Sara K's profile at Help.com

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Last 3 Posts Authored

• What do you plan to do this Valentine’s day? posted (1 year, 3 months) ago
  Yes, I know it’s a crassly commercial holiday hyped up by corporates like Hallmark. But I s…

• Is it healthy for teenagers to be so obsessed with relationships? posted (1 year, 4 months) ago
  I’m not trying to pick on teenagers here. I was once a teenager too, after all, and I do …

• Just looking for some pro tips here! posted (1 year, 4 months) ago
  Okay, here’s the story: I’m twenty eight. He’s thirty. We’ve been togethe…

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Sara K's Top (5) Replies by other users' votes

• (2 votes)
  

  Hello Dyal. I know you are younger than me, but I think I will call you veerji, like we Punjabis do. :)
  
  Do read this carefully. It may sound harsh, but it comes out of experience.
  
  The first thing you need to do is stop pitying yourself. Stop it. Snap out of it.
  Veerji, you are young. You have an able body and an able mind. You have a relatively stable family. You have skills. You are not suffering from any mental disorders. So why feel so sorry for yourself?
  
  You need to end the negativity in your head, wake up and THINK HARD about what you want to do. Once you have decided, you must actually DO what you have decided.
  
  A singing career is a fine idea. But since you don’t have enough savings yet to dig into, focus on getting a stable job first.
  
  I see two good options
  
  #1: CAD
  If you learnt nothing in class, relearn it. I don’t know which city you live in, but I have seen many places which provide refresher classes for CAD in Chandigarh. I’m sure there’ll be some in Ludhiana, Jalandhar, Amritsar, Patiala, Bathinda or whichever larger city is close to where you live. It should take about a month or maybe two to complete the class. Once you are done, look for a job, veerji. Do whatever it takes. Look in newspapers, ask friends, respond to ads. It shouldn’t be THAT difficult to find a job with the way the economy is growing, if you have usable skills.
  
  #2: Full Time singing
  
  Don’t just go and look for a recording studio straightaway. Sing for local events, such as Jagarans, Kirtans, college ceremonies, ring ceremonies, marriages etc. It will take some time to establish yourself, and it will take a lot of hard work but you will be doing what you love.
  
  Once you have a steady cash flow, you can go professional and look for a recording deal.
  
  Veerji, the world is not an easy place. It can be harsh and cruel. The world is not meant for people who are mentally weak. You may be physically as frail as a leaf, but if you are mentally strong, if you are willing to work hard, if you have determination, you will overcome. And mental strength comes from within. You have to DECIDE to be strong.
  You said that you want to be rich. That’s great. I live in Delhi right now, and this city is full of young people like you who want to either drive BMWs or already have a BMW and want to drive something bigger. But how many of them succeed? When I was at IIT Delhi, I used to meet some of these people. Do you know how hard they used to work? I once questioned a rather bright Second Year BTech student about his schedule.
  He would get up at four thirty in the morning, take a bath in freezing cold water, and get on his table by five. He would study and revise lecture notes for about three hours, have breakfast and head to class. After coming back, he would relax for a while, and then study for his CCNA exam. Nights he spent working on his Sun certifications. Total time spent working: Fourteen hours. A day.
  
  Why? Because he wanted the best placement so he could save enough to start his own company. And why did he want to do that? Because his sister died of pneumonia, and he never wanted to lack money in his life.
  
  That is what successful people are like. They are desperate. Andar aag hundi aa, veerji. AAG. A burning, searing fire in their belly.
  
  Tussi bas apna ik nishana banao, veerji. Aur je ik vaari bana leya, fer aapa nu hor kuch dekhna hi ni.
  
  Himmat rakho, te rab te bharosa rakho. Sab kaam changi tarah ho juga. Safar lamba tan zaroor hai par hasde khelde jao. :)
  
  - written 1 year, 4 months ago – voted for by Dyal, Kitten_Ciao

• (2 votes) I want to kill myself because I’m really fat,not
  

  Yes, I see, honey. A big hug to you.
  
  Obviously, you are not having an easy time right now. Anyone can see that. As humans, we all feel the need to be loved, to be cared for. We look for companionships, and try to form relationships.
  
  It’s never easy feeling alone, even for far more battle-scarred adults.
  
  But hey, it gets better! As a teenager, school can get very stressful, because the people around you are still immature, just as unsure of themselves are you. Life can get a lot better once you’re a little older. You need to stick it out, hun. Hang in there, because it’s only a matter of time until things improve! Be strong. There is wonder and beauty in life that you haven’t even had the opportunity to appreciate yet.
  
  If you’d like someone to talk to, I’m on this site far too much anyway. Chatter away!
  
  - written 1 year, 4 months ago – voted for by SleepWell, windmills,

• (1 vote) Why is it wrong to be a prostitute?
  

  While I am not religious in any conventional sense, I do admire the Christian tenet which tells us not to judge others too harshly, lest we be judged as well. Hating Taliban commanders who kill and maim people is one thing. Humiliating someone and calling them names on the basis of their chosen profession is completely another.
  
  Gandhi himself repeatedly stressed that there are no respectable professions in the world, just respectable people, whatever be their line of work.
  In a lot of ways, I find this woman a lot more respectable than many amongst the top brass in the government hierarchy.
  
  As it is, I see nothing wrong with voluntary prostitution. But even if I did, I would surely hesitate to impose my own sense of morals on someone who is not hurting anyone else at all!
  
  I’m sure she’s well aware of the risks and pitfalls, much more aware than most of us can ever be as outside observers to the industry. There are all sorts of people with dangerous careers out there. There are military people deployed in forward posts right now who are far more at risk of sudden violent death than this woman would ever be. There are firefighters who accept grievous risks as a part of their job profiles. There are adventure sport enthusiasts who are well aware that one mistake could cost them life and limb. There are journalists who brave floods, riots and war for the sake of their careers. There are pro-democracy activists who risk being detained, tortured and killed by their own repressive governmments every single day. If an adult is willing to take those risks with a smile, who are we to berate them for their choice?
  
  As fractal has said, it wouldn’t hurt to have a backup career as age catches up. That’s about all the advice I feel qualified to give.
  
  
  
  [quote mysteriousmystery]
  i think a womans body is special, a gift i dont think just anyone should be able to get to it for a price money can buy.[/quote]
  
  Really, is that right?
  
  As a woman, I most certainly don’t consider myself (or my body) a “gift”, thank you very much!
  
  A gift is something you give to another person as a gesture of your love for them.
  
  I love my husband dearly. I make sure he is well cared for. I happily choose to fit in with gender roles that many people in the West would consider quite inequitable, because I feel comfortable that way, because that is how I have been brought up. I have nothing against feminism, but it is not an ethical system that I really subscribe to.
  
  BUT, I have not gifted my body to anyone either. I agree with the feminists when they stress that a woman’s body is her own. I retain full ownership of my body, and always will, just like my husband. It is not for you or me or for anyone else to judge what a woman should or should not with her own body. It is her body, her choice.
  
  - written 1 year, 3 months ago – voted for by crystalsandsand

• (1 vote) Need help refining my zombie plans.
  

  LOL. I can’t stop laughing at this thread. Think I woke up my SO. :D
  
  I think you should invest in learning how to drive a Battle Tank. There are plenty lying around in Afghanistan and they’re great for ripping through large masses of zombies.
  
  - written 1 year, 4 months ago – voted for by President Awesome:3

• (1 vote) I don’t like feeling inferior, jealous and envious
  

  Aww, cheer up, sweetie.
  
  I know exactly what you’re talking about. I used to be (actually, still am, to an extent) just like you in many ways. Not only did I find all the other girls prettier than me, I was also VERY socially awkward, because I had been brought up conservatively and had had almost zero contact with males my own age until I went to uni.
  
  Thing is, there will ALWAYS be someone better than you, there will always be someone who can beat you at every single thing in life. But so what? Why should that stop you from being you? The vast majority of humans are, by definition, just average! Average looking, average intelligence, making average amounts of money. And yet they manage to find partners, don’t they?
  
  See, you don’t have to get into a race. You don’t have to be the smartest, sexiest, coolest, nicest and best of them all. You don’t have to do that. All you have to do is be your own unique self. You are intelligent, articulate and perceptive. Is that not likeable enough?
  
  Go live your life, honey! Don’t even try to compete. Life is not a race. It is not about finishing first or second or last. It is about taking the scenic route to wherever you want to go, spreading joy and cheer along the way.
  
  Be who you are. 
  
  - written 1 year, 4 months ago – voted for by kevincol1

Last 5 Replies – All 114 replies »

• question for the atheists….
  

  [quote MarlinTheFish][quote ſΔιℜϒ ℑΔιL][quote MarlinTheFish][quote ſΔιℜϒ ℑΔιL]We aren’t rebelling against any gods[/quote]
  
  you’re misunderstanding what I wrote.
  
  [quote ſΔιℜϒ ℑΔιL] any more than you rebel against mermaids.[/quote]
  
  I’m not rebelling against mermaids. what would be the point of that?
  
  [quote ſΔιℜϒ ℑΔιL]
  Atheism is not a religion, only idiots think they can weasel that through, so it isn’t rejection of religion, simply an absence of all.[/quote]
  
  saying you don’t doesn’t prove that you don’t.
  
  [quote ſΔιℜϒ ℑΔιL]
  think of it like an atheist is a vegetarian and says, i do not eat steak. and then some other person coming up and saying, what about bacon? or ham? or chicken? it doesn’t matter which subset you speak of, we don’t associate with the entirety of it, simple as that.[/quote]
  
  you’re missing the point. it’s more like this… I’m not asking if you would eat turkey, I’m asking if you would eat tofury. lol![/quote]
  
  you said “….other religions to rebel against them as well?” so no, i did not misunderstand, this is what you said. the mermaid example makes my point; im not rebelling against gods, and you arent rebelling against mermaids. they dont exist, so what’s the point? you said it yourself. saying i dont what? i dont reject religion? use yoru words and complete sentances if you cant make yourself understood. and your tofurkey thing is a load of crap, the metaphor isnt about fake remakes of one thing or another it’s about the entirety, not the subset. use your brain please and try again.[/quote]
  
  yes, you did misunderstand…
  
  I said “…wouldn’t you also have to be fairly familiar with other religions to rebel against them…” them meaning “religions”, not “gods”. sorry about that. but in my mind rebelling against religion is something completely different than rebelling against God.
  
  You can’t rebel against God even if you believe that he doesn’t exist. so I agree with you. but for different reasons.
  
  see? I am saying try this tofurky, but you still see meat.
  
  the interesting thing is that most atheists seem to reject the existence of god because they define god according to the way religion does. but if they reject religion, why then is it so hard to reject religion’s definition of god? it’s a funny relationship that seems based on a dualism. in order to define themselves, they must accept religion’s definition of god.
  
  what about the possibility that God doesn’t even like religion? perhaps he doesn’t like to be worshipped. Why would he want that? why would she want that? perhaps God has no opinion on the trials and tribulations of man, and therefore cares not at all? what if god is not supernatural. what if god is not even a being at all, but a force or a system?
  
  doesn’t atheism seem to skip right over all those questions?[/quote]
  
  A possible reason for that rejection is that there is no real REASON to invoke a hypothesis as outlandish as god.
  
  You could define “god” so vaguely that almost anything fits the definition, but then what? What’s the point of doing that? You can call a force or a system by the name of god, but why not just refer to it by its usual name? I could call a pizza god too, and say that I believe in THAT god. But why make things needlessly complicated?
  
  The vast majority of religions see god as a supernatural, supreme being with powers to alter the laws of nature as we know them. When atheists reject god, it is this kind of god they’re rejecting.
  
  Changing the definition of god and making it so vague as to be impossible to reject is sheer sophistry, little more than a verbal trick.
  
  Technically, atheists should specify that they only don’t believe in the religious kind of god but that’s usually understood from the context.
  It’s impossible to disbelieve in all the possible definitions of god.
  - written 1 year, 3 months ago

• question for the atheists….
  

  [quote ☯Minerva☯][quote=MarlinTheFish]but that’s not what I’m saying at all. never have I said anywhere… blah blah blah, therefore God must exist. I’m merely saying that I haven’t encountered a completely logical formulation that definitively excludes the existence of God. maybe there is one. I would love to see it. I’m just saying show me.[/quote]
  
  If you are talking about god, as in gods of the religions, then you can’t logically forumalte a defintive argument that disproves the existence of a god. The gods of the major religions by their own defnitions exist outwith the measurable universe. They cannot be scientifically deduced, or observed.
  
  If however you’re talking about a theory of the creation of the universe that is explainable without invoking god, then ANY theory fits this. The big bang theory already does this. It does not need the hand of god to make it happen. It is entirely possible that this universe came into existence from the collapsion of another that sparked ours into life. That’s just one workable theory (we know now that our universe is not infinite, but finite). However, one thing we do know is that all energy cannot be created or destroyed. So perhaps the energy ball that was our big bang already existed in another universe, or was created with the destruction of a universe before our own.
  
  Who knows? We don’t yet, that’s the point. You cannot argue for the existence of god, and you cannot argue against it. Not with 100% assured certainty anyway. YET. There is a possibility that is entirely plausible, that we may one day be able to conclude either way that there is or is not a god. This knowledge may not be accessible by us now, but what’s to say what we’ll find out in future.[/quote]
  
  
  
  As far as the energy part goes, we now know to a very high degree of accuracy that our universe is “flat”.
  In mathematical terms, the three-manifold which corresponds to the spatial part of spacetime in comoving coordinates is a plane.
  
  I’m not sure about all the implications of this (astrophysics isn’t my field!), but it appears that in theory at least, a flat universe has zero total energy. Everything cancels out.
  
  And if the energy of the universe is zero, it is perfectly logical to conclude that it would have “just happened”, without any external impetus. No need for a creator. No need for anything. What we have is a universe that came from nothing and in terms of energy, IS nothing.
  - written 1 year, 3 months ago

• question for the atheists….
  

  I think atheism is more about a lack of belief than an active disbelief. There are atheists who do actively disbelieve. But most simply profess to “not believe”.
  
  God is the theists’ hypothesis, therefore they are the ones who must prove it.
  
  Believing in a personal god, one who built the world and actually influences world affairs, does require extraordinary assumptions about the real world.
  
  I am completely free today, to propose that there are in fact twenty six dimensions and not four (as some versions of string theory do). But it would be my job to prove it, not anyone else’s to DISprove it. Until I provided you with a convincing proof, you would be perfectly rational in not believing my story at all.
  
  Of course, belief is not always logical. As I said before, I do weakly believe in a kind of deistic entity (”god”), for no good reason other than it being a useful term of reference sometimes. I offer no valid proofs for this entity, because I have none; it’s just an offshoot of my belief that some things are just meant to happen. And I have no proof for that either. You wouldn’t be wrong if you said that I was being silly (as my husband sometimes does). But then, that is belief for you.
  
  As a kind of agnostic theist, I am deserving of all of Dawkin’s scorn, but I feel comfortable this way, and its just too much of an effort to change. :)
  - written 1 year, 3 months ago

• question for the atheists….
  

  Well, I don’t come from a Western country, and a large number of my associates are atheists or at least irreligious in some form or the other. Atheism is the norm in scientific academia - it’s rare to find physicists or mathematicians or (woe betide!) biologists who actively believe in a personal god.
  
  Doesn’t really have much to do with any specific god. It’s more of a rejection of any kind of deity with supernatural powers and everything else that goes on about such deities in religion.
  
  I personally have a vague belief in some kind of deistic “life force” which I sometimes call god. It doesn’t play any role in my daily life though.
  - written 1 year, 3 months ago

• Did you know that 4,287 of our soldiers died in the Iraq war, and about 75,000 people in the US die in an alcohol related death every year?
  

  I really don’t get why people repeat “war is necessary” and “they want to kill us” like some kind of demented mantra.
  
  How do you know they want to kill you? Can you read minds? Do you seriously believe it’s okay to go and kill a million civilians because you THINK they want to kill you?
  
  Are you telling me that every war that every country has ever fought has been in valiant self defence? For god’s sake, stop watching military recruitment ads and get real.
  - written 1 year, 3 months ago

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