective on happiness and life. The professor concludes with advice on embracing change and living a life worth remembering.
Lonely=Strong? Age of Alone: New Normal
Loneliness and aloneness are becoming increasingly common in today’s society, with many people lacking intimate relationships, friends, and even engaging in less sex. This has led to various coping mechanisms, such as busyness, creativity, magical thinking, and engaging in online communities or social media. However, these strategies often fail to provide true fulfillment and can lead to mental health issues such as anxiety, depression, and substance abuse. The growing trend of loneliness and aloneness is difficult to reverse, as people become entrenched in their ways and develop an ideology around their solitude.
Why Men Abuse Modern Women, Degrade Them Sexually
Women are now more educated and financially successful than men, leading to a shift in traditional gender roles. However, in sex and interpersonal relationships, women are less empowered than ever, as men use these areas to assert their dominance and punish women for their success. This has led to an increase in infidelity, toxic masculinity, and dark triad personalities in both men and women. As a result, commitment in relationships is declining, and the battle between the sexes is becoming increasingly destructive.
Loving My Narcissist HURTS so much!
Loving a narcissist is a painful experience due to their lack of empathy, idealization followed by devaluation, and inability to truly connect with their partner. The narcissist’s inaccessibility and indifference can be devastating, as they often discard their partners without any emotional reaction. This experience can leave the partner feeling shattered, questioning their own judgment and ability to trust themselves and others. Ultimately, the pain of loving a narcissist comes from grieving the loss of who they used to be and the potential of what could have been in the relationship.
Weak People Pleasers? Walk Away!
In this lecture, Professor Sam Vaknin discusses weak people and people pleasers, who he believes are the core problem of humanity. Weak people are suggestible, malleable, and mutable, and they engage in the most disgraceful and antisocial acts simply because they cannot say no. They are enablers in the worst sense of the word, and they provoke abuse and engage in self-harming behaviors. Vaknin advises that people should forgive these individuals, but they should also safeguard their lives and protect their sanity by removing them from their lives.
Root of All Evil: Idea of Progress
Professor Sam Vaknin argues that the idea of progress is the root of all evil, as it has led to dystopian outcomes. He analyzes postmodernity, environmentalism, the Renaissance, and Nazism, showing how they are all interconnected through the idea of progress. Vaknin claims that exclusionary ideas of progress have led to reactionary counter-modernity, such as communism, fascism, Nazism, and religious fundamentalism. He concludes that humanity’s future is at risk due to the belief in progress and the actions taken to achieve it.
Overt+Covert Narcissist in One Person: Self-supply (44:17), Binary Narcissism
Professor Sam Vaknin discusses the concept of a binary system in narcissism, where both overt and covert narcissistic self-states coexist within an individual. This rare condition occurs when the overt narcissist collapses and fails to transition into a covert narcissist, resulting in both self-states being active simultaneously. This creates internal conflict and dissonance, as the overt self-state attacks the covert self-state, generating self-supply for both. The educational sublimatory channel, which encourages humility, healthy supply, self-esteem, honest communication, and empathy, can be used as a potential healing mechanism in therapy for individuals with this binary system.
Closure is Bad for You
Closure, a popular concept in psychology, originally came from Gestalt therapy and referred to image processing. However, it has been inappropriately expanded to include trauma, relationships, and more. Many experts and psychologists now consider closure a myth and even counterproductive. Instead of seeking closure, one should focus on embracing and integrating pain and negative experiences as part of personal growth and development.
BDSM, Sexual Sado-Masochism Disambiguated
BDSM is not the same as classic overt sexual sadism and classic overt sexual masochism. Sexual submission and domination are usually intra dyadic practices, taking place in couples among intimate partners, and rarely conducted in public. BDSM is a ritualized extended fantasy, a roleplay, while sexual masochism revolves around self-objectification, sexual degradation, extreme sexual degradation, dehumanization, losing one’s identity, sometimes faceless self-pornography, the infliction and reception of real pain. Sexual sadism is about being turned on by torturing a partner, observing the agony, observing the writhing, observing the physical changes, observing the uncontrolled dysregulated reactions to pain, observing the disintegration, the tears, all this turns on the sadist.