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Comment by yters | Hacker News Reader

As an introvert, so level of becoming an extrovert has helped me. E.g. dating and the getting married, learning to dance and weight lifting, which helped with the dating and getting married. Also, Toastmasters got me comfortable speaking my mind.

I also try to achieve my goals in the easiest, most direct way. E.g. ask for a raise instead of wait to be given one, find the fastest way to finish the degree, use online dating, become Catholic to end the despair etc. Also, ignore the haters, of which there will be many if you follow my advice. But, there will also be more people that respect you for being direct and decisive. That being said, don't be a jerk, and use what you gain to benefit others, especially look out for those that get sidelined by society and give them a chance.

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"become Catholic to end the despair" - could you elaborate?

I'm also curious about this. Maybe OP was struggling with "what's the point of life if we all die anyways" and found Catholicism gave them an answer more quickly and efficiently than other methods like reading/synthesizing/applying what philosophers and other thinkers had to say about the issue?

(I consider myself Catholic so this is definitely not meant to be a dunk on religion or Catholicism)

One thing that I appreciate about Catholicism is that it attempts to be a much more rigorous and academic approach to faith when compared to the more "evangelical" strains of Christianity popular in the US.

The Reformation did some good with pointing out that religion doesn't need to be a solely academic pursuit, but some branches went to far and seem to have interpreted that as "there is nothing academic worth pursuing in religion"

No, not really. This is kind of a "converts mistake," in that they assume that the religion they convert to is only the educated, attractive apologists that won them over. The popular church venerates Padre Pio and really believes he could bilocate, manifested stigmata, and that you can pray to him for healing.

Happens with orthodoxy too, a lot of people get a rude awakening when they actually go into a Orthodox church and talk to people, aka "The Rod Dreher effect."

Yes, very odd for a religion based on the premise their founder is literally God incarnate, could work miracles, levitated into the sky, walked through walls, said his followers will do even greater things, and can secure his followers eternal life. Pretty inexplicable why they have all these other nutty beliefs about members of his movement. I see where you are coming from.

Yes, this is the reason. I read through plenty of philosophy and such, and Catholicism was the best synthesis as well as claiming to be historically and empirically demonstrable. Previously I was protestant and then maybe atheist, and I always felt an underlying sense of emptiness and despair. Since becoming Catholic this fundamental sense of spinning through the void has disappeared, partly because Catholicism seems to be the only worldview that really takes rigorous truth seriously. Every other perspective seems to have fundamental questions they are unwilling to entertain. I don't feel I sold out by accepting an answer to my questions.

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