Last night I went to a concert. It's happening often to me now: I find myself at concerts where the kids who attend could be my offspring. It was a delightful urban music duo from Canarias with a lot of talent, yet the crowd barely numbered thirty people or so.

I came out of the club near Gran Vía and headed down Montera, again enticed by the prostitutes there, but I simply walked by without paining about any decision because there was none to make. However, when I reached Sol I walked nearby two young American women. One was speaking loudly over the phone, apparently the topic was someone she met in a club and the girl was trying to convince her friend that she didn't take money from the guy from the guy she left the club the night before. This proved to be tremendously enticing, the "young exchange student who is dabbling into escorting to get some fun cash" storyline which formed in my mind. I shook it off and made my way back home.

Some days ago I signed up for a tantra workshop, which will happen tomorrow. I don't have high hopes for it, but I must find progress towards the healthy satisfaction of my sexual needs. By this I do not mean the orgasmic release itself, as long as I feel I'm making progress, hiring prostitutes off the street or proposing a sugar daddy arrangement will seem less enticing.

I write this not without grimacing in discomfort, but I think I am happier when I can write about my shadow. I now call my shadow "everything I don't write down publicly", thoughts and actions that I may consider too dark or embarrassing to share online. The more aligned my actions and my writing is, the more "whole" I feel.

This morning I was in the shower, and I thought "it's time to navigate back to the truth". I used to be more honest before taking care of my grandmother, then I discovered lying is a great way of avoiding difficult conversations and preventing hurt feelings (as well as getting your own needs met), and I started liberally lying where convenient, making me about average in this matter to tell the truth. For example, a friend might invite me to something I'm not particularly fond about and I might make up an excuse rather than saying I'm not interested in that, or "this weekend I just want to bum out, but thanks for the invite".

After experiencing both moderate lying and reasonable honesty, I can say I'd rather default to reasonable honesty, mostly for the feeling of coherence. But I think it's important to learn how to lie, not to get nervous or fidgety if you must say something that is not true. It's a skill that can be used for good and for bad. If ICE came to knock at my door and I'm hosting "illegal aliens", I ought to tell them I have seen none of those dirty Mexicans around.

There's also "concealing the truth" in which you don't say something that you should say. This also has a spectrum of adequateness, cheating on your partner and then calling that "not lying" because you were never directly asked is bypassing the matter. But, having thoughts about cheating and communicating it can be premature or unconstructive, unless you have a plan about it. Our thoughts and feelings belong to us and are temporary, describing a temporary state as truth is not being honest, it's confusing truth for something else.

The problem with focusing on the things that you don't say, then you end up writing a confession. I'm thinking about the things that I have experienced, yet I haven't written about, and this comes to mind: when my sister to Spain came I asked her for Modafinil. She brought the actual brand one which is super expensive. I finished it, and now that my cousin came I asked him for another box, but I asked him to buy the generic version. Well, call me disappointed, the generic version is much less effective.

I don't need it (I won't take it on weekends) but it makes work work more pleasant. It's interesting to note, we tend to have pairs in our vices, uppers and downers. I'm using weed to wear off the modafinil in order to sleep, and then taking the modiodal to wear off the haze from the weed the next morning. I guess the socially accepted version of this pair is alcohol and coffee.

It's strange how the perception of my own intelligence varies so much. If I am alone for a long time, I will think I'm hopelessly stupid. If I am surrounded by smart people, I will think I'm a dull knife. If I am surrounded by average people I don't think myself as more or less intelligent than them, but I find their gaps in knowledge disconcerting, It's like they have read what was assigned in school, they know how to do their work, and they know how to navigate their environment but little else. Sometimes I'm very surprised by these gaps, a person might be saying "oh there's this animal that lives in the jungle in South America that is sometimes hunted and eaten, it's a strange animal, but I don't remember the name" and with that I might suggest it's a Tapir "yes Tapir! How did you know that!", well, if you prompt me with "a strange animal that lives in south american jungles and is hunted for food" pretty much the only possible response is a Tapir.

The other day I was playing a questions board game and someone got an easy question: what is the longest river of Africa? and the person exclaimed "how am I supposed to know that?" and I said "How are you supposed not to know that?", I mean, most people only know the name of exactly one river in Africa, and if you choose that single river you'd be correct.

I think if I were a D&D character, and assuming you roll the dice fairly, I'd be intelligence 11 or 12, wisdom 14 or 15. In fact, let's try this...

Strength: 14 Dexterity: 15 Constitution: 15 Intelligence: 11 Wisdom: 15 Charisma: 7

I think that's a fair assessment. Charisma is the only area where I see myself as below average, though I think some friends would disagree with me. I'm also like a multi-class character, in which I pay levelling up with a lot of experience because I dabble into too many things.

Unlike D&D, in real life most attributes can be trained to increase them. I think intelligence is the least trainable of these, but it's possible to increase your memory capacity and your reasoning process. It's also possible to artificially increase by the use of technology, as if we were able to use an exoskeleton to increase our strength.

I think Charisma can be trained, but it's an uphill battle when you don't like people. I've searched for self-help groups for people wanting to hone their social skills, but I've found none. Private therapists who will charge you by the hour are available, but that's not really necessary in an early stage because the personality is so ripe for beginner gainz (or so I like to think).

I just came back from lunch and I was thinking just how difficult it is to self-rate yourself honestly and accurately. I was making this mental exercise: given a pool of 1,000 random men who are not impeded by age, where would I rank in strength? I honestly think I'd be among the 100 strongest (probably at the lower end). How does that translate into a dice roll? Claude says 14-15. Dexterity should probably be adjusted to 16.

There's an impulse to want to appear modest rather than accurate, and mis-calculating towards the higher end will result in ridicule. Some people may throw their hands up and declare the entire thing stupid, to which I honestly agree, but done consciously you do not come out of it feeling better or worse about yourself, but knowing yourself better.

Perhaps I may also obtain knowledge by trying to assess my co-workers:

Milennial CEO
Strength: 17 (crossfit nut)
Dexterity: 14
(I'm afraid he discovers calisthenics or yoga) Constitution: 16
(skiing nut) Intelligence: 18
(top 99% GMAT) Wisdom: 14
(is increasing as I'm seeing it) Charisma: 16
(a charming person)

CTO
Strength: 13
Dexterity: 9
Constitution: 14
(does his own landscaping) Intelligence: 18
Wisdom: 18
(a self-made Englishman founder/builder, married and father of two kids), Charisma: 14
(this is I'm changing between low and high, because he's the charming introvert, it's difficult not to like him).

Enfant Terrible Dev
Strength: 14
(plays good level basketball) Dexterity: 14
(very high vertical jump and good footwork) Constitution: 10 (he catches every virus in the office) Intelligence: 19 (blows your mind)
Wisdom: 7 (also blows your mind)
Charisma: 14 (he's funny and charming too)

Really talented junior Dev
Strength: 13
(hits the gym now and then) Dexterity: 10
(I'm not sure here, he has good posture and skeleton but seems stiff, probably ripe for mobility gainz). Constitution: 12 (probably being uncharitable)
Intelligence: 16 (he's probably always been the smartest person in the room, but now he's humbled).
Wisdom: 14 (ah he knows life's true objectives, but he's playing his part in the investment it takes to gain financial independence).
Charisma: 11 (again I pain putting this score because to me he is one of the most charming characters of the office, but "nerdy" is the impression he conveys.

Really talented designer
Strength: 12 (cardio box training)
Dexterity: 13 (you'd guess less but I saw him dance)
Constitution: 10 (an almost average thirty something)
Intelligence: 16 (but he's become an expert at prompting AI, he's augmented himself to a 19 or 20).
Wisdom: 16 (ah I know he's kinda depressive and self-deprecating, as I write this I notice I should be more attentive towards his emotional needs, he's also a kind soul.
Charisma: 13 (he has above average natural charm)

Hmmmm I think I could be self-assessing my intelligence poorly due to the fact that I'm surrounded by smarter people than me. Scoring inevitably leads to rankings and then it's difficult not to establish a hierarchy of competence. This is misleading because there are some skills which escape grading and thus you can't establish such a hierarchy.

Ok, to feel better about myself, let's leave it at intelligence 12.

I came back home from smoking after work and I re-read myself. I thought: what a beautiful entry, let's not ruin it with further comment. It's 19:20 of a Friday night, I'll log off for today.