a razor’s edge
I have no final conclusions, but the experiences of my life have ranged from trying to become something, to acquire something, to seeing that there is nothing one can add to what actually is. And it now seems to me that the warrior’s path is some middle way, some joining of these seemingly contradictory worlds. But it’s very difficult for me to find any purpose in this. I feel quite certain that the outcome of all this labor is nothing more than being able to claim controlled folly over folly; and I’m equally certain that there is no controller – that what we call control is merely accepting what is rather than resisting it, but there is no control or controller other than spirit, and there is no personal link with spirit – how could universal spirit be personal? Maybe it’s both and neither.
Anyway, as I said – no final conclusions; I still wonder at what a warrior actually is, what the whole picture will look like when I can see it all instead of portions. But today, it seems like a lot of work for nothing but the illusion of controlling folly and I’d rather just watch it arise. Maybe I’m more inclined towards seeing than sorcery. I just don’t see any point to it. And to act towards it (sorcery) anyway, as a not-doing or something, would just be artificial at this time.
So how are things going for you guys and girls? Are you finding what you’re looking for in CC’s work? Is there fulfillment or do you not expect to ever be fulfilled? What will it take for you to say to yourself, “This is it. This is what I dreamed it would be like. I’ve accomplished my quest.”? Or will there be eternal longing?
D5 Creation
My natural reaction to events is quite predictable. I have an automatic response for just about everything that happens. Without any deliberate intervention, my life is a constant repetition of the same conflicts which end the same way. If I modify my behavior during a conflict, it does not end the same way. I am trying to modify my behavior to produce the desired effect. Most times, it doesn’t work. I find that modifying my behavior in any way at all distances me emotionally, so if it doesn’t end well, that isn’t as big a deal. Also, if I choose to act angry briefly, before I am angry, I have a lower probability of doing something really stupid. The problem here is that if I act angry, I will definitely become angry. I can keep up the act for a few minutes without getting lost in the role, but no more. I initially tried to limit myself to socially acceptable behavior, but that is too big a handicap when no one else has such a limitation. I don’t think impeccability is about right and wrong. I think it is about automatic or not.
When I act like an automaton, I am miserable. When I play these games with my behavior, I’m not miserable. That is my bottom line.
I don’t like the idea of accepting what is. That leads to complacency, which leads to wasting your life.
Like you say, there is no purpose. All I can do to describe what drives me is what Carlos called functional purpose, seeing energy. He (or DJ) has said the term sorcery isn’t adequate. It means nothing to me.
Before you say I’m just quoting his books or regurgitating what he has said, Tensegrity has given me a glimpse at seeing energy directly. So far it has been fleeting. When I see a portion of the outlines of the luminous egg with my body, the urge of my eyes to take the lead automatically re-engages the interpretation system we are all sick of. Another thing is when it has happened, it had nothing to do with me ‘doing’ anything, it just happened. It was startling. The feeling it produced was one of longing. It seemed to give me an inkling of what Don Juan was saying about how the bond between a man and woman is superficial (or something like that). The real longing is for the energy body. That’s what feels like has awakened or is awakening, or is trying to awaken.
And before you say there is nothing to do in order to awaken, I mean having the courage to ‘un-shield’ from friends and people around you. For me, people are trimmings. It takes a certain amount of intent to discard most of that. By ‘that’, I mean dealings with our fellow men. I think it’s easy to remain stuck to interaction with discussion about controlled/uncontrolled folly.
I’m reminded of an Al Pacino quote from The Godfather Part III:
“Just when I think I’m out, they pull me back in”
The question then remains: After seeing energy, then what? I reckon the act of totally cancelling out this interpretation system would give the answer. Or maybe it wouldn’t. I don’t know.
Hi Crow.
The definition of what is is that it is whether you like the idea or not, whether you accept it or not. What is is what is – there isn’t anything else. It is much more automatic to think we can reject what is, than to accept what is – by ‘accept’ I mean to just see it. To see what is instead of seeing our thinking – our interpretation of what is, our desire for what should be. All that is escapism, which I used to think was wasteful.
What we really don’t want to accept about what is is our thoughts about it. What is is always perfectly fine; our thoughts about what is make us want to change it, to want it to be something else. It already is something else (it’s everything else) – we just have to stop thinking about it with our past, our knowledge.
I’m not clear if your bottom line is to not be miserable or to not be an automaton. Are you clear on it?
I think there are people who like the idea of not being an automaton, but really have no realisation of what that entails. Do you realise that you can’t have any knowledge, any idea of a self – the being called “Crow” – in order to not be an automaton? As long as you have knowledge, your life will be experienced through that knowledge, and thus be predictable and automatic. If you want to alter your life by altering your knowledge, you can do that. But is that being free, or is that choosing a new automaton? Maybe you wouldn’t feel miserable if you could choose whatever automaton whenever you so desired. And when you get there, will the automaton that you are now be any less free than any other automaton that you can become? Does ‘options’ = not miserable? Or does being free of the self that holds the knowledge of what constitutes miserable and not miserable….
I want to choose whatever automaton I so desire. Whatever emotional response I have to an event, I will acknowledge it. I will choose whether I will act on that emotion or not. I will choose whether I will act as though I feel differently than I do. I want to have the nerve to follow it through to its conclusion.
We disagree on acceptance. Acceptance can mean yes I agree and I’ll go along with it, or no I don’t agree and I’ll go along with it, or I don’t give a shit and I’ll go along with it. You are supporting I don’t give a shit and I’ll go along with it at all times. This doesn’t work for me. I have tried it. It made me a pawn in a game that I didn’t like. I reserve the right to play a pawn in a game that I like, or to decline if I don’t like the game. I will support I don’t give a shit and I’ll go along with it only if I really don’t give a shit. I will not try to convince myself that I shouldn’t give a shit.
I don’t have the same idea of freedom as everybody else here. I am not going to fly past the Eagle. I am going to die. I am not going to take back my edge from my children and volunteers are not accepted into sorcery.
For me freedom is the ability to choose whatever automation I so desire, whether I will go along with something or not, and in what manner I will redefine myself.
forfuckssake:
Have you tried squinting or closing your eyes during Tensegrity? I wonder if it would help your seeing. Closing your eyes would probably improve your form anyway.
No, I haven’t Crow. Just tried to stare into Infinity with unbending intent (as far as I can comprehend what that is, for now). That means eyes wide open and clear.
For you, does squinting also mean a kind of blurring of the eyes?
What do you mean by “improve your form”?
My initial reaction is that closing the eyes would weaken the link with the spirit, thus diminishing the amount of redeployed energy. That “link with the spirit” is a borrowed quote from my kung fu instructor 😉
Or from another angle, in the vein of Daoism:
For Tensegrity, eyes open.
For Recapitulation, eyes closed.
Open. Closed. Open. Closed.
(For the jist of this last bit, think Homer Simpson: America. Australia. America. Australia.)
At some point (like the yin and yang symbol where the extreme of one polarity reverses itself, ie. black into white and white into black), your eyes remain open while recapitulating and closed while performing Tensegrity.
Also, the possibility that it eventually becomes irrelevant- a kind of non-duality…
You could be onto something, Crow.
Erm, that’s enough rambling from yours truely! Heh, heh.
Today I am in a different place than when I started this thread and it’s impossible to recreate the moment I wrote it, so if my responses seem discontinuous, they are.
There are many things I won’t go along with in any given moment. I dont support not giving a shit and going along with it at all times. I don’t support anything “at all times”? Every time is new and immediate and will not be a reaction from the past/knowledge if one is alive and aware.
I would never suggest to anyone to try and convince themselves to not give a shit. When you see, you simply won’t be able to give a shit. Trying to add supposed qualities of seeing to the non-seer is not the way. Not giving a shit, as you call it, is not something to be added, but something that is left when the self (importance) is taken away. And that taking away cannot be done by the self. The self cannot remove the self without continuing itself. Nothing has to be removed. The non-self is. The self is not. This is just seen.
I don’t disagree with your acceptance. But we are talking from different places on acceptance.
The actual action of acceptance is very clear and obvious for me – it is or isn’t. Whatever comes up in a conversation or inner dialogue or as a thought, no matter how fleeting, is accepted or we wouldn’t think it. We can make efforts to not accept such things, but that’s just proof that we have, and are, accepting them. Non-acceptance exists as an idea only, not as a reality. You never become aware of something you don’t accept. But you don’t have to go along with anything that you accept – you can go against it, which will consume alot of energy. The solution is to be the nothing-source which these thoughts are arising in. That’s where non-acceptance exists, and yet you wont be able to say or know that when you’re there; no such idea will occur to you. So non-acceptance doesn’t really exist there either.
“For me freedom is the ability to choose whatever automation I so desire, whether I will go along with something or not, and in what manner I will redefine myself.”
I see. Then it’s a matter of deconstructing your identity and being able to remain in a somewhat deconstructed state (fluidity) in order to respond to life’s situations in a way that benefits you? Is this a fair description? Would the benefit be solely energetic or would it involve something more like getting what you want? Not that it concerns me or that you should answer me, but I’d ask myself that question.
Hi forfuckssake.
I hadn’t noticed your post earlier. It appears we were posting at the same time and yours snuck in under mine.
By sorcery vs. seeing, I was referring to DJ’s definitions, which I’ve outlined in a topic by that name (sorcery vs. seeing). Sorcery was not an adequate term to describe or encapsulate DJ, yet it does describe a way of knowledge… there are some people who do fit the term “sorcerer” according to the definitions given. But outside of conversation, the name means nothing to me either.
I won’t say you’re just regurgitating. I was fucking with Bratschewarrior because he was fucking with me. That was our “agreement”. I’m not naturally hostile or accusative. I don’t really care myself whether people are repeating books or not. I love books. I think it’s hypocritical to read books and yet object to people sharing book knowledge – why does it matter? I only bounced that back at Bratschewarrior because it appeared to matter to him/her. I wouldn’t say anything like that myself.
“And before you say there is nothing to do in order to awaken…”
I must be sounding like a broken record. You’re trying to head me off before I throw my ready-made knowledge at you. I’m really not that way. It’s unfortunate if people read my posts to some particular individual and then assume I’ll post the same to them. I start fresh each time unless the conversation is building on some particular knowledge or point of contention. I don’t know you and I have no prepared plan of where our conversation should lead. I accept whatever you have to say unless I see something that seems contradictory, at which point I may bring it up and see what you have to say. But I’m not interested in proving or disproving anyone. I’m interested in sharing ways to be more aware.
I really like your response. I didn’t have any anti-thoughts towards it.
Can you tell me anything more about functional purpose? I’m not familiar with CC’s use of that term. Is it synonymous with seeing?
I like the wording. For me, being without knowledge is a state of functional awareness. That is, without past knowledge as a reference, I am functioning in the immediacy of whatever presents itself to my awareness… I am acting directly on what is actually occurring and not re-acting to any mind-knowledge substitutions or projections. And I feel like that is the beginning of seeing. Does that sound like it concurs with you and your experience?
Can you tell me what it was about tensegrity that led to seeing? I mean, do you feel it was the actual exercise, or a state of awareness you fell into during an exercise, or the response to energy freed up by the exercise…? You said tensegrity gave you a glimpse and then you said it had nothing to do with you ‘doing’ anything. Do I interpret that to mean tensegrity led to an absence of you as “the doer”? I realise that an explanation may not fall simply into one of my questions, but if you can shed any more light on it, I’m interested.
I don’t know… magic? 🙂
What I was trying to describe was seeming somewhat contradictory to me so I guessed it might to someone else too, but not necessarily anti-thoughts.
From your response (and after re-reading my post) it may appear to a reader that I’ve seen more than I have; something like smoking a cigarette, acting ‘cool’ and dropping the line, “Ya know, I’ve seen energy.” Like I’ve “made it”, or something. I’ll repeat that it was fleeting. As soon as I saw something, it was a feeling of elation, liberation. The longing came a split-moment afterward (or simultaneously) when I tried to grab onto what was happening. I say ‘grab onto’ because it was (and is) independent of my volition or anyone else’s.
I got the bodily sensation that we all see energy all the time. We’re just not conscious of it. Like described in the book, Tensegrity makes it conscious. I think obsession with interaction (whether controlled or uncontrolled) is a main contributor to keeping it unconscious. It distracts us. The point Carlos makes that the effect of Tensegrity has to come by itself and that this can’t be stressed enough seemed to reinforce itself for me.
Of course, I view forums as a form of interaction, a way of occupying the mind. Talking about stalking thoughts in another thread: While on a forum like this, for me it goes something like, “You could be doing Tensegrity right now. Or recapitulating. Why are you really on here? What purpose does it serve? You’re just trying to build/uphold a reflection of being a warrior. Get real and close the option to turn back.”
For now, writing all this out seems a way to clarify my thoughts. But that could just be an excuse, a reason to remain attached to words. What’s that quote in The Wheel of Time? “Words keep us grounded”
I forget exactly where I read the term functional purpose, either in one of the many interviews Carlos or the Witches did or in one of the notes from the Tensegrity workshops. Essentially, I think it is synonymous with seeing. Using that as a reference point for what you choose to do with your attention, as opposed to letting relationships dictate your time or concerning yourself with what others think of you. But I could be talking out my ass. Actually, I’m definitely talking out my ass!
Thanks for the reply.
I started to respond to your post and I came across the answer that I was looking for and asking you about. In my experience, it’s the “saturation” in Tensegrity and other practices that opens the door for non-volitional awareness and seeing. I emphasize saturation as the “key joint” in the Tensegrity “machine”. Tensegrity is one way of “clothing” saturation.
Being “immediate”, “functional” or “present” are other forms of saturation – the opposite of “skimming”.
Thanks. A succinct explanation.
From that, I could say that when I saw something and tried to “grab onto it”, the automatic reaction was for the “skimming” to re-engage or to re-affirm itself.
forfuckssake:
I ask you to close your eyes or squint during Tensegrity for three reasons.
1) My daughter is a seer. She sees with her eyes closed. I have also seen fleeting glimpses and every time, I have been squinting. Just enough light past the eyelids to make out the (tonal) shape. I have read that men are incapable of seeing with their eyes closed, but True says no.
2) It is my understanding that Tensegrity works primarily because the practitioner becomes immersed in the activity, effectively cutting off the internal dialogue. Although the movements themselves may do something, it is the focus on doing them just so that really matters. Martial arts forms are not intended as tools to affect energy, but they are intended as tools to improve focus and balance. A valuable tool for mastering a form is to do it with the eyes closed. You have to really concentrate to know where the hell you are.
3) If you learn to see, maybe you can teach us.
True:
When I wrote my previous post I started with a dicussion on symmantics, re-read your previous post, determined it wasn’t a matter of symmantics, and edited my reply. Now, again, I think it was just symmantics. I think you use “accept” the way I would use “acknowledge”. You did not imply a judgement when I thought you did. If that is right, then I agree, Acknowledgement is the first step. Then you have to decide whether or not you will go along with it.
My hopes and desires are corrupted by my arrogance and my fear. I can’t trust what I want. My behavior is to be determined by whim, or by probability analysis.
By the way, I am not a probability expert. If I make errors in my math, who cares? The point is to avoid fear and arrogance.
I feel for you Crow. I wish I could help you see that it’s impossible to avoid things. That’s not a working path. It should be apparent that it hasn’t worked so far. Fear and arrogance are still concerns for you, so whatever you’ve been doing up to this point hasn’t worked.
If you don’t mind my advice, I’d stop trying to avoid them and just simply notice them when they arise… try to see what they are, what their source is and to whom they belong. Who or what is it that is feeling this fear, this arrogance? Is it not the tonal that is afraid to die, afraid to be exposed as a lie, and has developed arrogance as a shield, as an effort to continue its lie that it has things figured out and under control? Is not this tonal already dead? It has no future and no present… just a past that it must keep repeating in order to give itself the illusion of continuity.
I have led you with answers, but do not accept them. You have to see to whom this fear and arrogance belongs for yourself. To name it “tonal” doesn’t change anything at all. Our knowledge of the tonal is not equal to seeing what the tonal actually is. When it is seen for what it actually is, it may not stop altogether, but it doesn’t need to. It just needs to be removed as an extreme and put in its true place as another of the million items on the tonal – no more and no less than any other item. The emphasis that avoiding gives to these items makes them seem to be greater than they are, worthy of concern. Nothing in the tonal will survive. The tonal is concerned with itself as another effort to perpetuate this false continuity.
Who is it that peers out from behind your eyes? When your awareness looks behind your eyes, does it find the back of your head or infinity? The tonals items are happening, arising, in this awareness/infinity/nagual. This is the proper perspective for someone to choose their automaton, to stalk an identity, to emphasize and de-emphasize items at will. But all the items have to be made equal first. Avoiding and desiring make the prerequisite of equality impossible. Then you have to find out how to choose without desiring. B) That requires intent. Intent cannot go against what is, whereas all desiring (and avoiding) goes against what is.
Good luck Crow.
I hope the statistics favor you. 😉
ps. What was said about fear and arrogance goes for hopes and desires too. Hope is the tonal’s effort to project itself into a future… to maintain an appearance of continuity and reality.
Thank you True. I appreciate your advice. I think I get what you have been saying now.
Sweet. May the knowledge become power for you. Which means that something has to die. Maybe you’ll be noticing an influx of crows again. 🙂
Three of four years ago when I was living and breathing Castaneda everyday, life seemed so much clearer.
Not doing was enough. It was the easiest thing in the world to do because there was no right or wrong to it. Everything had an edge of mystery that covered enough of the semantics that the imagination would fill in the rest. There was a comfortable lack of sobriety. The desire was clear – it was for power and understanding, what else could it be for? Freedom? Freedom from what?
Behind the every fanciful intent to lose self-importance lurked visions of power and seduction, to conquering this gate and that… these concepts were far enough removed from everyday awareness that they cast no real shadow of responsibility. And there were so many validators along the path that the world was alive and responsive!
And now some years on, branching into Tao and the 4th Way. All similar concepts, all pointing at the same thing, the mind, the centers… the terminology describing the process, the levels etc… It ‘s all the same on paper.
You know what it actually feels like? Leaving your first school where you know everybody and everything about the school. You like it there because it feels so familiar but at the same time you’re bored sick by its familiarity and yearn for something different, something new. It would be nice to have the new thing come to you in your familiar surroundings, keeping them as they are, but then they wouldn’t really be new would they? No you have got to change schools, start at the bottom where you suddenly know no-one. Meet new friends, learn in a different style. So what’s it to be? The sickly familiar everyday?
But imagining the alternative and doing the other are like being told what an apple tastes like and actually biting into an apple and tasting it for oneself. I had to jump off backwards when I did a bungee jump. And thats what it feels like now, that I am bored shitless with repeating the same shit over and again and yet I watch myself do it over an again! I say I! Not that there’s anything wrong with that either – you know I think that’s what really gets me more than any of it – its the fact that there is nothing wrong with it, judgement is just another trick the mind uses against itself… that tangles the knot even tighter… And even saying this is just another example. The idea always gets in the way, particularly the ideas about oneself…
But say we get to a point where we do see something. Do we try and verify it thereby automatically negating its validity! Maybe by doing absolutely nothing we begin to realise that there is really nothing to do – the sheer weight of nothing becomes unbearable – give me something to do! Crave the old routines!!! Anything to keep that silence from tearing my world apart!
And then – well, now the pressure eased maybe I can return to the emptiness, but what made me think I had ever left???
But how serious should we take, after all isn’t it one big cosmic joke?
Better let the cat out…
Hey Wall.
I too found other schools greatly helpful in clarifying and broadening my grasp of CC’s teachings. I find the fourth way a wonderful resource for stalking oneself – you know, observing the centers, the many I’s, aim, considering, lying, etc. It’s like a very systemized path of stalking. And I find correlations between self-remembering and heightened awareness.
And I’ve utilized alot of non-dual paths like zen, tao and advaita to do some deeper deconstructing of core beliefs and bring me closer to seeing and stopping the internal dialogue and the world, dropping the mind, etc. Before I had those references, I didn’t really know what much of that meant. I found dropping the sense of self as a seperate I-ego-identity accomplished many of the tasks set forth to CC – recapitulation, erasing personal history, self-importance, routines, perceiving the mystery, transcending reason-tonal, etc.