Doesn’t have to be a thing you bought. Just some thing you didn’t have but then once you did it expanded your scope of actions.
The first obvious example that comes to mind is a car. Plenty of drawbacks to prevalence of cars, but being able to go where I want when I want, and far away, is very transformative.
I’m interested in other examples of things that aren’t just useful, but that open new possibilities.
The first was my bike. Totally changed life. It opened up the entire county to me, though the far end was not viable time wise.
Then my first car.
After that, I suppose it was a cell phone. Gave me the freedom to travel and stay in communication on my terms. However, part of that was caller ID by default. The freedom to ignore calls and make the decision based on who was calling without having to worry about missing an important call was big time. Since I could do this anywhere my car could reach, it was the pinnacle of freedom, with subsequent iterations only expanding the use.
After that? My cane.
After my body fucked up, and I was on a walker for a while, being able to walk steadily without the walker was freedom again. It may seem like the walker was that, but it never felt like it. I went from jogging and walking and hiking freely to crawling, literally in a second.
From crawling, a walker sure was better, but it was as much a symbol of limitations as it granted more mobility.
But the cane? That’s when I knew I would be able to have something resembling the life I had lost. It isn’t the same as it was and never will be. But the difference between having the cane and not having it is what makes it powerful.
I really thought when the cane came up you meant taking over the world one hard smack at a time
Reading regurlarly, It really improved my attention time, and it definitively helps to manage my anxiety, weirdly enough.
My divorce. I didn’t even realize that my ex-wife was abusive until getting into the divorce process. Once I got away and started to understand, I began to take some of my power back and develop even more. I went from terrified of her to strong and confident.
I hope your new positive path continues. Good luck, said the survivor or a bad marriage.
I had a teacher advise me to make a habit of occasionally seeking out embarrassment, to stay in the habit, and prevent being paralyzed by fear of embarrassment.
I’ve followed that advice for years, and it’s like a super power.
I’ve done so much cool shit that a previous version of myself would have been afraid to try.
I don’t even remember all the embarrassing stuff, even though there’s plenty. The cool stuff is what sticks in my memory, even though I’m prone to remembering my mistakes.
Saw a Ted talk that said the same thing. The guy over came some social anxiety by actively putting himself in an awkward situation each day (his was asking if he could get his coffee for free at the coffee shop). Once he got use to low stakes situations where people were surprised, confused or mildly judgemental (but also amused or just disinterested) it was easier to do things that actually mattered without worrying about people’s reactions. And he got a few free coffees.
First step is to post something onpopular but true on Lemmy, and be OK with the downvotes. I dare you all. :)
HAMAS are terrorists and a part of the New Axis of fascist dictatorships which consist of Russia, Iran, China and North Korea among other minor countries and militant groups. Free Palestine movement is their loud, but in the grand scheme of thinga inconsequential piece of propaganda. TikTok is one the main propaganda tools of the Axis. There. Got downvoted for this plenty of times. Good thing the useful idiots are just a loud minority of primarily well-off USA students who cosplay being communists without understanding a thing about communism.
- I want to downvote you cos I disagree.
- But I have a policy of never downvoting unless it’s spam.
- But you seem to be posting this to get downvotes to test the hypothesis of the OP. A downvote will help you in the long run.
- But I disagree with you so do I wanna help you?
- Of course I wanna help cos life is hard.
- But I don’t do downvotes unless it’s spam…
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Segmentation fault
A low-powered zoom microscope. I can again look at and work on tiny things, fix jewelry, electronics, remove splinters. Use it WAY more rhan I ever thought I would.
For anyone interested, just Google “stereoscopic dissecting microscope used”. The ‘used’ part is to makes it less expensive. They can cost a lot. I used to use my lab sonicator water bath to clean my jewelry, and our dissecting scope to check the jewelry to make sure all the skin crud is gone from every crevice.
