Tying up loose ends

>>I’ve got a bit of a Napoleon Dynamite addiction – that’s the reason for the Dang!… If you still havent seen this film – go and rent it now!!!<< If it's the one I think you mean, I watched five minutes and hated it so much couldn't go on! About some kid w/ fuzzy hair? But not into movies much these days, especially not 'good' ones. >>One thing I’d like to know more about is your notion of decision. Is this similar to the notion of ‘free will’? If so, does everyone have free will, or ability to make concious, willfull decisions?<< Yes it is pretty similar and yes all have it, whether they use or no. best NN

>>see, I reccon ‘free will’ is one of the main fallacies of christianity<< Bottom line: If this is what you think, then it's what you think. It's your decision! You decide. You should ask Michael about the nature of free will vis-a-vis sex, since I'm sure you will disagree with my replies... believe me, you will not get the equipment to understand yourself from primate models and statisticians...! But I despair of you really I do... >> I know that I dont have a fully ‘free will’ – I still have automatic/reflexive reactions to things around me<< When your lady allowed her mother to make her anxious, she decided it, it wasn't a 'just so'. A habit is still a decision. You demonstrated the fact to her. Similarly if your shy friend decided so, he could change read 'The Game')! And don't you think that your bold friend could change with one bad experience? It is only a question of self-knowledge. Pay no attention to 'the average' - it is completely unimportant. When people look in statistics they can find anything they like. They decide! Please imagine what a 'fully free will' would be like, and get back to me with a serious imagination of the condition. How strange your mind is freeform! (forgive me it's late!). You reject spiritual models without a murmur but you are quite happy to accept the opinions of statisticians! How can you live this way, always waiting for the next survey of 'everyone/the average' just to find out who you are??? Your assumptions about the 'de-animalising' nature of spirituality betray a telelogical fallacy, too easy for me even to pick on! I repeat: it is not to *remove* the animal that you are here, but to *evolve* it. To decide what to do with all the things you have, wherever it is (you decide) they happened to come from. Your problem Freeform is that you have the view you just landed in your body and have to make the best of a bad job! This is far from the only possible view of the human condition... Your idea is to blame a bad job of work on nature which you attempt to correct is that it??? To me a statement such as this is incomprehensible and bizarre: >>In the same way someone placed in a dangerous situation will freeze, someone else will run, and someone else will fight – there is no concious choice to these behaviours!<< You are saying that a choice which is not conscious is not a choice??? You are saying that because one habitually ignores one's freedom it does not exist??? If the person runs when threatened but it isn't 'their decision' - whose then? Please answer this one freeform. This time. Whose decision then? Whose decision to run? Whose decision to fight? Whose decision to chat the girl up? Whose to be shy? Whose, if not one's own? Please answer! Surely if one runs when threatened with a gun one has just learned something, as they say, 'about oneself'? Perhaps you think some totally de-animalised 'perfection' is possible??? I can only shudder... I am not convinced of the need to convince you of anything to the contrary of what you believe... life will do the job quite well by itself! Also in the definition of 'free will' is much room for personal style. I don't talk about free will, but about deciding. free will sounds like a substance, then you have to ask who has it and what it is, etc. But everyone knows about deciding. As a matter of fact true free will is very close in nature to acceptance, its opposite, which is just what one would expect. best NN PS Just playing around here! Been out all night watching bellydancing, it'll do that to ya.

Freeform –

I think we are totally agreed, apart from the way we like to say it!

But you may not. I apologise for not having waited until today – that post was written at 2am so I might not have been at my clearest. I also think that it is no bad thing to like to phrase things differently – it is necessary for different paths etc.

I came up with three ways of saying what I mean – I also noticed that Michael’s post of today on transforming the negative is very relevant – on the ‘choiceless choice’ etc. So it is one more thing of use here.

Anyhow, I give three (very) different ways to say same thing, then I’ll answer what you said above.

METHOD 1:
Take two people – Mr F and Mr N. Mr F believes the fat person had no choice but to be fat. Mr N believes it was the fat person’s choice to be fat. But forget the fat person! Just look at Mr F and Mr N. They decide what they believe.

It is as simple as that. They decide!

METHOD 2:
Earlier you had a conversation with Michael in which he explained his ‘magic power’ – the power of making his own body. Possibly you felt it was a rhetorical game he was playing, but I feel that it is a real magical power. I mean look at him – he does it, for real! He has the eyes, the beard, all perfect! Look at what he does, all the time! Taking the formless, attracting and bonding and circulating in different ways, up to the present moment and the flesh…

Now it seems clear that you freeform also have such a power. After all you are in a body. Everyone in a body has this power. Of course many take it for granted, or actively try to prevent their own power from being exercised well. If they prefer! Still, their true desire is to have a body and this desire they are always fulfilling.

The body furthermore (as the Taoist process of ‘fusion’ demonstrates) is not disconnected from – say – the emotions. Nor the ideas believed by the person in it. These are all things that are created by the person just as the body is. The ‘filters’ a person has are created by the person. That is why you can change them – as you had your lady notice and change.

You can only change it, because it was you who created it! It is all you, all! It is all your choice.

You can say, I am not aware that it is my choice. But this too is only your choice! You decide.

METHOD 3:
Heavy-handed support from authority figure – well one of mine anyhow. Austin Osman Spare – “You are always what you most wish – the prospective! Your desire is to live according to your desire, and this you are always realising. You are ‘it’ already!”

So now you see surely that it is more than a linguistic game to ask, who do you think does it if you don’t? Even if you don’t agree it is always you who does it, you must admit it is ONLY A QUESTION OF YOUR OWN CHOICE whether you agree or not! Even if you see nothing the way I am saying it here, still you can see it is a real question and not my way of trapping you into anything!

Now then –

>>you know how Michael’s hard drive crashed? he desided to think of it as proof that the ‘fire dog’ season is in full swing.<< All I can say is that on this I think Michael's way is very wise, not merely more entertaining! All the apes you model are acting with a similar wisdom. It is a question of how the universe is put together and along what lines and for what reason. I don't think you read carefully what he wrote on this subject! He talked about elementals. More below on this. >>The point is, whether you like it or not, (lens in) *people will always make the best choice available to them*!!! Yes this includes all kinds of criminals, rapists etc. Certain instincts, drives, animalistic circuits limit our choices!!! You can see it all around you – it’s plain as daylight. ok you can put the word ‘decide’ there – but it doesn’t chage *what actually happens*.<< I certainly see what you mean but again I am afraid to say my attitude is just the opposite! (NOT merely being ornery... ok?) You say certain drives 'limit our choices'. But are these drives not part of 'us'? There is nothing that is part of us that is not ours!! What is ours is our choice to be ours. You say that putting the word 'decide' in changes nothing - but when you helped your lady with her mother issue, weren't you putting the 'decide' in and didn't that change everything? I am interested why you bring in 'criminals and rapists' here? Surely not to say they are 'bad' - since you dislike the idea of calling things bad so much. Or is it that you think I am blaming the fat person for being fat?! I am not attempting to attach any blame here, so leave that thought alone. How could there be blame? Nothing is wrong! You always tell me this, so here anyway I KNOW we agree! So then, you say: >>I’m saying *there was only one choice*!!! there was no decision process, it’s like a reflex reaction – it happens *automaticaly*!!!<< And why is the reflex action there? Who put it there? 'SOMETHING' must have decided, to the extent that 'decide' is a meaningful word. If you say 'not me who decided', you are putting yourself in opposition to yourself - I do not see why! There certainly was *a* process of some sort. If not your process whose? Presumably you therefore think that the apes you model are behaving also only by 'reflex action'? The bacteria and the butterflies - just what you call 'reflex action'? Please tell me, why are these reflexes present? What are they made of and what is their purpose? Is it different from the purpose that moves the stars? The planets in their orbits? Different from the purpose that moves the wind? Different from the purpose that moves you? This is why I say, Michael's correlation of his hard drive problem to the positions of the planets was very wise! At some stage maybe you decide to change your reflex. Example - every time some raises their fist to you, you flinch. You decide to learn not to flinch. As part of this, you observe yourself flinching. You realise at some stage, that it is 'you' who is flinching. Then you can change it. But it always was 'you' who flinched. The fact that you didn't realise it was 'you' makes no difference. Perhaps you say, but the fat person wishes to be thin, so how can I say it is their choice to be fat? Is this what you mean? >>I’m saying one has to earn their freedom – they have to evolve their animal aspects to have all the choices available to them – it’s a process and not a destination, it’s not a case of disliking the animal aspect, it’s a case of widening the field of available choice/behaviour – being animals we have wonderfull abilities, but because of certain events in our childhood we can only use some of these abilities…<< That seemed sensible to me (although I do not agree with it!) - up until the point where you say 'because of events in our childhood' etc... do you really believe things like that? But I won't argue. You decide. Michael has progressed pretty far down his path, wouldn't you say? And yet if you read his post of this morning, you will find that he often has no choices about things - the 'choiceless choice' he calls it - which is similar to what I said yesterday about the nature of 'free will' being very close to that of 'acceptance'. Many people here have said that being more in touch with their destinies seems to restrict their choices! But I would say they are exercising greater free will! Perhaps you agree with that, I don't know. Perhaps you think that when the sun rises every day, there is 'no choice' for him, and it is all a 'reflex action'? Is this what you think? Only asking! Anyhow, there is no sense in which what I asked - who then? - was a linguistic game only. It was a philosophical question and I believe a very important one. I have noticed that the further I get the more I see that everything has been 'me all along' - NOT that it has suddenly become me, NOR that I have suddenly 'earned the right' to call it me. Simply that it is me. Other people I talk to say the same. On this board too! Jernej said to Swedish Dragon - 'Don't blame others, only you create yourself'. Michael says he magically creates his body. I say I decide everything I am. Spare says you are only what you desire to be. I am asking you only, if this is all wrong and I am not 'all me' and you not 'all you' - what is the alternative (anyway in principle)? That is not a linguistic trap at all. So are we getting anywhere? love NN

>>You’re probably thinking “he’s off on one again… it is you who decides to have these drives, it is you who decides to be alive in a body etc etc” – that’s fine, but saying that has no practical use for me. As you know I’m pretty pragmatic, I’ll discard things very easily and quickly if they’re not useful to me right now – perhaps when they are useful, I may pick them back up – but I generally don’t consider ‘truisms’ as useful.<< Yes you're right that we are using different things - I only thought it was more obvious than you did how these two things are the same thing, and I felt the sameness more interesting to emphasise. If one really does not find 'truisms' useful I do not mean to imply that one must then use 'falsisms'! >> I don’t usually anthromorphosise the sun – only for entertainment…<< HERE I think is where I would put my finger on the difference. How can I say it - without actually bringing up experiences of mine which you would doubtless regard as 'useful metaphysics for Nnonnth where he is playing'? Maybe I can't... To ME, when you say you 'take to scientific ideas', it means you *identify yourself* with them. That's why you said, removing the concept/model can be hard work! It takes class! For example, you identify maybe with a theory of gravity that explains why the sun rises in the east. This allows you to identify on that level with the sun as well as with the theory. You are both -the sun and yourself - behaving according to logic! And the reason that people make such theories is precisely so - that they can identify with and understand what is happening around them. (This is all MY perspective on it Freeform, so don't be worried that I think you think it too!) What is so weird is that my problem with this logical approach (which can be excellent mechanically of course) is that it misses the emotional ones and spiritual ones as well - what you call the metaphysical; I find this weird because not so long ago you were trying to convince me that I took models too seriously! The models all have holes in, you know as well as I! (Take Godel! - the Kafka of mathematics!) Why should 'practical behavioral psychology' be different? But I see what you are saying - you have not yet found a useful hole in it. Well anyhow - I can add a little more... What you feel are my 'metaphysical ideas' are actual experiences of mine. They aren't 'theories' but things that I know from doing/feeling/being alive. I am trying to leave out what you would consider the 'content' of my experiences - trying to avoid talking in a way that does not seem objective. But I see now a little more where you come from, and this conversation has been far from fruitless for me! I hope you feel the same. Maybe we have discovered the limits of what language can do between us at the present time... but more of that shortly. This is why I brought up what Michael said, about the elementals that make up the stuff in the depth of his computer. Is this 'anthropomorphizing' the computer? I don't think so! It is a question of his having *communicated* with the life inside it, seen the *language*, heard what the elementals *said*. Then he realised something (although in his case of course he knew it already) - that what drove those components in his computer was just what drove him, and indeed what drives the planets in their orbits. Was this anthopomorphizing them? Or was it computerizing and planetizing himself? When I talk to you, am I Nnonnthizing you or are you Freeformizing me??? For the record, saying the sun is 'alive', anyway, is not anthropomorphizing the sun - not from my perspective. It is far more like solarizing myself. One of the 1st questions I asked on this board, ages and ages ago, was to Michael - I said to him do you not feel that the sun is a living being? And he said yes! That was how I knew I could trust him... Buddhists don't talk about this. Since then he has written to Rainbowbear about using the sun for sex alchemy and I see now that, even though Michael is (SO! VERY!) different from me, he is really the same. That is pleasing to me! That is a uniting that I like. 'A uniting I like' describes well what we all - human or non-human, physical or non-physical - are here for. That is the same thing as the yin-yang fish-in-circle symbol. Same law for all - Tao. Tao is the 'ultimate meta-model' maybe? This is all about aliveness, about what it means to be alive. I was sure that by talking to you about it I could get it across. I see what I am saying not as metaphysics but as vitalism! Naturally I cannot agree - if you must insist on saying it - that my 'metaphysical ideas are impractical'. Their practicality is indeed obvious to me, especially since I connect vitality-life-force-tao to them. Naturally you may say not useful for you, but certainly you can see that I did not 'attach an elemental' to 'reflex action'! These 'reflex actions' are expressions of the truth of life to me, that's all. (As for entertainment - well what is impractical about entertainment? Do you keep the idea of entertainment separate from the idea of spirituality? I did not think that was the Taoist spirit at all! But I know you agree on this, it's why you said - Smile!) When you say that you prefer scientific ideas, what it means to me is that you prefer to think impersonally. To me the universe is very personal! And I have found that I can only progress by seeing more and more, all the time, just how very personal it is... how all talks to all... because all wish and are driven by the same thing and all reflect it their own ways... when you told me you preferred to play in the sculpture rather than consider it, I thought you knew this well anyhow. That is why I say I'm (still) sure that we agree - and logical levels be damned! A thought to leave you with: you said to me once that what occurs in communication is a transfer of symbols. We attach internal meanings of our own to these symbols and when a symbol reaches us, we delve into our own meaning-sets to see what the symbol means to us. Obviously true! But equally obviously, not the whole story! For example, how do you account for Michael's experience, with the energy that attached itself to words of a Zen student? (What he posted today). i have experienced similar things, which is why I loved his post. He checked very thoroughly - the student did not intend to transfer this 'black cloud', this centuries-old miasma of self-disgust caused by zen thought process about letting-go-but-not-transforming. The student did not intend to attach these meanings to the words. And certainly Michael did not intend to attach these meanings to the words! Yet somehow the meaning was passed to Michael in the act of communicating of those words. How? Love NN

It seems most of your post was things I already had said to you… bizarrely, all this fun agreement in you seems premature and is only building tension in me, but to get those out of the way –

Of COURSE jam session of COURSE getting great pleasure of COURSE tension keeps us on toes of COURSE a mating dance of COURSE no right note of COURSE universe is play/dance. I’m sure I’ve said those things already… or you have anyhow… really, Freeform, come on!

Can we make more progress here? You seem to think that what I want is your agreement… it isn’t! So I do think perhaps our (excellent) conversation is drawing a little to a close…

I will answer what struck me as requiring answer though and see if it jogs anything for you –

>>you have ‘actual experiences’… Can you see how completely degraded your original ‘actual experience’ gets by the time it reaches me?<< Let me answer that with a series questions of my own, of which this is the first: Have you ever been on the loo and uncorked a big one, and experienced the shock as the loo water splashes back up and hits you in the arse? Answer grasshopper! >>Please include all the content that is relevant!! – because it’s important at this stage, I can figure out the context myself (I’ve been trained in this!)<< I'm trying, but I have yet to establish a language with you whereby I can do so, the way I did so instantly w/ Michael. Some things are not so easy to say! The loo question and his brethren will help (believe it or not). I have a very strong sense about what I am able to say to someone. >>I bet if you thought about it now, you’d notice that you’ve even built up a mental image of me inside your mind<< There are two answers to this Freeform. The polite one is: obviously! >>I really enjoy when models are contradicted<< Yes.. ahm... right. But have you ever experienced anything like what Michael did, yourself? best NN

>>>>Have you ever been on the loo and uncorked a big one, and experienced the shock as the loo water splashes back up and hits you in the arse?<< yes! - in fact I tend to throw a sheet of toilet paper in beore I start to 'uncork' - to stop that from ever happening again.<< Ok then - question 2. Have you ever felt the sun on your face as you walk out of your front door and thought, 'Mmmmmmmm'? >>>>There are two answers to this Freeform. The polite one is: obviously!<< intriguing! - you know me enough to realise that I'd prefer the not-so-polite answer.<< The not-so-polite one is: Obviously, dipshit! You know *me* well enough to know I understand at least that much about how my mind works! >> I’d ‘freeformise’ that energy into some big ruber monster… I gathered all the power rangers… they fired some huge laser… got out of their robots, and started dancing with the light…<< Heepers! You're weird. But I do see how this works. You have the 'story' of the power rangers so you can use that alchemically. I think this is the difference 'twixt you and I from the magical point of view - that you use symbol in this personal way - I think this is the mark of an alchemist-at-heart. With me it doesn't seem to work like that. I call it an artistic process for that reason. When Joyce began 'Ulysses' I doubt he saw it all, it was a discovery and unfamiliar at first. That's how it is with me, and I like it that way! As I am still I become aware of things - like pictures - like the power rangers - except I have not experienced them before and do not 'know what they do' automatically. I have to work with them to find out. Two years ago I began seeing a man who looked like a monk, hooded. Also a large and impressive minotaurish guy. Also a big snake. Etc. They still appear from time to time and recently, more frequent. I have what some might call familiars around me but these guys are different. So a few days back I was Instant Messaging with a Brighton-based guy called Paul Hughes-Barlow. I had liked his book, 'Tarot And The Magus' very very much, reviewed it on Amazon. His sales then jumped big so we got to corresponding. During the instant-message session he suddenly said to me, you've been seeing Gaap and Botis! They're there now! Who? Gaap is a monk figure he says, Botis a grinning threatener with big teeth. I say I know 1st but not 2nd. Who are these guys? He says the 'Goetia'! This is all news to me. Later I look up the goetia on the net and find that Botis can also appear as a viper. They are seventy-two spirits who legend relates go back to the time of Solomon. The situation is ongoing... I thought of something. When those nobel guys went about proving their theories it was based off an earlier inspiration. That's the inspiration I work off. yes, bad energies - My lady's brother said, you have to meet this guy. We go and hang with him. This again is a while back and I'm naive. We are talking, of course I'm friendly and polite... magic... music... movies... we cover the bases... all the time, I have the constant desire: to scratch this man's eyes out. I keep catching myself about to do it. Disgust, abominable in pit of gut. Just when I've squashed and forgotten it, it comes back: reach up and SCRATCH THEM OUT. Like a fool I dismiss it. We even invite him back to our domicile and give him brandy. Talk late. Feeling never leaves me. When he leaves - my lady says, I feel ill. I tell her I also feel ill. These days I would know what to do - in those days I didn't. She and I were ill for two weeks. He was a 'reformed', 'ex' black magician. Big lesson to me: evil does exist! Like Michael I began by thinking it was an attack. Now I think maybe the guy was just such an asshole he couldn't help spreading illness wherever he went. His aura was like a discordant symphony of brutal mace blows. >>now a question for you – if Michael was part of your family in some way – who would he be?<< Instant answer is: weird older brother! I came here looking for brothers I guess. love NN