Hey people(s)!
I’ve been out hiding from technology for a while, and I’ve got a few things to share, and some of it will be a response to my reaction of some of the newer terms in our universe, and some of the more ingrained terms. I’m short on narrative today, but I hope these power points are effective too! I fully expect and hope for reactions all across the spectrum.
attempts to put a point on a nebulous blob Within every blob, there are infinite points, and so while one may find a point in a blob, one cannot find a blob in a point. Be more free in your language, allow what you say to mean more than one thing. Resist the urge to help someone understand what you mean, instead, help others understand what your words mean to them. The truth of your words are never the same after you have spoken them. The best you can get to the original meaning of your words is close.
the last letting go It’s been a great journey, letting go of right and wrong. Yet, we all harbor certain judgments of this and that, righteously ‘in the know’ that those things are definitely right, and definitely wrong. Ceasing judgment isn’t simply adopting a slogan. It’s being yourself in the moment, without apology, and trying understand why no one else needs to apologize, either. If you can accept that we are products of both our nature and our nurture, how could a polluter be ‘wrong’? How could a fundamentalist Christian be ‘wrong’? How could any way of being be ‘right’? Functionality is nature’s only morality.
wage slavery Slavery is coercion. No one is coercing any of you to pay your internet bill, or pay your rent. you are informed by your environment, not coerced by it. By U.S. constitutional definition, wage means to trade one’s time for money. Slavery is not a trade. You may be a slave to your comforts, your parents, even what you think you are ‘responsible’ for, but in no way are you being coerced by anything but yourself. Stop blaming others for your problems, it’s a clever, mechanical diversion from the work it takes to lift the one foot out of the the mental prison you and everyone in your life has been constructing since you’ve been born.
there’s nothing left to die for Everything worth dying for has already been paid for in the price of our ancestors blood. Start living. All of ‘that’ which we are running away from is one large death dance. Start dancing for the living, and the not yet born. Life is for the living, death is for the dead.
spiritual processes What is purity? it is a test that is given out that cannot be passed if you fail to meet certain requirements. How could a belief in a soul be served through purity tests? It can’t be, because impurity assumes that which is present doesn’t belong.
If one is not of indian blood, one cannot eat peyote or hold eagle feathers. If one is not a regular church goer, they are not a ‘true’ Christian. If one is not speaking properly, they are not of one belief or another.
One learns from their environment what is sacred to them. One must answer the call, if one thing feels like it’s going to help you develop your spirituality, then do it. Don’t learn to appease the critics, do not dance their dance. learn your own dance, from your own heart. If you learn anything about anything that isn’t for your own heart or your friends’ hearts, learn to deflect, ignore, and compassionately judo your critics criticism.
deep, direct vulnerability Be not afraid to say something is ‘this’, or something is ‘that’. Mutate what was once right and wrong in your life into a system of meanings discussed between friends. if you wait until the ‘big man’ in your group declares such and such as ‘so’, then one is still buying into the cheap benefits of right and wrong. As a practice, be so vulnerable to being ‘wrong’, from the barbs your critics you develop the hide of a rhinoceros. Claim that which you are moved to claim. Be so ‘wrong’ in the eyes of others, and, what is the same thing, be so ‘right’ in the eyes of others. speak your mind, do not hinge your words on the words of others. The first reaction is the most honest reaction.
You may find that with little practice, the most compassionate action isn’t sharing what first comes to your mind with others, but with yourself. When one speaks, they place themselves into the position of defending the self. Share with yourself your most vulnerable thoughts and reactions. When you do this with your rhinoceros skin, and have more deeply considered your systems of right and wrong, you will find that which is not you disappears upon a glance of analysis, and that which is truly you suddenly seem to appear from nowhere, like a ship suddenly emerging from the fog. One of the riches of existence is discovering potentials of oneself that had been previously suppressed by the reflections of others.
awaken from the dream world The dream world is so called because it has a place; in our dreams. Be awake in the waking world. Please. For the sake of all being. Sleeping when awake, only living in one’s dreams, reveling in the if of the imagination, is the greatest threat of the return to functionality. I’m not talking about your ideas that we lackadaisically call dreams, I’m talking about fantastic realms that have to be artificially created and maintained while other waking work awaits. I’m talking about active passivity, the ‘work’ we do to avoid working. This point will probably be the most misunderstood. That’s okay, it’s not an easy thing to discern. But if one loves music, then play music, don’t just listen to music. If one loves games, then don’t just play games, make new ones. Work, work work. Then, when you are tired, work some more. Work so hard in the waking life that your body forces you to get some dreamtime. then, you will for the first time in your life, know what your waking limit is. Many of us with our record collections, pipe collections, and book collections understand well our dreamtime limits. it’s now time to find balance, but that cannot happen without equal swings on the pendulum.
be good, if you want to Now I spiral into the depths of contradiction here. The bodhisattva is a person who gives over their enlightenment (which you, as a non-worker bee, possess) for the benefit of others. You can become inflation-proof by creating more than financial wealth. There is a million-plus shortage of workers in the non-profit world. You may not be able to afford all your consumer goods, but most pay a living wage and one can create a net-positive value in your community by uplifting others, making your dollar more valuable in the long-run. Help others earn what they receive, rather than be recipients of your tithing. There are billions of dollars of grant money that go unclaimed. Rather than work less and provide for yourself, work more, for the greater benefit. This is all about functionality of society, not judging the capitalists. It is simply not functional to give someone a handout, and that is exactly what many jobs and programs do.
earn your friendships Don’t ask for friendship, give yourself and what you do to people who are able to receive it. When you receive something in return that is useful to you, you have made a friend. do not allow any other arrangements to allow themselves to be claimed as ‘friendship’. Be painfully honest, are you a friend? Do you have friends?
stop arguing If you hear something you don’t agree with, don’t assume you are correct. There are infinite points to be made between what you believe what what the speaker believes, and considering the point above that people can’t know what they exactly what they meant even if they just said it, or wrote it down, you will often observe in written debate ‘belief drift’ where the two writers (or speakers) slowly drift into and out of things that are close to their original intention. Only a robot copy and pastes their original statement over and over again until they ‘win’ the dispute. to stop arguing is to let go of your judgments, and to help your compatriots let go of theirs. This doesn’t mean stop communicating, this means stop taking up positions altogether. If you simply share what comes up for you, honestly, you will be doing as much learning as you may have originally hoped your adversary would be learning. If you must argue, argue to enlighten, not dim the light of others. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, but fear taking a stance in a dialog. The point of conversation is to further your own understanding, not impede the understanding of others.
don’t question your own voice undo your domestication by living out your first impulse. If a worker in a store knocks over a display in your presence, help them if so moved. laugh at them, if so moved. but do not restrain yourself. restraint is a request made by others. whether or not your spirit will gain or lose from your actions should not be decided by others. when you restrain yourself back to worker-bee, you lose the potential to learn. when you lose the potential to learn, you dishonor your brain, you dishonor the possibility of your spirit. be magnanimously wrong, or exceedingly right in the eyes of others; those things are of no matter, but to the domesticated. Every time you stop your impulse, you lose an opportunity to learn.
be contradictory Some of my suggestions seem contradictory. Question yourself, Don’t question yourself. Take a stand, don’t take a stand. I can only explain this very esoterically. A nebulous blob is made of infinite points, but a single point is not a nebulous blob. The blob is ‘of’ points, but not any single point itself. Sometimes you’ll need to remind yourself and others of one or the other. Because of time, you can’t do it all at once. It is okay. contradiction is okay. Purity is not the goal, deepening understanding and functionality is one of many noble goals.
Well, I’m out of steam, I hope the results of my mini-sabbatical can be useful to others.