site banner
PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   1382 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for September 17, 2025

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

  • Requests for advice and / or encouragement. On basically any topic and for any scale of problem.

  • Updates to let us know how you are doing. This provides valuable feedback on past advice / encouragement and will hopefully make people feel a little more motivated to follow through. If you want to be reminded to post your update, see the post titled 'update reminders', below.

  • Advice. This can be in response to a request for advice or just something that you think could be generally useful for many people here.

  • Encouragement. Probably best directed at specific users, but if you feel like just encouraging people in general I don't think anyone is going to object. I don't think I really need to say this, but just to be clear; encouragement should have a generally positive tone and not shame people (if people feel that shame might be an effective tool for motivating people, please discuss this so we can form a group consensus on how to use it rather than just trying it).

2
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Slow and steady progress at the gym. Now I can squat two plates and bench one plate. In the past week I suddenly got physical growth to match the strength gains. I feel so much more confident in general. A few pounds of muscle on my bones made a world of difference. I guess now I'll keep going and see how far I can climb this hill.

I want to do more self improvement things, but I'm running up against my time and energy budget. I'm hoping to fix my sleep soon and get more energy that way. Trying to cut down on doomscrolling, but this Charlie Kirk saga is making it hard. I've made more of an effort to talk to and dance with girls at events. No bites yet but I'm putting shots on goal.

General encouragement to all the bros and lurkers out there: There's a lot of low hanging fruit for making your life better. Find just one thing now, and you'll thank yourself in a few weeks.

Now I can squat two plates and bench one plate.

Good job! Benching 60kg x 5 was easy for me, but my fucking knees won't let me squat more than 1.5 plates, and only on a good day. I've switched to endurance training (cyclist squats on a wedge) for my knees, with a plan to add some split squats or lunges when I'm ready. I hate both.

I've switched to endurance training (cyclist squats on a wedge) for my knees, with a plan to add some split squats or lunges when I'm ready. I hate both.

I wasn't aware of cyclist squats. Interesting.

Re lunges, I'll take those (and weighted step-ups) any day over traditional squats. I blame having all my height in my legs. Lunges and step ups (and maybe cyclist squats) feel so much more functional for building strength to do all the other stuff I want to do, like running and hiking.

A few pounds of muscle on my bones made a world of difference.

There's a lot of low hanging fruit for making your life better.

People talk a lot about 'noob gains' and rapid early progress in muscle gain, but they don't talk enough about the early psychological effects of heavy resistance training on the indolent and sedentary. There's a large spike in hormones when you first start lifting that go a long way towards killing anxiety and reinforcing confidence and resilience.

Honestly its probably more impactful on male attractiveness than the physical toning itself.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats