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Two sides of ‘distraction’

Distraction(s) may be bad if you truly wish to transcend conflict, but good if you merely wish to avoid it.

To expand on that: its good to ‘face up to reality’ if you suspect that beliefs have nothing to do with reality, but it may be better to distract* yourself from reality if you strongly think/believe your beliefs are real. Because those who take their beliefs to be fundamentally real, create conflicts with reality and with themselves. Those who see the unreal nature of their beliefs have an opportunity to experience peace.

* e.g. TV or other mental entertainment, excessive eating, smoking, mild/moderate drinking or marijuana consumption etc.

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Posted by on January 2, 2013 in Uncategorized

 

On Becoming Enlightened and other New Years resolutions

Many people who say they want to change don’t actually want to fully transform themselves from caterpillar into butterfly. They want to get the benefits of being a butterfly while still holding on to their caterpillar body. They want to be flying caterpillars.

Based on this Adyashanti talk:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-Cs6Tmw5us&list=PL8398AFFC1CED84FE

 
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Posted by on January 2, 2013 in Uncategorized

 

In my experience, sex can often serve as an adequate substitute for chocolate.

 
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Posted by on December 19, 2012 in Uncategorized

 

A cynic is someone who loves to condemn reality for not living up to his expectations

 
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Posted by on November 10, 2012 in Aphorism, Self-deception

 

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A cynic is someone who enjoys criticising those who fall short of (his) false hopes.

 
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Posted by on October 25, 2012 in Aphorism, Definition

 

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A cynic is someone who becomes critical of people for not living up to his false hopes.

 
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Posted by on October 25, 2012 in Aphorism, Definition, Self-deception

 

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I loved my girlfriend unconditionally until she cheated on me.

 
Aside

It is common to confuse spirituality and religion. Perhaps this is because spiritual experiences are often associated with religious practices or environments. This in turn may be partly due to the fact that most people throughout history were religious in some sense or another. But as societies become more secular, and we gain greater insights into human nature, it is easier to tease apart religion and spirituality and so ‘non-religious’ definitions of spirituality become increasingly possible.

Here is my first attempt at such a definition:

“The seeking, description, exploration and celebration of ordinary reality, which is revealed to us when we no longer imagine ourselves to be fundamentally separate from other people or the rest of the universe.” 

Non-religious definitions of spirituality: Definition number 1

 
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Posted by on October 22, 2012 in Uncategorized

 
Aside

Steven Pinker’s article says some interesting things about dignity which – at first glance – appear to clarify it, but in doing so may perpetuate the underlying assumptions which make dignity such a ‘tricky’ concept to deal with in the first place. In other words its a ‘false fix’.

It seems to me that dignity – not unlike self-esteem – is based on a certain set of unquestioned beliefs we have about human beings. These are that : a) people are ‘separate’ from the world and each other b) people have different levels of worth c) the worth that people have is ‘dependent’ on certain situations or states the person is in e.g. being in squalor, out of ‘control’, smelly etc., d) that people deserve at least some ‘minimum’ level of worth as determined by their surrounding situation or personal behaviour.

It is only when I project these beliefs on to others that I think that some people have less dignity than others. A smelly drunk ‘seems’ to have less dignity BECAUSE I have learned to value people in certain ways based on their situation (smelly, dishevelled) or behaviour (socially inappropriate/out of control, slurring speech etc.).

Consequently, if I want to ‘give people back’ their dignity, I merely need to stop taking their dignity away from them – by ceasing to project my beliefs on to them.

After I have stopped taking their dignity away from them by no longer seeing their worth as dependent on their situation or behaviour, I can help them change their situation or behaviour, if appropriate.

You have dignity. Until I think you don’t.

 
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Posted by on October 21, 2012 in Uncategorized

 

Conditional and unconditional open-mindedness

I realised recently that I was not as open-minded as I thought I was. Basically I realised that I am mostly ‘conditionally open-minded’ and not so often ‘unconditionally open-minded’.

When I say ‘conditionally open-minded’ I mean being ‘open’ to new possibilities or ideas but ONLY if my current system of beliefs i.e. scientific, spiritual, political etc. can be imaginatively expanded to ‘fit’ these new possibilities without too much disturbance.

Whether or not I choose to ‘accept’ a new possibility as possible, true or right depends on how much I have to ‘stretch’ my current system(s) of beliefs to fit in this new possibility.

So for example if I were to ask whether ‘telepathy’ might be possible, I can ‘expand’ my scientific beliefs ‘analogically’ as follows e.g. ‘We can obviously communicate with radio waves. Could telepathy be something LIKE communicating with radio waves? In adapting to new environments, species come up with amazing ways of taking advantage of any new forms of information or communication that might increase their chances of survival. Could certain species have learned to take advantage of ‘telepathy’ in the same way? Or when it comes to auras, I can at least ‘imagine’ that an aura might be something ‘like’ an electro-magnetic field around a living body.

But when it comes to things like channelling spirits or life existing outside of a physical body* (heaven, reincarnation etc.), I find it much more difficult to see how this might ‘work’ scientifically – it involves too much ‘disturbance’ to my current system of beliefs and so its more difficult for me to accept that these phenomena might be ‘real’.

So what then is unconditional open-mindedness?

Unconditional open-mindedness is when you are able to accept the possibility of existence of something without a pre-existing system of beliefs at all. This is not the same as ‘gullibility’ because you don’t actually BELIEVE that this thing exists either. The issue of ‘belief’ is left out of the question altogether.

It’s the mind that says ‘I don’t know’, or ‘Maybe’ or ‘Perhaps’ and it does not need to classify something as ‘possible’ or ‘impossible’, ‘true’ or ‘false’, ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

 

* That said, I might be able to ‘permit’ the relaxing of certain long held materialist assumptions e.g. that the brain ‘produces’ consciousness, if it allowed for a scientific theory of great explanatory power and predictive capacity.

 
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Posted by on October 18, 2012 in Uncategorized

 
 
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