Otis

Wow! That's a big one. Good luck with that!

Excellent!

Beautiful! How important it is for parents to humble their role in the "moulding" of their child. The child is born with its original nature; every attempt at shaping, no matter how well intended, creates corruption and dysfunction. They are not clay for our concepts and our desires; they are living beings, with their own mind and soul, and access to an unspoken wisdom that most adults have forgotten. The test of new parents, I think, is the test of patience. Can I surrender my need to control this being? Can I allow their inner guidance to blossom and grow, with the least bit of interference? Can I see my role as just the gardener, who tends and prunes and weeds, but does not force or bind? Can I be like the Taoist ruler, who creates the fewest laws, who allows and trusts the organic wisdom of the child? What better gift could we possibly give our kids, than to leave their inner guidance intact? Rather than create an "internal parent" with rules, concepts, shame, shoulds, etc., that will be the basis for their judge and their overall ego, can we be selfless enough to recognize the spark of genius in our child, and just be kind enough to fan that spark into flame? It's a big test. I think this is also a great response to the "power of thoughts" OP.

OK, I'm glad you got something out of it. If you ever feel like sharing a specific gem from the site, let me know.

Excellent response. Instead of giving the kid a list of self-descriptions (which is all reinforcement of ego - how I'm supposed to be), just give them opportunities to discover these traits for themselves. Paulno's list is also excellent, because it is just a reminder of what is already available, not a list of what daddy expects me to live up to (which is a head-trip, not a gift). That list might make a nice poster for the wall, something the child will see and read on their own, many times, rather than something that is force-fed to them.

Hmm.... ... with all due respect, I've spent the last hour or so looking around at his site and conversations, and I guess I'm not seeing the worth in it. I wanted to like it, because I've enjoyed your posts, but it's a whole lot of unpleasantness for one epiphany that doesn't seem that incredibly deep. Yes, I agree that that "I" am an illusion (as a being in any way other than just life itself), and it is surrender of this concept of "I" that opens me to the next step, but that is still just one step along the way. How about surrendering "you"? Ciaran seems totally wrapped up in the "you" delusion (which is, IME, deeper and more toxic than the "I" delusion). How about surrender of perspective? How about surrender of controlling the body? Of controlling the life? Surrender of habit, panic and avoidance? Surrender of yardsticks and hierarchy? Surrender of being right? Humility is not just something that enlightened people are "supposed to do". Humility is the exact action of surrendering the "I". I don't hear anything deeper than "you don't exist" on the site (maybe I haven't found it yet). And the rants are too painful to sit through. I don't know if this guy is enlightened or not, and I don't care. Because he comes across as a miserable human being, and no more insightful than your average troll. I don't recognize any freedom in his words, only attachment to the concept of non-self. Can you at least point the way to something specific that you find worthwhile on the site?

The only question that really matters to me is: how do I choose? Everyone else can have their religion and their nationalism and their fervent beliefs, and that's just the way it is. That's as much how the world is as earthquakes and hurricanes. If I choose to see others as wrong, then I am getting caught up in the same trap that I decry, which is: "I am right, and the rest of you mother f'ers are wrong". That's the issue that I think is important, not what religions teach. It's my need to be right. Personally, I am anti-ism in that I see my personal choice as too sacred, to give it up to authority, method or tradition. That doesn't mean, of course, that religions don't have a great deal to teach me, and I find the most resonance with Zen, Sufism, Yoga, Tantra and Taoism. But they are not "right" any more than any of my other beliefs are. They are merely pointers beyond "right". Likewise, in discussions in these threads, it is vital that I don't cling to my own "rightness" (which includes in it other's "wrongness"), or I will ignore the gifts that others are trying to share with me.

Wild, isn't it? These sticky encodes, these memes that have wormed their way into my brain, to come out later on, as if they were "me"? Why do we find ourselves saying the same thing to our kids that our parents said to us? Not because it's reasonable or true, but because it's what's there. It's been recorded in our brains as some variation of "truth", as part of our "this is what parents say" and so it just comes out. Or for example, "that's what she said" or other culture-wide jokes. Talk about a sticky meme, that became part of the integral social self of many many people.

Good stuff, Scott! I think the stumbling block sometimes is an unwillingness to say: "I am my ego". Instead, we want this rhetorical ego to be taken away from us, so that "I" can now live in Nirvana. But it is precisely "I" which is the source of anguish. Nor will changing my beliefs free me, because it is precisely the process of believing that imprisons me, not just the beliefs themselves. Not that the "I" can be cut out, either, of course. How would "I" cut "I" out? I can only stop. Stop taking my self seriously, stop believing that I see truth, stop trying to be in control, stop making plans and decisions, stop using will, stop, stop, stop. And trust that "I" am only the smaller part, a cluster of functions that has tried to be a homunculus in my own brain, has tried to be a puppeteer of my own body, that has tried to imagine my way out of my own situation. Trust that the full self, the body in which I am contained (but which I cannot truly know), is wiser than "I" am (because it contains me as well as the rest of it). It can use all of this processing power a great deal more powerfully and efficiently than I ever could, so it's time for me to relax, and stop trying so damn hard.

It could also be said that consciousness is not evolving, but just the tools of consciousness (all communication systems, including brains). Brains may just be a way of focusing consciousness, like a lens can focus light. As brains evolve, so then does consciousness have an opportunity to become more localized, and perhaps, more aware. I don't see a special place for humans, though. Whatever it is that follows us will undoubtedly see themselves as the means by which the universe knows itself, and will see the legacy of sapiens sapiens as just a step along the way.

Blasto, I think you might enjoy this (long but) very interesting talk by Peter Russell, who makes a similar argument from a neuroscientist's point of view. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7799171063626430789#

Dear fellow Angelenos, I want to invite you to join me and some friends, each Friday throughout summer, to join in some sword-fighting and grappling mayhem at Santa Monica beach. I bring my shinai (bamboo swords) and foam-covered swords, as well as kendo and hand-to-hand armor, and we engage in friendly combat play. No refs, no points, no bloodlust, just good clean fights. I find it is an excellent way to awaken and move certain elements inside myself, without being caught up in the toxicity of real violence or intense competition. It's choose-your-own-adventure, find your own inner warrior, and go out for pizza afterwards camaraderie. Location: just a bit south of the Santa Monica pier, past the volleyball courts and gymnastics park area, right by the big traveling rings set, in front of the bicycle rental place (blue awning). 5pm until sunset, throughout the summer. PM me, if you have questions or want my cell #. Hope to see (and spar with) some Bums this Friday!

Ah yes, I think I've seen you there before.

I don't understand your question.

My most consistent (and intense) partner/opponent is an SCA alum. Even made his own leather armor. Similar vibe, too, I imagine, in terms of: it's all swashbuckling. We're probably a little less competitive.

Excellent post, Xabir!

Another excellent share! I am definitely going to buy a copy of this for my niece, a teenager who just had her first. I don't know if it will impact on her (she is a thoroughly modern young lady), but even if she reads it once, it may plant some important seeds. For a single non-parent, I spend a lot of time thinking about how I would like to raise my hypothetical children. After all, I've been learning for the last several years, how to raise myself again, this time without the stories. So I'll probably buy a copy for myself, to serve me and the children I would like to someday love and raise. I'm also very curious about the other books in the series. And touch, I hope! Lack of touch is another example of f'd-up parental ickiness modeling. If we experience no touch in our world, it's easy to think that touching our kids is somehow "inappropriate", because expressions of sexuality or violence are destructive. But caring touch is beautiful and important, especially for babies!

I think that both look within and look nowhere are great complementary strategies. Look within is a yang practice, look nowhere a yin one. What is probably not useful is look outside, because it is an illusion. There is no "outside", not that the "I" can directly experience, anyway. The "I" is only tuned into the simulacrum of the exterior world that my habits have created inside my head. The "outside world" is a falsehood, because I only experience my brain/habit's reconstruction of what my senses take in. "Look within" as a practice studies my habits, so I can tell how and why I create the simulacrum. It exposes the ways that I have been creating, imagining, forcing, and believing thus far, so I can leave those habits behind, and embrace freedom. If I don't see it, I can't surrender it. As has been stated excellently above: I don't blame the external world; I merely learn from its effect on my system. "Look nowhere" as a practice steps into the new realm of living, that of surviving without the training wheels of habit. Look nowhere plugs the ego's attention function into "the void" (a phenomenon which can be experienced, but not easily explained), which seems to be where the attention is really supposed to go. When the ego "plugs in", then it also folds up and gets out of the way. At that point, the ego is no longer driving the organism. The organism is living its own (full, free) life, without the petty interference of the ego. Because the organism has been under the sway of the ego/habits for so long, it doesn't know how to live a life yet. It is like a man-child, whose growth has been retarded by the overly-zealous ego acting as puppeteer and micro-manager. So the organism experiences both freedom and clumsiness, when I look nowhere. That is why look within continues to be such a potent complementary practice; because it helps transition the organism from ego to full self, from habit to wu wei.

Sounds great, Steve! For the rest of you: I just got some new armor and fixed some old weapons, so we have capacity for more combatants at any one time. Come play if you can!

Thanks, Adishakti. I am a big believer in growth through play. It's a very different energy than discipline and struggle, and I manage to open up a lot without overwhelming my own system. And it's fun!

Thanks for noticing. Yes, the explorations have been very important for me, on many levels. As much of a silly prank the Rodeo Drive thing was, it has really shook up some of my flinch and flee responses. It's not like my homophobia is 100% evaporated, but that fear of appearing gay has definitely relaxed a great deal.

This conversation reminds me of the following video, which a friend shared on Facebook recently.