2026-03-21 07:04:53
Love a nice, clean theme on a blog like most of us have here on Bear. However, I can’t stand minimalism as a whole. It lacks personality and crushes whimsical ideas.
That, combined with a strong sense of nostalgia I’ve been entertaining here lately, has led to this new theme.
Inspired by early 90s Wacky-Pomo design. Think early Nickelodeon commercial marketing.
It’s simply FUN. Breaks the rules without trying to be edgy or taking itself too seriously.
I don’t know how long it’ll stick around but I dig it for now.
2026-03-20 09:48:00
BearBlog has embraced the beauty of randomness. There is now a link you can click to go to a random BearBlog and another to go to a random BearBlog post.
Many of these Indie/Small web sites like PowRSS, Ooh, and Bukmark Club have a random button. Clicking these links transforms you into a snowflake in the snowglobe of the Blogosphere. Then it is shaken up and you are in the backyard of some complete stranger.
Some of the best stories, website layouts and nuanced views of the world are discovered by way of this method.
Embrace the beauty of randomness, the same way Bear just has. 🤎🐻
Feel free to use these buttons, and any of the others. ■
Addendum: I have added these as keywords to my web-browser and Obsidian. Invoking /rp or /rb on my address bar or command palette will go to Random Post and Random Blog respectively.
🎧 Bonobo - Boiler Room London - Live at Alexandra Palace via local audio
2026-03-20 07:20:00
I've reached a turning point in my journey to save my soul. I recently stepped back from a meaningful commitment and now see it as a start to something more thematic. This post is the first of two to describe that change.
Here, I want to address Nikhil's call to stop loving oneself—found by way of angrybunnyman's response to it. Although I'm usually fond of the former's writing, I took several issues with the post.
For the rest of this post, I'll refer to Nikhil in second-person perspective; this also allows me to speak to those I intend to reach.
The pop psychology of today has conditioned us to believe that we should always love ourselves. But what if we are mediocre? If we keep celebrating ourselves without confronting that mediocrity — loving ourselves unconditionally regardless — we will never improve.
The initial premise is fair, but the counterpoint that self-love perpetuates mediocrity and thus prevents self-improvement is flawed. Is love for ourselves conditional—and conditioned upon achieving a level of 'good enough'? That seems to be the case for you, who posits some level of self-loathing as necessary.
You acknowledge that the term "self-loathing" is triggering, but you don't mean one should hate oneself. Sorry, but what is self-loathing if not that? If the key argument is to develop self-awareness of one's mediocrity in order to address it, why does one need to stop loving oneself and replace it with disgust? It's a toxic attitude to promote.
All meaningful transformation originates from a place of disgust. You despise the status quo to such an extent that you are driven to disrupt it. This notion of loving yourself regardless of who you are or what you bring to the table is crippling — and, frankly, annoying.
That's a bold claim to say all meaningful change stems from disgust. Discontentment and dissatisfaction with the status quo, sure, but there's an embedded sense of rugged individualism at the heart of this paragraph that overlooks how change is produced by systems. And to tie efforts of transformation to one's self-worth and what one can contribute? That's the real annoyance, because it's the idea behind hustle and grind culture.
You are not supposed to love yourself endlessly. You are not supposed to love anybody endlessly. Don't hate people for who they are, forgive them wherever possible — but loving them unconditionally is its own form of stupidity.
Where's the rulebook that stipulates these suppositions? This sounds like an arrogant imposition of one's worldview, and at this point I'm surprised by how much this messaging is in contrast to your [Nikhil's] usual temperament. What are you arguing for, anyways? Why should how another person chooses to live their life bring so much grief to you?
How can you improve if you are deeply in love with yourself? How will you enrich someone's life unless you master the art of accepting flaws — beginning with your own? You cannot genuinely accept someone else's flaws until you have identified and reckoned with yours first.
I suspect you may be surrounded by narcissists if what's quoted is construed as an argument. For one thing, loving oneself does not prevent self-improvement; it encourages it because it's a recognition that one deserves what's good. If you've ever gone through a depressive episode, then you know that lack of self-love (or self-respect) creates a cycle—the very one you believe that self-loathing can overcome. As for accepting flaws in oneself and others, and enriching another person's life, let's not tangle them up here. Humility is a virtue, yes, but there are some prideful people who, by virtue of wanting to be impressive, do impressive things. They're not mutually exclusive; why conflate the two?
We can only tolerate other people's idiosyncrasies when we can see beyond our own. That is precisely why this endless self-love doesn't work. It turns your gaze inward, away from the ways you might be an inconvenience to someone else. Accepting that you could be a problem to someone requires a clear-eyed awareness of your own shortcomings.
Counterpoint: I respect my time and energy enough to not let what others say or do bother me. (Present case excluded because I'm choosing to fight on this hill to prevent the spread of toxic ideas.) Introspection is what helps one recognize how they might be an inconvenience to another; it's because I am a level of self-absorbed and have a degree of fondness towards myself that I am mindful of how I relate to others. I think you mistake self-love for narcissism, in which case I suggest evaluating who you're around before making sweeping declarations about the human condition.
So cultivate disgust for the parts of yourself that fall short. I cannot stomach someone who casually announces, "Oh, I'm just not good with maths" or "Sorry, I'm bad at reading signs." What exactly am I supposed to do with that? Why should I be expected to absorb it?
Well, you're not "supposed" to do anything. But as a practice of decency, consider taking such statements at face value. Because we live in a society that's preoccupied with appearances, so when others display the humility of admitting their shortcomings, it might be an opportunity to normalize acceptance. Unless you're telling me that all shortcomings are equal and that we ought to devote our time and energy to mitigating each and every one? I'd rather hang out with someone who put in the effort to be a good listener or a good friend or a good collaborator than someone who was constantly berating and preoccupying themselves for sucking at trivial things like maths or reading signs. The real irony of your arguments is that you expect others to pursue a state of perfectionism, without regarding what it would mean to judge and be judged constantly.
It is only once you fix something that you realise it was fixable. Then you can decide whether to distance yourself from people who won't, or try to help them become better.
Counterpoint: forethought about what's worth fixing/addressing in the first place is wisdom. For instance, fixing/addressing the shortcomings in another person's life. Not sure where the savior complex (i.e., the idea that your role is to help others become better) comes from, but I'm more concerned about the near-dehumanizing approach to that salvation (i.e., distance yourself from those who won't help themselves).
Too much of anything is corrosive. Being excessively self-critical is equally damaging, because then you are viewing yourself purely through an external lens — as a subject to be judged rather than a person to be developed. The goal is to cultivate enough awareness that self-improvement becomes a continuous, natural instinct.
You reveal your biases here. You spend much of your post denigrating self-love and promoting self-loathing and self-disgust as pathways to change, but now you caution against being overly self-critical. You speak of judgment, but do not see how judgmental you've been throughout your whole post. So, this last bit reads as a preemptive defensive statement but it lacks conviction.
So, regardless of what Instagram psychology preaches, be harder on yourself when the occasion demands it. God knows the world is starved of good people.
I agree that the world is deprived of good people. Lord knows it has enough people who judge others without an appreciation that everyone fights their own battles, often invisible and silent.
My advice (if you'll receive it): Go all in on self-improvement, but keep it contained to your own affairs. It takes a lifetime to know oneself; why presume you can generalize how others ought to live without knowledge of what constitutes their lives?
Part 2 also addresses self-love, but is less argumentative and more introspective.
2026-03-20 00:47:00
I was reading paco’s post and I was about to send an encouraging email only to find their blog doesn’t have a way for me to contact them.
So I guess I’ll make one of those “Re:” posts that are getting so popular around here. In this case, I’ll try to add my two cents and hopefully get to paco.
Sometimes I need to slow down, take it easy and accept I cannot always work at 100%. That's ok.
Yes. That’s very ok.
What if I get used to work at 20% of my potential, thinking it's the best I can do?
20% is a lot. 1% is a lot. There are nuances, not everything is best or worse (actually those are just constructs of the mind).
looking back I'm always disappointed in myself
You may need to find a way to work on this. It’s addictive. And it’s bad for you.
I forgot how to put real effort in a difficult task. Or probably, I forgot why it matters.
Very few things matter. And I say that in a good way.
Why it's important to work for meaningful things.
Meaningful things find you while you work, not the other way round. Also, important is a big word. I think it should be reserved for the very few things that matter in life.
[Working for meaningful things is] the only way to build a meaningful life. It's not handed to you. You have to work for it.
I may repeat myself but meaning is shown when you are awake and present. It’s not something you can “build”. I mean, you definitely can help, but being anxious, afraid or unhappy definitely won’t help.
I fear, deep down, I don't care to achieve things anymore, I don't care for success or anything else related.
Sounds like you do care. You wrote this post, didn’t you?
Or maybe I'm scared of putting in the work and still fail.
We are all scared of what may happen if. By being present, your mind doesn’t try to go and predict what may happen if. Fear is reduced to ashes.
Either way, the result is that I am not happy with how I do things right now. I need to make some changes.
Definitely. If you’re not happy, you need to make changes. Can you control it? Maybe, to some minor degree. Most of the things you can do are related to taking care of yourself (health, physical and mental, both are one) and then working on what you truly enjoy (hint: you can find ways to enjoy a job you don’t like because it let’s you do other things that not only you do like but you enjoy and they release you from the concept of time or suffering).
I hope some of the points are made resonate with you whether is paco reading or not.
Thank you for reading.
A|
—-
Further reading
Relaxing is NOT a waste of time
2026-03-19 23:38:00
Sometimes, I think of the countless days I was certain I wouldn't survive. Someone once shared, from their notes app, a method for the unsurvivable periods: write them down. The idea is that, when the next hard period arrives (and it does arrive) you'll have evidence, a list of things you were sure were going to kill you but didn't. Mine looks something like this:
A forced gap year from attending university due to financial struggles
A fallout with a dear friend
Second year of engineering school
That one severe depressive episode from early 2024
Living in a foreign country with an expired visa
I'm currently tackling unemployment as a recent graduate, and it's been feeling like the end of the world. Everyday, I panic I'm never surviving this! I've never experienced something so bad! - But I did. I have a list with proof that, every single time, I made it to the other side of something I was convinced was going to be the end of me. So, think of all the times you thought you wouldn't survive, and think of all the times you will.
2026-03-19 23:37:00
From Nikhil Stop loving yourself:
The pop psychology of today has conditioned us to believe that we should always love ourselves. But what if we are mediocre? If we keep celebrating ourselves without confronting that mediocrity — loving ourselves unconditionally regardless — we will never improve.
So you need a measure of self-loathing.
Echoes of my past self. Pop psychology, they argue — correctly — has assembled a self-esteem industrial complex that mistakes stillness for peace. Affirm yourself. Celebrate yourself. Accept yourself exactly as you are, in this chair, with this coffee, in this mediocrity you've been marinating in since the third time you told yourself you'd start on Monday.
They're not wrong about the rot. They're wrong about the antidote.
The voice that tells you you're mediocre doesn't arrive in thunder. It doesn't announce itself. It speaks in should — that small, damp, load-bearing word that props up every unfinished project and unstarted morning.
You should be further along
You should weigh less
You should earn more
You should want the correct things
You should with greater efficiency
Let us name it: "should" is an endless hallway in a house filled with termites.
Self-loathing speaks exclusively in should. It is the should-generation engine, running constantly in the background, consuming whatever fuel is nearest — your ambitions, your afternoons, your capacity to sit still without flinching. Self-loathing would have kept me on the couch in the precise posture of a man explaining, at length, why starting tomorrow made more structural sense. What moved me was something quieter and stranger. Closer to curiosity. What, exactly, can this thing do?
That's the unnamed third option.
Loving something does not require unconditional surrender to its current form. This is the thing the pop psychologists and the self-flagellants are both missing, from opposite directions. I love this body and I have spent twenty years making it do increasingly unreasonable things. I love this mind and I quarrel with it constantly, the way you quarrel with someone whose judgment you respect and whose blind spots you can map from memory. I love the people closest to me and I want tremendous, specific, almost embarrassing things for them — not because they are lacking but because I can see the shape of what they're becoming and I want to be present for more of it.
That wanting — toward something, not away from something — is the gear that slips in both halves of this argument. Self-loathing is motion powered by lack.
It burns dirty, and it burns the operator, and eventually you look up and realize the destination was just a different room in the same building where you started hating yourself.