8. The Sopranos 5/5. This may be even better than the Wire. I was very impressed and ok with the ending too. Can't believe I hadn't watched it yet.

1. Miracles by C.S. Lewis (4/5)
2. Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis (3.5/5)
3. The Pilgrims Progress by John Bunyan (2/5)
4. Maps of Meaning by Jordan Peterson (5/5)
5. Intro to old Testament (Harvard Lecture series) by Christine Hayes (5/5)
6. Class Warfare: Inside the Fight to Fix America's Schools by Steven Brill (3/5)
7. Educated by Tara Westover (4/5)
8. Thus Spoke Zarathustra: A Book for All and None by Friedrich Nietzsche (3.5/5)
9. A Delusion of Satan by Frances Hill (4/5)
10. A Storm of Witchcraft by Emerson Baker (4/5)
11. Why Jesus? Rediscovering his truth in an age of mass marketed spirituality by Ravi Zacharias (5/5)

1. 12 Rules for Life - Jordan Peterson 5/5
2. The Dubliners - James Joyce 3/5
3. The Money Culture - Michael Lewis 4/5
4. The importance of being Ernest - Oscar Wilde 3/5
5. The Great Gatsby - Scott Fitzgerald 3/5
6. Console Wars - Blake Harris 3/5
7. The Blank Slate - Steven Pinker 4.5/5
8. The tattooist of Auschwitz 3.5/5
9. The undoing project - Michael Lewis 5/5
10. Sapiens - Yuval Noah Harari 5/5

Sapiens was cool.....I liked homo deux better but just because history can be a little painful to sift thru


What's that Pinker book about.... evolutionary psychology? I read his better angels book and it was pretty dope

Yeah to be fair Sapiens was a slog and a half. I only finished it earlier. I’m being generous with that console book rating too that was horribly written, I grabbed it at the library on a whim. It was about Sega vs Nintendo but fuck me the writer was awful.

Yeah bro the Pinker book was about nature vs nurture, I saw it on a must read list so gave it a go. Do you fuck with Michael Lewis?

I notice you’ve been big into the theology/religious books, is that a rabbit hole I need to go down?

Yeah I fuck w Lewis heavy....last year I read the big Short and the 5th risk...both were fire

Saw him on your list an figured I should probably peep that one

An rabbit hole is definitely the right description regarding religion and spirituality lmao

I find it to be fascinating .... Idk what your religious views are but even as an atheist or agnostic it would probably be worth researching to confirm you actually believe what you think you believe after reviewing all of the relevant information on the matter

It's essentially the question of the meaning of life..... I can't think of a more interesting subject tbh

Yeah you should 100% check out the undoing project. It’s about two Israeli psychologists, Amos Tyversky (sp?) and the guy that wrote Thinking Fast and slow (Daniel Kahneman), and how they basically invented behavioral economics.

I don’t really have a religious view tbh man. I won’t bore you with any thoughts on it anyway. Everyone thinks their religious views are interesting but it’s boring as fuck haha. I was brought up catholic obv because duh Ireland but nah.

That’s a good way of putting it to be fair, I think as you get older you search for the meaning of life in the betterment of self whether it be physically or through internal self development. But yeah in terms of the religious reading where did you start — where should I start?

Thinking fast and slow was fiiiiiiire I'll definitely have to peep

Word I can dig it....lot of catholic raised friends of mine basically despise organized religion as they grew up

Actually cliche as it is I started reading a book on St Patrick lol got inspired on the holiday

But word I mean.... my thoughts on like what do I actually believe in were rooted in the concept of fear. Like.....who or what do I look for when I'm nullified by absolute fear and for me that was God..... obviously there's plenty of God's to choose from..... I like to read apologetic works....where they basically argue their religion is right lol that way I can kind of decide who is making the most sense. I read everything though....I read these athiests.... Dawkins and that other smug prick I can't think of.....I've read most of the major religious texts.... Quran, tsoa te ching(I fucked that up lol) uhh the Hindu one....with Krishna....oh the bahgavita....butchered that too lol.

Honestly since you like Peterson id check out maps of meaning......it's hugely philosophical and discussed the relevance of having some form of religious view of the world

One of the first things I read aside from the Bible was maybe Eckhart tolle the power of now..... More of a new age spirituality book that speaks on eliminating the existence of time through mediation.... basically budhism

I decided a long time ago to become Christian so I focus alot of my reading on Christian history, apologetics and literature but I mean I'd suggest reading all of the religious texts and seeing what makes sense to you and go from there

You have to really be into it tho cuz some of those texts are dry af lol. Sometimes it's more rewarding to read commentaries that explain the texts or give historical context on them so you can understand a bit better the significance of what is being said.

For me like u said I started by wanting to get my physical fitness in shape....from there I started just listening to lifting podcasts and at some point I heard someone say they read everything and since they started reading their life skyrocketed into success.....so I started reading everything

Eventually in my thirst for knowledge of everything I started seeing the recurring theme of religion and ideology in everything I was reading and decided that if I wanted to understand myself and how the world works that was what I needed to be studying.

I study everything tho, history, psychology, sociology, economics, literature, theology, science etc

sapiens was dope.

bags you gonna read any more ancient shit this year? if you wanna keep with them greek homo's read some thucydides, or if you wanna get in touch with your italian/roman roots maybe some sallust. im bout to read his jugurthine war book, but i read his book on the catiline conspiracy awhile back it was pretty dope

catiline had the blood of the nobility, relatively solid background, his ancestors fought hannibal, but he went into crazy debt trying to be consul (president) but lost out to cicero. so he conspired with other indebted nobles and plebs to basically kill a bunch of senators and people to put himself in power and abolish all debts, from the poor and wealthy alike

it was dope but its also my favorite period of roman history, the republic still in full swing, albeit going downhill, but people trying to keep it going blah blah

but word

or really just read julius caesars the gallic wars

its obviously a one sided commentary written by caesar himself, but it was basically him documenting himself conquering one of romes most ancient foes. all of france basically, on foot, mass murdering and putting into slavery millions. but not only is the battle shit interesting, but the inter political shit and how he wrote about the enemy and their ongoings

i forget now i'll have to re-read it but there was a passage about a siege where the gauls were starving to death and basically eating eachother and there was some boss fucking quote that i can't remember. fuck. lemme hit the google machine up yo

Honestly I know I need to study Rome and I've been kind of dreading it because it's so massive in scope

i completely understand. i've spent way too much time learning about it and still feel like i know next to nothing about a vast swathe of it, because i only focused from like the punic wars to the end of the republic. then briefly touched on empire times but they were already wack by then.

you do audio books right?

it'd probably be easier to do some type of overview deal first, but a good one, so then you have more context on timelines and events, that if you want to learn more you could then get into the boring but much more detailed sources where those overview type things get there facts from

i'd honestly recommend dan carlin. let me find the actual names of them but he does a great job on the eras i find the most interesting

Punic Nightmares

^ thats a three part series on the punic wars. basically where rome became the dominant force of the mediterranean by defeating carthage. i'd check that out first. i could probably find you links if you want to mp3's since its old and he charges a couple bucks for old episodes.

Death Throes of the Republic

^thats a six part series, but its pretty massive, if i remember right, part 6 is like 6 hours itself, and he still had to struggle to wrap it up. but thats probably his masterpiece. cucks like rogan think his mongols series is his best work, but this is. honestly i'm biased because this is hands down my favorite period in history, caesar and all them. but if i remember right he builds the entire ground work, and its all entertaining. but yea.

you should definitely check those out man. i'll get links.

but word the punic wars i'd check first only for timeline continuity, since they happened a couple hundred years before or some shit. there was a few times they clashed til it was settled, but that shows some of the evolution of their governmental system and how they became big dogs on the scene and not just a regional power, and then death throes shows more of the political workings as well as the dominance they put on the world

fucking rome was the shit

Word bless me w the links

Was def thinking a brief over view that covers everything from rise and fall should be first then I could zoom in on whatever periods I feel I want to analyze most

An I read physical books too but with having full-time classes rn I've been having less time for physical reading

here is a zip of the podcasts i mentioned. they're basically books lol. this doesn't cover ALL of rome though. again it started as a kingdom (short period), turned into a republic, much like americas government, senate/elected officials etc. which lasted for centuries, then finally the empire most people are familiar with. roman emperors. excess. faggotry.

but word these are all placed in the republic. the death throes of the republic focuses on the waning years of the republic though, and how it eventually became an empire with emperors. which is the fall i enjoy. most stuff you will find is on the fall of the empire hundreds of years later than that.

but basically all the expansion and dope shit occurred during the republic, the empire was mainly them being cucks, just holding what better men conquered by paying off barbarians until they finally said fuck it lets just take it all. but even then, the fall of rome itself, (the city and western territories) happened like 1000 years before the eastern empire fell. but modern people view the eastern empire as "byzantines" but they were rome. rome didn't actually fall till fucking CANNONS came into play.

but word, it was like 750 bc when the city of rome was founded. 400? something AD when rome the city itself fell, and i think it was the 1500's AD when eastern rome (constantinople/modern istanbul)fell

sorry for nerding out. but basically these focus around like 300 BC to 100 something BC during the punic wars. then the death throes is the final 100 years BC ish

http://www.mediafire.com/file/fgix1z...ublic.zip/file

Good LOOK.

I WILL listen to those these year. Probably will procrastinate like crazy tho.

Currently wrestling with Humes treatise of human nature. Fucking guy. There's no need for him to write this shit so densely lol smh.

Shits fire tho. I'm worried I may have just entered another deep deep rabbit hole with philosophy....but I suppose it was the only logical progression based on my focus over the past couple years

9. True Detective s3- 4/5. Not as good as season one but better than season 2. Beleiveable and realistic. Would watch again.

10. Future memory by p.h. Atwater 5/5 - this book came out in 1993....it talks about remembering the future. It gets a little new agey...but dope af and very synchronicity.

11. The biology of belief 10th Ed. -Bruce Lipton 5/5. - must read for understanding the actual science behind mind over matter. Also why the healthy get healthier and the sick get sicker.

I synthesized this formula for my psychological practice to help:

“Decreased stress +increased learned = less depression

I should really start reading more. I dont know where to begin though. Ive always been a dean koontz and stephen king fan. I just dont feel like id be getting much out of these types of books. I mean they were great for passing the time while locked up. Koontz was a god to me then. Its been a long time though and if i wantes to read something good and educational that has a great stoey.. Well idk were to begin..im not into crime novels and shit. So where most people i know love patteraon books i just never really enjoyed the content. Idk. Plus they seem like such simple.reads. whatever. Idk yall. Just stopping by to say that i know i ahould start reading more and dont know where to begin. Id want to enjoy the time spwnt reading so it would have to be the right material. I have very short attention spans for shit that doesnt interest me. Thanks