Very unpopular opinions

[Apech]

1 hour ago, Nungali said:

Harrumph !   

 

Life is great .... then you die and it gets even better ! 

 

In the midst of life we are in death etc.

 

 

[Nungali]

6 hours ago, Apech said:

In the midst of life we are in death etc.

 

 

 

Eh ?

 

Life is University

death, graduation .

Have you chosen your career,

do you know your destination ?

Have you a map of the territory  ?

Do you know  your True Wil ?

Or do you think life

is just time to kill ? 

[Taomeow]

9 hours ago, Nungali said:

Do you know  your True Wil ?

 

 

Taoists see true will as a cooperation between your yang zhi and yin zhi.  Zhi is a shen, i.e. one of the inner "spirits" or, in an earlier system, inner gods.  Yin zhi is the part of your will that is somewhat similar to the concept of "destiny," a kind of hidden hand in your life, and you understand its moves only in hindsight.   "Oh...  so now I understand why a and b had to happen -- if they didn't I wouldn't arrive at c!")  Yin zhi is the part that knows a lot of what's in store for you in advance, and exerts its clandestine influence based on this knowledge.  The other part of your will -- yang zhi, your will on the surface that makes things happen, or tries to -- may sense it and be guided by it, or it may be disconnected from it or resist it.  If both are working harmoniously, you have your true will.  If yang zhi pulls you in the opposite direction or just randomly wherever, or is too weak to catch mice at all, you don't.  It's important to add that all five major inner shens have to pull the weight, otherwise your true will will have a hard time emerging.   

Edited June 14 by Taomeow

[snowymountains]

2 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

Taoists see true will as a cooperation between your yang zhi and yin zhi.  Zhi is a shen, i.e. one of the inner "spirits" or, in an earlier system, inner gods.  Yin zhi is the part of your will that is somewhat similar to the concept of "destiny," a kind of hidden hand in your life, and you understand its moves only in hindsight.   "Oh...  so now I understand why a and b had to happen -- if they didn't I wouldn't arrive at c!")  Yin zhi is the part that knows a lot of what's in store for you in advance, and exerts its clandestine influence based on this knowledge.  The other part of your will -- yang zhi, your will on the surface that makes things happen, or tries to -- may sense it and be guided by it, or it may be disconnected from it or resist it.  If both are working harmoniously, you have your true will.  If yang zhi pulls you in the opposite direction or just randomly wherever, or is too weak to catch mice at all, you don't.  It's important to add that all five major inner shens have to pull the weight, otherwise your true will will have a hard time emerging.   

 

This is interesting, is it by any chance the case that one expresses someone's entire organism and the other one the self/conscious personality ?

 

[Taomeow]

1 hour ago, snowymountains said:

 

This is interesting, is it by any chance the case that one expresses someone's entire organism and the other one the self/conscious personality ?

 

 

To an extent, you could say that yang zhi is more about conscious decisions, choices, effort stimulation -- the playground of the neocortex -- while yin zhi is more connected to the unconscious processes of the mind, the lower brain, and to the visceral processes of the body.  The midbrain serves as "the middle man" in their communications, but if there's disconnects on any level (a very widespread scenario), communication turns into that children's game they call telephone (or Chinese whispers) and becomes mildly, or more often grossly, distorted.  

[Mark Foote]

14 hours ago, Nungali said:

 

Eh ?

 

Life is University

death, graduation .

Have you chosen your career,

do you know your destination ?

Have you a map of the territory  ?

Do you know  your True Wil ?

Or do you think life

is just time to kill ? 
 

 

 

As my father used to say, "You men will whistle while you march!"

 

I remember that now, as I look to "steep, drench, fill and suffuse this body" with "zest and ease", the adjunct to kneading the bath-ball of "one-pointedness" together in the first of Gautama's concentrations.  For me, "zest and ease" comes out of clarity and gravity (or more like gravity and clarity).

 

What a concept.  Ease in a bent-knee posture, held over time.  Whistle while you march.

 

What brightens me up:

 

When “doing something” has ceased, and there is “not one particle of the body” that cannot receive the placement of attention, then the placement of attention is free to shift as necessary in the movement of breath.

 

... I sit down first thing in the morning and last thing at night, and I look to experience the activity of the body solely by virtue of the free location of consciousness. As a matter of daily life, just to touch on such experience as occasion demands—for me, that’s enough.

 

That freedom of consciousness to shift and move, even the thought without the freedom brightens me up.  Look, ma, no Pali quotes!

And now for something more on topic--uh-oh, Pali...

 

Udayin, as an emerald jewel, of all good qualities, might be strung on a thread, blue-green or yellow or red or white or orange coloured; and a [person] with vision, having put it in [their] hand, might reflect; ‘this emerald jewel… is strung on a thread, blue-green… or orange-coloured’–even so, Udayin, a course has been pointed out by me for disciples, practising which disciples of mine know thus: This body of mine… is of a nature to be constantly rubbed away… and scattered, but this consciousness is fastened there, bound there….”

 

(MN II 17, Vol II pg 217; see also AN IV 304-305, Vol IV pg 202-203)

 

 

 

 

Edited June 14 by Mark Foote

[snowymountains]

1 hour ago, Taomeow said:

 

To an extent, you could say that yang zhi is more about conscious decisions, choices, effort stimulation -- the playground of the neocortex -- while yin zhi is more connected to the unconscious processes of the mind, the lower brain, and to the visceral processes of the body.  The midbrain serves as "the middle man" in their communications, but if there's disconnects on any level (a very widespread scenario), communication turns into that children's game they call telephone (or Chinese whispers) and becomes mildly, or more often grossly, distorted.  

 

Thanks, this is interesting, similar concepts exist in Gestalt and PCT ( without specific references to brain anatomy, though what you wrote makes sense ).

 

From the Taoist side of things, do you have any recommended reads on this topic ?

[Nungali]

9 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

Taoists see true will as a cooperation between your yang zhi and yin zhi.  Zhi is a shen, i.e. one of the inner "spirits" or, in an earlier system, inner gods.  Yin zhi is the part of your will that is somewhat similar to the concept of "destiny," a kind of hidden hand in your life, and you understand its moves only in hindsight.   "Oh...  so now I understand why a and b had to happen -- if they didn't I wouldn't arrive at c!")  Yin zhi is the part that knows a lot of what's in store for you in advance, and exerts its clandestine influence based on this knowledge.  The other part of your will -- yang zhi, your will on the surface that makes things happen, or tries to -- may sense it and be guided by it, or it may be disconnected from it or resist it.  If both are working harmoniously, you have your true will.  If yang zhi pulls you in the opposite direction or just randomly wherever, or is too weak to catch mice at all, you don't.  It's important to add that all five major inner shens have to pull the weight, otherwise your true will will have a hard time emerging.   

 

Indeed , Crowley ain't got no monopoly on it .  I assume you have read my comparisons to it and Zoroastrian Khvaranah  ?

 

THIS is a very relevent part to it  (as experienced in 'lineal life' )  :

 

"   "Oh...  so now I understand why a and b had to happen -- if they didn't I wouldn't arrive at c!"

 

Eventually  it all starts 'falling together' and the picture gets clearer , like  fitting the pieces of an unknown image together in a jigsaw puzzle .

[Taomeow]

5 hours ago, snowymountains said:

 

Thanks, this is interesting, similar concepts exist in Gestalt and PCT ( without specific references to brain anatomy, though what you wrote makes sense ).

 

From the Taoist side of things, do you have any recommended reads on this topic ?

 

The first source I came across when taoist "subtle anatomy" was news to me was "The Web That Has No Weaver" by Ted Kaptchuk.  There's a brief "dissection" of the concepts of yin zhi and yang zhi there, alongside a very good explanation of the functions (and dysfunctions) of the other shens.  

 

 

[Taomeow]

1 hour ago, Nungali said:

Eventually  it all starts 'falling together' and the picture gets clearer , like  fitting the pieces of an unknown image together in a jigsaw puzzle .

 

That's close to what I meant in Apech's other concurrently running thread, about ideas, when I wrote "a closed gestalt."  It's similar to a jigsaw puzzle fully assembled -- the last piece falls into place and Eureka!  

[Salvijus]

Unpopular opinion. 

 

Darwin's theory of evolution is no good. 

 

 

Edited June 15 by Salvijus

[Salvijus]

14 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

Taoists see true will as a cooperation between your yang zhi and yin zhi.  Zhi is a shen, i.e. one of the inner "spirits" or, in an earlier system, inner gods.  Yin zhi is the part of your will that is somewhat similar to the concept of "destiny," a kind of hidden hand in your life, and you understand its moves only in hindsight.   "Oh...  so now I understand why a and b had to happen -- if they didn't I wouldn't arrive at c!")  Yin zhi is the part that knows a lot of what's in store for you in advance, and exerts its clandestine influence based on this knowledge.  The other part of your will -- yang zhi, your will on the surface that makes things happen, or tries to -- may sense it and be guided by it, or it may be disconnected from it or resist it.  If both are working harmoniously, you have your true will.  If yang zhi pulls you in the opposite direction or just randomly wherever, or is too weak to catch mice at all, you don't.  It's important to add that all five major inner shens have to pull the weight, otherwise your true will will have a hard time emerging.   

 

There's an easier answer imo. Whatever you truly desire at the bottom of your heart. At the deepest part of who you are. That is your true will. Your True driving force in life. 

 

If I was to spoil the answer. It would be love. And it's not your will. It's God's universal will for all life. 

Edited June 15 by Salvijus

[Taomeow]

Did I miss the switch from Very Unpopular Opinions to Very Popular Platitudes?   

[Salvijus]

49 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

Did I miss the switch from Very Unpopular Opinions to Very Popular Platitudes?   

 

If it is so popular then why did you fail to think of it? 

 

And if you think there's a better answer than the "cliche" one. By all means, let me hear it. The stage is yours. 

 

Edited June 15 by Salvijus

[snowymountains]

10 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

That's close to what I meant in Apech's other concurrently running thread, about ideas, when I wrote "a closed gestalt."  It's similar to a jigsaw puzzle fully assembled -- the last piece falls into place and Eureka!  

 

And then, after a little while, a new one opens, per Gestalt.

[snowymountains]

10 hours ago, Taomeow said:

 

The first source I came across when taoist "subtle anatomy" was news to me was "The Web That Has No Weaver" by Ted Kaptchuk.  There's a brief "dissection" of the concepts of yin zhi and yang zhi there, alongside a very good explanation of the functions (and dysfunctions) of the other shens.  

 

 

 

Thank you, it's really interesting that a lot of things have indirect roots in Taoism, at least as far as a philosophical level is concerned.

This one has also been rediscovered independently eg in PCT, which has different philosophical underpinnings. But Gestalt is so aligned with Zen and apparently with Taoism that I cannot but feel it must had been directly influenced by them.

[Salvijus]

For gestalt therapy to be a complete system it has to realize that to really heal all sense of incompleteness it has to focus on that which is beyond incompletness and is always perfect. Current gestalt system fails to realize that there are false ways to try to heal unfinished gestalts aswell. And you can spend decades getting nowhere. Or even worse, arrive at a false sense of completeness. If the makers of gestalt had been a bit more wise. They would've taken all the wisdom from buddhism and not just tiny bits of it. Because now it's a very water downed system that's barely effective. But then it would just be called buddhism. Not gestalt. 

Edited June 15 by Salvijus

[snowymountains]

16 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

For gestalt therapy to be a complete system it has to realize that to really heal all sense of incompleteness it has to focus on that which is beyond incompletness and is always perfect. Current gestalt system fails to realize that there are false ways to try to heal unfinished gestalts aswell. And you can spend decades getting nowhere. If the makers of gestalt had been a bit more wise. They would've taken all the wisdom from bhuddism and not just tiny bits of it. Because now it's a very water downed system that's barely effective. 

 

Actually Gestalt is a very good therapeutic modality and very effective. What you say about Gestalt honestly sounds removed from its reality.

 

The issue Gestalt is facing is that because by its very nature its not as structured, it cannot qualify for being evidence-based and these days this is an issue because this implies that as a modality it cannot be applied in scale e.g. throughout a healthcare system, it relies on having a good therapist.

 

Now, whether evidence based therapies, which also are excellent, truly work without a good therapist is a different discussion. When 15% of outcomes are determined by technique/modality and 30% by the therapeutic relationship, anyone can make an intelligent guess.

 

Anyhow I won't go more into Gestalt as it's off topic.

 

On plus side, the advantage of the evidence based approach is that it also stops spiritual practices, like Buddhism, to be masqueraded by malpractitioners as therapies, because they're not.

Edited June 15 by snowymountains

[Salvijus]

36 minutes ago, snowymountains said:

On plus side, the advantage of the evidence based approach is that it also stops spiritual practices, like Buddhism, to be masqueraded by malpractitioners as therapies, because they're not.

 

There is no other way to bring real peace to the mind except by aligning your life with the truth. So spirituality is the only legit therapy out there. Every other means to bring peace to the mind is fool's gold. Unfortunately it sometimes works. Like people drink themselves into numbness etc. And unfortunately there are many such foolish endeavors in the world going on. Therapy because it contains the elements of buddhism has some value. But if it contained the whole of buddhism then it would really begin to shine. 

 

Edited June 15 by Salvijus

[Salvijus]

33 minutes ago, snowymountains said:

Actually Gestalt is a very good therapeutic modality and very effective. What you say about Gestalt honestly sounds removed from its reality.

 

At least you could've made some arguments to back your statements. That middle part of your comment was just random information. 

 

Edited June 15 by Salvijus

[Maddie]

10 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

 

There is no other way to bring real peace to the mind except by aligning your life with the truth. So spirituality is the only legit therapy out there. Every other means to bring peace to the mind is fool's gold. And there are many such foolish endeavors in the world going on. 

 

 

The problem with this statement would be, which spirituality are we talking about? And how can you demonstrate that your statement is correct? 

Edited June 15 by Maddie

[snowymountains]

7 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

 

There is no other way to bring real peace to the mind except by aligning your life with the truth. 

 

 

Whose truth?

 

7 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

 

So spirituality is the only legit therapy out there. Every other means to bring peace to the mind is fool's gold. And there are many such foolish endeavors in the world going on. 

 

 

Spirituality is not therapy.

 

4 minutes ago, Salvijus said:

 

At least you could've made some arguments to back your statements. 

 

 

Perhaps back yours on Gestalt? Or alternatively eg read a book about it before making statements about it?

[snowymountains]

1 minute ago, Maddie said:

 

The problem with this statement would be, which spirituality are we talking about? And how can you demonstrate that your statement is correct? 

The "truth" 😁, that one, yes 😁

[Maddie]

5 minutes ago, snowymountains said:

The "truth" 😁, that one, yes 😁

 

Is this the lion cub's truth that mom is good because she feeds him?

 

Or the gazelle's truth that the lion is evil because she hunts them?

Edited June 15 by Maddie

[snowymountains]

Just now, Maddie said:

 

Is this the lion cubs truth that mom is good because she feeds him?

 

Or the gazelle's truth that the lion is evil because she hunts them?

These are false dichotomies which keep people away from "the truth"(TM) 😂