Video games, anime and animal-featuring videos usually help with sadness, regret, yearning, etc. When I'm feeling particularly annoyed, nervous, anxious, or generally troubled, I'll go for ASMR to soothe myself. I'll also normally watch a video of it, with my eyes closed (unless it has moving pieces, like a pendulum), before going to bed. In my experience it helps "wipe clean" the mind, making whatever was bothering me while awake unable to intrude in my usually vivid, imaginative, wholesome, fun dreams. It it weren't for it I'd probably always wake up groggy and grumpy.

Sadly, it has a lot of associated stigma due to the shameless, flagrant and unrepentant hijacking by 3DPDs who use it as an easy way to make YoutueBux by exploiting the attention of lonely people via "affectionate" role-playing, the overwhelming majority not containing any elements of ASMR. This makes it really hard to find quality content, since you have to wade through dozens or hundreds of videos before finding the good stuff. If someone likes the role-plays and helps them, good for them... but the principle was originally for therapy though, and to aid meditation for people who are able to experience that static in response to sounds.

Pretty much everything I do can be considered as a form of self-therapy. From playing video games to fapping.

Well, I guess that when things get a bit too much for me and I don't really know what to do, I just play around with the tarot stuff for "answers". It's kind of funny what kind of stuff I get with that and it does get somewhat eerily close at times.

I stand astride eternity with my heels in the past and my toes in the future and I observe the passage of time

I like to write in my diary about how my day went, all the good things and the bad. It helps me a little bit, it makes it easier to cope with the things that I deal with in life.
I don't do it often enough though, usually because of laziness or simply forgetting to do so. It's time-consuming for me, but it helps me a bit considering that I might not be able to afford therapy like I used to and I don't have to worry about anybody judging me because of what they hear.

First step is to take stock...
It's almost the mid-point of the year. How have you improved?

>>30493
Sometimes I like to listen to Japanese scenario ASMR. It helps me imagine my waifu is there with me.

>>35474
>>30493
If you weren't already aware, japanese asmr/voice works are their own section on dl-site (and you can get pirated versions from xdcc). Momoiro Code puts out works with production quality and relaxation factor unmatched by almost anything else. Their youtube channel is good for quickly sampling their works (since unfortunately dl-site isn't the best for discovering) https://www.invidio.us/watch?v=IhIvNNw4UC8

I like to meditate in the style of a book called The Mind Illuminated. It helps me understand that I create my own suffering through thinking of the past and the present. The better I get at concentrating the less I suffer. I try to meditate 2x a day for 20 minutes each. I also make a conscious effort to never multitask and push all of my conscious awareness into one thing. Thinking = suffering

>>35485
I read that same book, but every time I try setting up for meditation I keep forgetting to do it after the first two times, until I remember weeks or sometimes months later.
How do you set up a proper meditation schedule? Every time I try to force myself it just makes me want to do it less.

>>35485
>I like to meditate in the style of a book called The Mind Illuminated.
This is one of the less muddled books on meditation I've skimmed through, but it seems it's basic technique is attention focused. Isn't attention counterproductive? I always had supposed meditation was about killing one's mind and achieving a sort of living death devoid of mental content.

To that end I've been working for a while, with some minor success, on being the least aware I could be of being at all. On good days I am pretty dissociated and barely even know I'm alive or feeling things. So focusing on anything, let alone deeply focusing, seems neigh impossible. I guess it'd be just my luck if I'd done the exact opposite of what I was supposed to.

>>35486
If you forget to do it maybe you can leave a note on your computer where you will see it. I've quit and started many times, all you can do is start again and get back to it

>>35487
I think there is a misunderstanding, through training of concentration and attention you would become more happy I think. Daydreaming rumination and worry only bring mental problems. A very highly trained meditator could probably find joy in staring at a wall because he pays deep attention to it moment to moment

>>35480
Thanks for the recommendation, anon. Apparently DLsite has a coupon for giving out a free Momoiro Code work so I used it today. It won't let me download it and it only lets me view it on DLSite Play so I can't download it to my phone. Are Momoiro Code works normally like this?

>>35529
> It won't let me download it and it only lets me view it on DLSite Play
> Are Momoiro Code works normally like this
Honestly I don't know, I've never downloaded directly from DLSite. I've always obtained (read: pirated) it either from xdcc or from file hosting sites. The majority of older works can be downloaded via xdcc from here (link rot13 encoded just to avoid drawing unwanted attention from automated bots): uggc://obneq.xnfhzv.zbr/xbr/

And newer ones can be downloaded by just searching on google, but you'll have to put up with the usual sketchy download sources. Pic is the stuff I have with me at the moment (all the ones I thought were pretty good), so if there's anything you can't get from xdcc that I've got let me know and I'll upload to some non-shitty filehost.

>>35530
I've never seen a link like that before and I'm not sure I trust it.

>>35981
The anon, to whom you're replying, stated that the URL is encoded. All one has to do is decode it, and since the algorithm is known (rot13), this is a trivial search away.

Also, for fun:

>It's a known fact that web surfing has become a much more important
>activity in the net than what was expected six years ago. Anti-prying
>measures have been taken in other services (mail encryption, for
>example), but haven't been in WWW: anyone can spy at what another
>user is browsing at the moment by intercepting his packets and
>looking at their content ("sniffing"). This document proposes a
>method that guarantees it won't happen anymore, by discouraging the
>act of sniffing.

>A new URL, 'uggc', is defined, which is a sort of twin brother to
>'http'. The former works in the very same way as the latter does,
>with the following exception: both URLs and the data travelling from
>the client to the server and vice versa are encrypted. The data
>retrieved is equivalent, once decrypted back.

- https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-farah-uggc-protocol-01

>>35982
That draft is from 2001 and still hasn't be implemented.

>>35983
That's why I said, "for fun".

>>35982
>Hell, it's been used for more than two millennia, and the ancients certainly knew what they were doing.
Ha! Thanks for sharing. Juxtaposition of the formal RFC style and the nonsensical spec is always amusing. You're probably already familiar with it, but the classic HTTP 418 RFC is also a fun read (rfc2324).

Although shouldn't the doc have mentioned TLS (née SSL) as prior work? That effectively obscures the URL path, leaving only the domain itself visible to eavesdroppers. You could even mitigate that a bit by using encrypted DNS (DoT/DoH) and improving adoption of eSNI, leaving only the dest IP visible as plaintext (which with the rise of CDNs is practically useless anyway).


>>35983
Check the date of the draft.

Coming home is self-therapy now that I live alone. I fill my house with bright colours such as white, pink, cream, light brown, and just a bit of blue.

>>35529
Fyi they're running a promotion for another free Momoiro work. They even have english subtitles this time (hardsubbed only, sadly)
https://www.dlsite.com/home/campaign/voice-works-trial-fes2020
(My coupon said it expired in 2 days but I don't know how long they're running it for – It's even possible it's the same one you mentioned and I haven't noticed until now)

Post edited on 16th Jan 2021, 3:57pm

Talking & Walking solves a lot of little problems

>>37489
and writing

>>35474 as well as indulging in whatever content in Japanese from books to train videos to reading the niyu-su. Furthermore, I often like to mix real life with this idyllic fantasy of living with my waifu in Japan. This would translate to going out as if strolling around during hanami, at night in a hot summer listening to the city sounds and crickets or, during the winter, taking a hot bath or cooking some japanese dish with her... It's cozy and fluffy and I don't feel like it's such an intense and out-worldly escapism as to negatively affect my daily life. Only the opposite.

I am very thankful for this ability to find joy in the mundane.