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Wellness Wednesday for February 25, 2026

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).

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Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

New year's resolutions check-in:

  • Posted my fifth blog post of the year on Monday, offering my two cents on the school shooting in Tumbler Ridge. It was expanded from a comment I wrote here after the Annunciation Catholic shooting last August. I'm sad to say the points I made remained exactly as relevant six months later as they were at the time.
  • Went to the gym three times last week, again on Monday, planning to go this evening. Can deadlift 1.8x my bodyweight for 4 reps, squat .98x for 9 reps and bench press .82x for 7 reps.
  • Have not consumed any pornography since waking up on January 1st.
  • Have completed 8/11 modules in the SQL course.

How goes it, @thejdizzler, @birb_cromble and @oats_son?

  1. Work: Committee meeting went great, can graduate whenever apparently. Starting to look for postdoc and/or biotech jobs this summer!
  2. Fitness: Another great race this weekend. Just under 58 for 10 miles on a hilly course. Negative split too which was awesome. Feeling a bit tired now, and have been able to sleep extra, so maybe time to back off next week. 10.5 hours last week, and will be ~11 this week.
  3. Intellectual Stuff: 2nd blog post of the month (Spanish update) is up. Marx is done, and Spinoza is close to being done so things feel more under control.
  4. Finances: Spending is way down this month, going to be well under $3k, which feels good. The main thing has been no big-ticket expenses. Hoping I can save equivalently in April and May.
  5. Dating: Went on a date with a med student this morning. She was very into me but I was more tepid. Will hang out with her one or two more times to get a better idea of if I actually don't like her or was just tired. Taking a new approach with porn: trying to quit just porn but not masturbating, which seems to be helping. Part of the reason I may not be super into this girl is porn brain, which would really suck.
  6. Tarot: Didn't do it this week.
  7. Socializing: Didn't do much of this this week because I have been cooked at work and with fitness and book clubs.
  8. Screen time: 1.25 hours.

Committee meeting went great, can graduate whenever apparently.

Congratulations