It’s not aligned to what most humans expect from others, as most humans expect other people have bare minimum of empathy for the suffering of others. This is pretty universally seen as virtuous. Your behavior goes against what vast majority of people consider virtuous and which most people naturally do. So, it’s not considered normal.

Good news is that you don’t actually have to have empathy (which is a difference of neurobiology), but if you want to live a decent life in a world where most people expect a level of mutual care, you can cultivate compassion:

https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/topic/compassion/definition#what-is-compassion

Compassion doesn’t require you to feel empathy. Though the link there defines it as “suffering together” (and is slightly awkward in general about separating feeling with and feeling for), the actual behavior it invites is orienting towards wishing other people wellness and happiness, and taking action based on that wish. Actually, literally feeling what other people feel is not needed (and research is beginning to see this as preferable to just empathy, which is often limited by our in-tribe biases etc.).

It’s worth noting that Buddhist Loving-Kindness meditation is becoming increasingly popular among care providers. Western neuroimaging now measurably shows that this specific practice protects against the exhaustion of empathy while cultivating the mental resilience needed to keep showing up for others.

Also worth checking out:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/science-backed-compassion/202504/the-empathy-compassion-gap

And of course you’d practice self-compassion in addition to compassion towards others. One cannot work without the other.

I recommend you read Spell of The Sensuous

Religions aren’t necessarily just picking some superhuman being to worship. There’s a lot about spirituality that’s simply trying to be in harmony with the world you find yourself in. Reviving paganism as it was might be hard (though there are revivalist groups that might be worth connecting with) but you can try to understand what experience of life made your ancestors characterize their understanding of metaphysics in whatever way they did. Meditate in nature etc. Find out if there are still any old holy sites in your region and see if you can’t visit them. If you have elderly relatives, you can just try asking them about superstitions etc. that they used to have as kids - there might be some grain of wisdom there that’s worth thinking about. Not as a belief to adopt but to wonder, what gave rise to the superstition and did behaving in accordance to it give beneficial results (for totally non-magical reasons). A good example of a superstition that may have had practical roots is whistling at night. It’s an easy way of coordinate and communicate if you’re thieving, raiding etc. so hearing whistling at night might be a sign of legitimate danger. That then may have morphed into various beliefs about whistling at night bringing evil spirits etc.

I realize you might be joking but if you really want a god or goddess to worship, go ahead. Just think about what you want it to symbolize for yourself. Gods have realms of influence for a reason - and it’s that tangible realm that should be what your worship centers around, not the symbol. Want a Goddess of Love? Focus on Love, not the Goddess. Want a God of Bravery? Focus on Bravery. And so on. How much you want to use a symbol to help you orient towards the realm that symbol points to is up to you.

Grab a rock you like from a place you like, put it on an altar. Symbolizes your connection to your land. Put a flower on it every week. Symbolizes your commitment to keeping your land beautiful. Do it with a presence of mind, not as an empty ritual. The magic is in the psychology.

Love this!

YES!!! Dancing has been a huge part of many cultures in the world since time immemorial. For every occasion and emotion! My pet hypothesis is that it particularly fell out of favor in the west (as a purposeful practice) because of Christian influence and the mind-body split. Some peoples even dance in funerals as an expression of grief.

It’s coming back a bit now but though it’s slightly hindered by the associations with new ageism etc. but I really wish people didn’t let that stop them from trying it. It does have clear benefits. You can use any kind of music. You don’t have to know how to dance. Just move the body with whatever music you like.

I dance at least a little every day, even if I don’t feel like it. And I very purposefully dance to aggressive music when I’m angry because I have a temper, and I don’t want it get the better of me. It has worked really well.

Edit: Not to devalue talking about your feelings at all btw. But a lot of people struggle with intellectualizing their emotions to the point they can’t connect to them at all in their body. You need a balance.

Just gave my view on the matter with precise language.

I made a distinction between a description of a subjective experience, and a claim about consensus reality.

People experience something and then use the best language available to talk about it. These experiences are viscerally real to the experiencer.

Vast majority of people will reasonably make a claim about consensus reality if they experience something that feels very real. Because vast majority of people don’t know or understand that you CAN have a very visceral subjective experience that only happens in the brain. Or to put it another way: the brain behaves in a way that gives one every reason to think the experience happened in consensus reality.

It doesn’t make them “crazy” or “stupid”. But again, because most people don’t understand the distinction between a subjective experience and consensus reality, it’s easy to be dismissive of people who talk about outlandish experiences.

It would be more rational and kind to meet in the middle: “I believe you had an experience, but I don’t believe it means Aliens exist in consensus reality.”

I meant that to have the subjective experience of aliens to be considered to have the same level of reality as emotions, 99% of people would have to experience it.

I know I already experience things that vast majority of people don’t. It doesn’t bother me because there are people who experience things I don’t. Consensus reality is fine for general use but the range of human experience is incredibly diverse.

99% or so. Leaving just a tiny bit of room for outliers which always seem to exist.

I’d say we’d need to be able to consistently capture it in some way other than the human mind:

any type of a recording. From basic audio/photo/video to fancy science gadgets.

Else, it’s just a blip in the brain. A very real blip for those who experience it but again, not consensus reality. Of course if there was some kind of an universalish experience of aliens comparable to an emotional state like love, then we’d probably have to revise.

So there are aliens, just maybe not in the direction that is popularly assumed

There are subjective experiences that people characterize as “aliens”. And the more people talk about aliens, the more exposure there is to the idea of aliens, which leads to more people describing a certain kind of subjective experience as “aliens”.

Subjective experience of something some people characterize as aliens is real (as in: people genuinely have an experience). Does not mean aliens exist in consensus reality.

Name checks out and I’m also immediately curious to ask about it 😆