Hedgehog's Delima

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Has anyone else heard this term?

In short it's a phrase used to describe a kind of person who has to make a descision about socializing with others.

The closer two hedgehogs come to one another, the greater their risk of inflicting pain upon one another. Hedgehogs must choose between pain and loneliness.

Lately I've been having days where my metaphorical quills are fully deployed. Does anyone feel the same?

i get hedghoggie in supermarkets and shopping centres...i hate any people contact or standing near me.
but then lemme ask you this?
how do hedgehogs reproduce?
gotta be soem prickly dealings there.
huh?

I first heard of it from Evangelion, but it was probably quoted from elsewhere.

At any rate, I can definitely relate. When I try to get closer to people, often I end up hurting them emotionally without meaning to.


I won't tolerate lonliness anymore (I was entirely alone for six and a half years)... but I don't want to go through the kind of pain that triggered that isolation again.

Of course, I know that I won't, because I now have a much better understanding of myself and the world around me than I did back then, but the pain is still there, still real, and mistakes made today build upon it.

It's a very useful illustrative expression.

I can do sociable pretty well, in terms of appearance and outward result. It's extremely rare for that social contact to be relaxing or refreshing, though. It's something I have to do on high alert which is draining.

I'm reviewing my past history, and I suspect that I've put more time into social activities than I've actually enjoyed, or than has actually been to my benefit (Though possibly I've not found the RIGHT social activities). Especially since new possibilities have opened through the internet, I've suspect I will be drawing the cost/benefit line in a somewhat different place in the future.

Any lighthouse-keeper jobs going anywhwere?

I believe this may be based on Schopenhauer´s porcupine metaphor. He says:

A number of porcupines huddled together for warmth on a cold day in winter; but, as they began to prick one another with their quills, they were obliged to disperse. However the cold drove them together again, when just the same thing happened. At last, after many turns of huddling and dispersing, they discovered that they would be best off by remaining at a little distance from one another. In the same way the need of society drives the human porcupines together, only to be mutually repelled by the many prickly and disagreeable qualities of their nature. The moderate distance which they at last discover to be the only tolerable condition of intercourse, is the code of politeness and fine manners; and those who transgress it are roughly told—in the English phrase—to keep their distance. By this arrangement the mutual need of warmth is only very moderately satisfied; but then people do not get pricked. A man who has some heat in himself prefers to remain outside, where he will neither prick other people nor get pricked himself.

Some of his other methaphors on pessimism, and this article at:
http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/s/ ... pter9.html

What does he mean by "a man who has some heat in himself"?

Someone who is sufficiently self-contained not to feel the pressing need to huddle. Even if it's painful, or likely to be.


I once had a female colleague at work unexpectedly invite me round for the evening.
No, she wasn't interested in me particularly. It was just that all her other friends were away or otherwise commited, and she couldn't face even a single evening in her own company. She was desperate, and I got the invite!

It was true, but to me almost incomprehensible.

Hedgehogs reach sexual maturity in the second year after they are born. After emerging from their first winter in hibernation they build up their body weight, and by late April they are ready to breed. The ideal mating time would be on a warm night, usually between May and June.

Mating begins when the male finds a female on his nightly hunting trip. As he approaches her, he makes lots of pig-like snorting noises, and then he shuffles round and round her, trying to gain her attention. This can sometimes go on for hours, as the female is usually more interested in foraging for food than mating. All the male can do is snort louder, and circle closer to her.

If he is persistent enough, the female may give in and allow the male to mate with her. Mating only lasts for a minute or two, but the female must completely flatten her back before the male can mount her, otherwise he could be seriously injured on her spines. After the two separate, the male plays no further part in bringing up the family. If the mating is successful, the babies are born four weeks later.

I think I've heard of that one since I was 4.

hyper alien, do you think if the hedgehog were aspie he woul dbe so persistent?

thansk fo the explanation thou

Yep I heard it on NGE (Neon Genisus Evangelian) and him and Rai defientally seem to be aspies and I defientally think that works with me too.

Duuuude, I can totally relate to that. Thanks. Really gives a name for some things I'm going through.