What aren't you doing?

True. Now, the question is: what is it that makes children gullible? A weak sense of self, sure. But what is it that makes their sense of self so weak? That is the question.

It is restraint, and nothing but restraint, that crystalizes self. What restraint achieves is it concentrates energy. It makes sure that less energy is dissipated than it is accumulated.

Those who surrender to instinct – the way children do – dissipate more energy than they accumulate. And when more energy is dissipated than it is accumulated, what is left to define the self? Nothing.

There are many complicated ways to explain how self becomes solidified, but I think that this explanation is not only the simplest one there is, but also the most accurate there is. I do really think that concentration of energy precedes everything. Thinking, for example, I take to be instinct concentrated. When you restrain yourself from acting in some manner, that action becomes thought (unless it ends up being repressed, of course.)

Growth is the period during which accumulation exceeds dissipation.
Maturity is the period during which accumulation is equal to dissipation.
Decline is the period during which dissipation exceeds accumulation.

This applies on all levels, from individual to societal.

This age of ours is the age of decline where everyone dissipates more than they accumulate. They may be gaining more money than they are losing but they are also losing more energy (strength) than they are gaining. Thus, in several generations, energy/strength will run out, so everyone will become weak and human species will go extinct. So now when you see older people complaining about how new generations are weaker than the old ones, you know what to tell them: it’s because they didn’t bother accumulating anything other than money.

Energy is accumulated through rest. People nowadays do not know how to rest. What they call rest is merely another form of energy dissipation (merely a pleasant form, unlike that of work, which they experience as unpleasant.)

I say it is experience in life, and goals. Self restraint, in itself, does not make a stronger self. Monks are masters of restraint and I don’t see it giving them a crystalized sense of self. Same thing with soldiers. With self restraint, I see their sense of self is diminished.

But that’s a part of natural learning process. First, you need to really know the object in order to control it, not just blindly control it (because somewhere in some book it says it’s bad). Excess energies can be consciously redirected to fulfill another goal, but they should be understood first, lest they already serving some unconscious purpose in some particular way (i.e. catharsis).

Right, there is a danger that one may just become a repressed individual who visualizes a stronger self by emphasizing restraint and thinking. Such individual strikes me as one who’d be eventually too afraid to make mistakes, which would only stunt his growth.

I don’t agree. Often, a loss leads to the greatest growth. Real growth, I mean, not just accumulation of information.

I tend to agree, but because life still keeps going and changing, growth should continue. What you’re referring to is a plateau phase, from which most go back into decline, although not always.

Yes, but life is also very cyclical, and a person may go through this process many times. I say, the more the better.

A lot of time is needlessly wasted, I agree, but I wouldn’t underestimate human specie to make them extinct, just yet. We are facing different challenges and different forms of stress today. We will have to adapt. As far as older generations being stronger, I’ll say this, they may have started working at an earlier age than us, but we will be working well into our (and past their) old age. And if human life span is extended, your children will be working well into their old age.

I don’t know what counts as good kind of rest for you. Most people consider distracting active rest as a good and effective form of rest.

I don’t know much about monks to be able to speak of them, but I can say, with some level of confidence, based on my limited and for the most part only Internet experience with Buddhists, that Buddhists, who are supposed to be masters of restraint, aren’t exactly so.

Buddhists are masters of pain. They can make it go away. But they aren’t masters of restraint.

They do not really restrain themselves. Rather, they merely make themself softer.

Impulsivity is a condition whereby instinct is escaping the control of one’s will.

There are impulsive people whose instinct is escaping the control of their will quite clearly and then there are Buddhists who are retarding, but not overcoming, their impulsivity and who thus appear to be in control of themselves.

I see restraint as life-affirming. It is that which opposes death. Death – and by death I mean more than just death in the way it is normally understood, I mean decline, whether it is slow or fast – death is what occurs naturally.

Things left on their own disintegrate.

In order to remain alive, you must restrain yourself. You must resist the natural course of disintegration.

Buddhists are not really opposed to death. They are actually aligned with it. They celebrate it. This is why they are nihilists.

And what is nihilism but position according to which death (decline) is more valuable than life (ascent)?

Few nihilists are honest about their death-wish. Most hide it behind some sort of idealism, usually involving some sort of afterlife, though this is not always the case (as Baudrillard noticed, the ideal world can also be immanent, taking place within this very world in the form of simulation, rather than transcendent, existing outside of this reality and accessible only after death.)

Nihilism is often defined as a feeling of being uncomfortable with the way reality is. I reject this definition on the ground that this is merely a symptom that may or may not be present. In other words, it is possible to be a nihilist and at the same time comfortable with the way reality is.

Buddhists are such an example. They are quite comfortable with the way reality is. Indeed, they are EXTREMELY comfortable with the way reality is, and it is precisely of this extreme comfort, ironically, that they are nihilists.

Life is a struggle against death.

In the absence of struggle, there is only death.

Buddhists are opposed to struggle against death.

They see struggle as something unnatural, and indeed, struggle is not natural. What is natural is death, not life. And so Buddhists, in a very real sense, are more natural than other people. But to be natural means to align with death. It’s not a good thing.

Nihilism, I define, as a physiological condition where body no longer fights against death but is aligned with it.

Repression is a negative, we agree on this one, but the relevant question is the nature of repression, and this is where I am not sure we are in agreement. Usually, it is said that repression is a consequence of excessive restraint. That’s not how I see it. Repression I understand to be a consequence of trying to do too many things at once. Indeed, repression is a consequence of a lack of meditation . . . This is why Buddhists, and also Osho, are experts at overcoming repression.

There is a difference between what we know we have to do (reason) and what we are inclined to do (instinct.) There is no problem following one’s instinct when instinct is aligned with one’s reason, but when it is not aligned, when reason demands a different kind of action, one has to shape one’s instinct to fit the situation. This means overcoming it to a degree and then using one’s creativity to try out new things. Repression occurs when instinct is not properly overcome before new action is initiated. There must be enough space before new activity can be introduced. You need to create this space by dissipating unnecessary activity (i.e. instinct.) This process of energy dissipation is what meditation is. If you simply tack one activity on top of another, you will become overwhelmed, and consequently, repressed.

In order to dissipate your instincts, you must register them consciously . . . without this registration, it is not possible to overcome them.

You need to be “the watcher” not “the doer”.

If you’re asking the guy, Jakob, depending on how long he’s been floating up there, he might not be considering that it’s time to open his parachute.

We all do that at times.Time to come back to Earth.

Magnus Anderson

So you’re defining true as all things positive and good?

Speaking only for myself here, Magnus, my so-called “true” or “real” self encompasses so much more than the positive and good.
My true self is also those things which others do not see, things which I don’t like to see in myself, things which I am unconscious of in myself, ad continuum.

The true self can be compared to that iceberg - what we see above the surface but ALSO in so much more of a panoramic and in-depth vision, what exists below that surface.

What you mean to say is that you gave your perspective of it.

I’m defining true as what exists in actuality…again, so much more than our good selves. Don’t forget, I am aware that I can be a mean, fierce dragon at times. That is also a part of my “true” self.
Why would you want to whittle a human being down to simply being mature or immature? :evilfun:

amazon warrior.png

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It’s not exactly the nature of repression that we disagree on. Rather, it’s the manner in which we understand the concept of restraint.

When I say restraint, I mean restraint from what is wrong.

I do not simply mean restraint from action. I mean restraint from what is wrong.

We have an inner sense of what is right and what is wrong. More accurately, we have an inner sense of what is wrong. Right is merely whatever is not sensed as wrong. Wrong is primary, right is secondary. Or so it appears.

Restraint, for me, means restraint from what is wrong.

Thus, restraint can never be a negative, it can only ever be a positive.

What people call “excessive restraint” I consider to be a failure to restrain oneself.

Rather than being “excessive restraint” it is “excessive drive to do something in order to avoid doing something else”. This is a subtle point.

Drives increase activity. They increase the speed of motion. They make you more concentrated. When one is on overdrive, when one is too motivated, there is always a feeling of considerable tension. This is especially true when the flow of such energy is obstructed. Then it causes us pain.

The situation is the same when we “restrain ourselves too much”. We feel too tense, indicating that there is a lot of motion within ourselves that cannot freely flow.

Thus, I resonate, that what is normally considered to be “excessive restraint” is in actuality “excessive motivation”.

And people who are “excessively motivated” are clearly not restraining themselves.

It’s important to understand that “excessive restraint” means increase in motivation. What happens is that a drive is added on top of the existing drive. Moreover, the action that is introduced is sensed as being wrong, but the individual nonetheless proceeds to execute it.

To refrain from one action in order to surrender to another is not “excessive restraint” but lack of restraint.

Restraint from action always implies switch to another action. There is no stillness. You cannot not act. You can only change how you act.

The sense of wrong is simply a sense that you have to pay attention to something other than what you’re currently paying attention to.

Thus, what I mean by restraint is restraint from what you’re currently doing in order to do what has to be done.

But this “what has to be done” is determined via pressure. It is not determined by some external authority, some instruction, some holy book or some other abstraction. Whatever exerts the most pressure must be dealt with immediately. Thus, a build up of pressure inside one’s head is a sign that one is not doing what one should be doing. (People nowadays do not think like that. They think that high pressure is fine so as long it allows one to achieve their end. I call such people “hyper-rational”. Note that stronger people are capable of dealing with greater levels of pressure without experiencing any kind of stress. That’s a different story.)

To conclude this post, let’s take a look at a simple example to understand what really happens when one “restrains oneself too much”.

Suppose you are engaged in action A. Now, at some point, you sense that there is something wrong about doing this action A. This is a sign of pressure exerted by some other action that demands your immediate attention. You can choose to stick to action A and ignore this other action, but this will lead to a build up of pressure inside your head, which will be uncomfortable. But you can also choose to switch your attention to this other action B and thus drop the pressure. Now, when you do this, what you do is you refrain from action A in order to give attention to action B. Most importantly, you are restraining from what is wrong: from engaging in action A when you should no longer be engaged in it. Now, you will be engaged in this action B. And at some point, perhaps, you will, once again, sense something wrong. This time, it will be action B knocking on your door, demanding your attention. So what do you do? Again, the right choice would be to switch attention from action B to action A.

This is what’s going on in a nutshell. Restraint here simply means sticking to a drive that exerts the most pressure. Repression means sticking to any drive other than the one that exerts the most pressure. We can call the two drives the fundamental drive, the one that exerts the most pressure and that focuses/concentrates, and the superficial drive, the one that exerts less pressure and that distracts/decentrates. Repression occurs when superficial drive is tacked upon fundamental drive and then maintained in this position for long enough to be noticed. Repression is automatic, it’s what occurs naturally, it requires no effort. In order to dissolve it, meditation must be used. Meditation dissipates these superficial drives and in doing so strengthens the connection to the fundamental drive.

People who are “too strict” are simply people who want to engage in one and the same activity for too long. This naturally leads to build up of pressure, to excessive motivation, as many other drives try to rebel against such a decision by demanding immediate attention but without ever receiving it.

“Excessive restraint” simply means that the return from action B to action A is taking too long, if at all.

There is a natural rhythm and this natural rhythm must be respected. This is what restraint, in the way I use the term, means.

One more thing:

Self can now be defined as a quantity of drives (or energy flows) that comprise it.

True self can be defined as a proper coordination of drives (or energy flows.)

False self can be defined as a lack of coordination between drives (or energy flows.)

I agree with most of what you say here, except for part where you seem to make a claim that a person always knows what is right or wrong in any given situation. I think I have said this to you before in another thread, that under great stress and time constraint, a person may not know what is right or wrong action, partly because his mind is under stress, and partly because he has no time to compute the situation rationally, and so he will rely on instinct for immediate action. Yes, this does not describe a day-to-day decision making process, but it does describe many life-threatening situations. Think battle fields: commanders do the thinking, and soldiers do the trained fighting.

I am not even sure you are in disagreement with me. You may or may not be, all depending on the manner in which you understand the concept of instinct.

Instinct can be understood positively or negatively. When understood negatively, it refers to what is commonly referred to as “surrendering to instinct”.

When I speak of instinct I generally speak of it in negative sense, in contrast to will, which I understand in positive sense.

Note that will is not separate from instinct. It operates on instinct. It is that which determines which instinct you should be paying attention to in real time. It relies on pressure as a guide. Whatever exerts pressure is to receive immediate attention.

What does it mean to surrender to instinct? It means to go too deep into instinct thus repressing every peripheral stimulus.

Will is that which makes sure that each stimulus receives its own slice of attention so that no stimulus goes unregistered.

When stimuli is unregistered, it is pushed into the subconscious, from where it starts controlling the individual without his knowledge.

This is what I mean by “instinct”.

I hope you will agree that this is a bad thing under all circumstances. If you value autonomy above everything else – yes, survival including – then you would agree.

Instinct must be in front of our will, not behind it. We must be conscious of our instincts, not unconscious of them.

I can agree that this is a difficult feat when one is under severe pressure. I can agree that under sufficiently severe pressure even the most strong-willed people will temporarily succumb to instinct. But the superiority of autonomy (will) over heteronomy (instinct) nonetheless remains. The value of autonomy remains the same.

There is an interesting and very important distinction to be made between reason and will.

Reason is about devising a plan of action that has to be executed. In its strictest form, it leaves no room for improvisation.

A plan of action knows what has to be done in advance. It defines what is right in advance and determines what is wrong subsequently as that which is not right.

Reason makes clear separation between planning phase and execution phase. The planing phase is the reasoning phase during which a plan of action is constructed. The execution phase is, well, the phase during which a plan of action is executed.

There is no problem with reason per se. It only becomes a problem when it becomes too strict, leaving no room for improvisation.

The planning phase may or may not be creative. When it is not, we usually speak of people “following rules that have been devised by someone else”. For example, people who adhere to Bible would be an example of people who plan uncreatively. They simply execute what Bible tells them to execute. They do not think on their own. When planning is creative, we speak of reasoning proper. When people who plan creatively act, they are executing plans that they themselves have devised (or thought through, if they have picked them up from somewhere else.)

Similarly, the execution phase may or may not be creative. When it is not, we speak of people who stick too much to their plans, leaving little to no room for improvisation. Again, Christians who adhere to Bible would be an example. Not only do they plan uncreatively, but they also execute uncreatively. Beside Christians, people who know how to think but who do not know how to act would be an example too. They may be able to plan creatively, but that’s not worth much unless they can also execute creatively, which they can’t. On the other hand, when execution is creative, it means that the individual is acting within the rules, but also in his own way, thus allowing his character to be expressed.

Reason is fine so as long both of these phases – the planning phase and the execution phase – are creative. Reason ceases to be fine the moment either one of the phases becomes uncreative and too stuck in the old.

Because the purpose of reason is to produce a plan of action, and because a plan of action knows the exact steps of action to be taken in advance, we say that reason is conscious. When Nietzsche spoke against consciousness and in favor of unconsciousness he was speaking of the danger of reason enforcing strict rules of conduct that allow no room for improvisation, no room for uncertainty, no room for what we were not conscious of in advance.

There is another problem related to reason that arises from its desire to separate planning (= thinking) from execution (= action.)

It must be understood that drives are by their very nature selfish. They want independence. Each drive only desires its own expression and it does so for all eternity, with no end in sight. Drives, on their own, do not work with each other, but against each other.

Because drives are by their nature independent, no drive can lead to any other drive. Thought does not lead to action, nor does action lead to thought. Rather, thought leads to more thought, and action leads to more action.

The seperation of planning from execution leads to danger of either of these drives becoming independent and denying the other drive.

The idea that every action should be preceded by thought is one manifestation of such a denial. We can see here that planning phase has become independent by the fact that it is desiring more and more of itself and less and less of the other, the execution phase.

Eventually, when people realize that thinking is infinite, which manifests itself in the problem of infinite regress of reasons, they start asking questions such as “when should we put an end to thinking?” and coming up with superficial answers that do not deal with the underlying problem.

The only solution is WILL.

Now, will is quite different from reason. For the start, it does not know what has to be done in advance. It merely knows whether what is currently being done is wrong or not. Thus, it defines what is wrong in advance and determines what is right subsequently as that which is not wrong.

The sense of wrong is nothing but the sense that a drive is exerting pressure. It is a sign that one should switch one’s attention from whatever one is doing at the moment to something else, that which is knocking on one’s door of consciousness, desiring to live, to be given its own moment of expression.

Will does not think. It may invoke thinking, but it does not think on its own. What it does is it balances. It determines which drive – and thinking is a drive – will get the spotlight based exclusively on the feeling of pressure.

Thus, under severe pressure, there may be thinking involved, but the kind of thinking that is involved would be different from the one that is involved in peaceful situations.

This is natural because in peaceful situations there is little to no external stimulation whereas in alarming situations there is a lot of external stimulation. It is only natural to respond differently in different situations.

Fixed Cross

What do you mean by “In the end”? How sure are you that people who are psychotic do not meditate?

Wouldn’t that be a bit hedonistic, Jakob? If someone is so deeply rooted in himself, would he need so much meditation? Wouldn’t he be out doing what needed to be done in the real world?

I don’t know about that. It might be in part an individual’s autonomy but it might also be the way in which a person envisions the universe and experiences qualia in connection with that universe which leads to harmony and deep synergy.

Others might cry over that, not laugh happily. Still others might just “see” the silliness and remain poised and balanced.
Is there only just one Buddha?

Sawing logs.

Should you be? :slight_smile:

Yes X 2.

Well that makes two of us. Mine is caused by a snoring congested husband, arthritic pain and a feline kid that decided she needed my attention all night. Both of them are sleeping peacefully now… now that I must be at work soon . Gonna be a long day :slight_smile:

Winding down.

Joker gave the hockey game experience :handgestures-thumbupleft:

:sleeping-blue: :sleeping-sleep: :sleeping-sleeping: :sleeping-yellow:

:sleeping-yellow: :sleeping-sleeping: :sleeping-sleep: :sleeping-blue:

Making friends. :sunglasses: