Ego & Identity

The Cruelty of Astrology

Submitted by Stephen on

In recent times I've been chatting to various folk who held, shall we say, interesting beliefs.

One of which is that of Astrology.

Now it seems to me, Astrology in any of its forms, be it modern/Western or the traditional, are by their nature, cruel, insofar as they limit people to particular boxes of qualities and characteristics.

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Implied hierarchies

Submitted by Stephen on

I noticed on a forum yet again reference to 'implied hierarchies' ... how we need special training, rituals, meditation, special potions and so forth to advance to the next level of 'spiritual awareness'. And worst of all, how our egos are inhibiting us from getting 'there'.

All of which implies, or explicitly states that we poor humans are 'less than' some perceived higher authority, spirit, God etc.

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Simple Tools for Clarity, Understanding and Betterment

  • Simple Tools: for Clarity, Understanding and Betterment.Simple Tools: for Clarity, Understanding and Betterment

    Table of Contents

    • Figure 1: Some clarity would be nice
    • 1. The Stretch Tool
    • Figure 2: Flapping in circles?
    • 2. The Choice Tool
    • Figure 3: Real-ising possible into actual
    • What's so wrong with perfection?
    • Reluctant to stretch?
    • Figure 4: Evolution of us
    • 3. The Big Now Tool
    • Figure 5: 'Little now' within 'BIG now'
    • Relationships to reality
    • Figure 6: Possible, probable, actual
    • Playpens of life
    • Space-time aspects of masculine and feminine
      • Bosons
      • Fermions
    • Figure 7: Reasons to relate
    • Creatively keeping, or keeping creative
    • Figure 8: Free-will and Fate
    • Hierarchies?
    • Figure 9: Childhood: Good vs Bad Oppositions
    • 4. The Make-Like-Einstein Tool
    • Single-minded
    • Odd one out
    • Ignore the Over-dog
    • As natural as
    • Play with it
    • The Future As
    • 5. The Cycle Tool
    • Figure 10: The past "pushes"
    • Happened futures
    • Quality over quantity
    • Figure 11: Heart and Head
    • Figure 12: Focus, while embracing possibilities
    • Common as
    • Detaching from detachment
    • All together
    • 6. 3 .. 2 .. 1 ..
    • Figure 13: Co-Operated
    • (7) Additional
    • Figure 14: Cycled realities
    • Figure 15: The Totality of One and All

The danger in "being offended"

Submitted by Stephen on

There is, in my opinion, a troubling trend in our modern societies, when people respond with "I find that offensive".

In basic terms to take offence is to blame others for how one feels, which places the responsibility and choice of one's own emotional states with another. As Viktor Frankl so succinctly explained "the last of human freedoms (is) the ability to choose one's attitude in a given set of circumstances".

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The subtext of 'being offended'

Submitted by Stephen on

In recent times I've observed a growing trend for people (e.g. in online forums) to write "I find that offensive" in response to someone's ideas or opinions.

So I penned a few words and submitted them to an online forum.

---------------------------------

In my experience, online forums are relatively feckless forms of communication, in that they lack the immediacy of face-to-face interactions. Venues at which people get to meet and really dig deep (e.g. via Bohmian/OpenSpace/World-Cafe style groups) can be extraordinary experiences.

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An elegant life

Submitted by Stephen on

I recently chimed into a forum discussing the subject of quantum physics, and the implications thereof.

Out of which came some ways of explaining my views in a more 'elegant' manner.

Following are my edited excerpts of my final few posts to this forum:

------------------------

Years ago, when in a self-development course, the teacher said "you're 100% responsible for your reality" ... me, in response "nah, that can't be true" (in class), He, "it's 100%". Me, "Nah, it can't be because ... yadda yadda". Class now cranky with me, an upstart who won't sit quietly and obediently listen.

Long story short. It is a literal 100%. I've done a lot of work over the years to nail the mechanics of how that can occur.

But here's the thing. If not 100%, then what figure is it? 100% has a certain 'purity' to it that I found compelling.

Science can't get near that 100%, blaming chance, or randomness or god knows what else. That's inelegant.

100% is elegant.

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Points to remember

Submitted by Stephen on

As mentioned in "Let's get clinical" and "for the 100th time", I've noticed a penchant for many people to believe in limiting systems.

Unfortunately, I forget on occasions the same very principles that I espouse.

A recent example was that of a lovely woman who professed to be an astrololger. Instead of my inviting her to consider some examples of  dynamic and fluid potentials available to her, I joked about her beliefs in a condescending manner. Not good.

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The art and discipline of happiness

Submitted by Stephen on

When chatting with a friend recently we discovered that we had (independently) come to a similar place in our lives — a wonderfully light, free and peaceful place.

We found that we each had arrived at this place by doing something exceedingly simple — we had finally "let go" blaming others, or blaming "out there" or "suffering" blame from others, or suffering or feeling lonely, or ...

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Consider some stuff

Submitted by Stephen on

I often hear of, or run across people who espouse all sorts of ... well, quite frankly, incoherent, silly ideas and beliefs.

Here's a few ideas that might reset standard thinking.

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Consider some "stuff" of which the entirety of existence is composed. Not physical, not even necessarily spiritual. Let's just call it "stuff".

Now, this "stuff" is, by definition, literally everywhere, in everything, everyone one, every thought, God, Evil ... it's literally everywhere. In fact there is no place it is not. Given its ubiquity, we can say it is "one-stuff"1.

If we want to believe that some spiritual beings or others are not composed of this one-stuff, we need ask of what they are made. Whatever that is, it will ultimately need to be made of said "one-stuff" in that said one-stuff is the ground stuff of all existence. No exceptions.

Now it gets interesting.

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