2. To increase Consciousness
3. To increase Understanding
I'm putting this here as a simple statement of intent. It doesn't aim to be all and everything but it sets a simple structure to the coming year:
1. Twice daily Prayer.
2. Basic Work: The Seven Day Standard
- Come into a state of SR whilst in the midst of difficult & surprising events x 7 daily
- External Considering* is always conscious: thrice daily
- Record efforts on 5x3 cards & use notebooks, journals, etc, where motivated.
- Rest for 3 days.
- Repeat this 7/3 effort for the rest of 2009.
3. Read Calvin's Institutes (Beveridge trans.) daily following the Princeton Theological Seminary.
4. Swim 2 to 4 times weekly. Reduce strokes-per-length, etc.
5. I have a new instrument to study and learn. Daily.
6. Study work sources, either in short bursts or durations. Have regular 'projects'.
7. Always 'follow the claim of the object', willing things, willing people, willing events, willing the Work.
* Some practical examples of External Considering:
- new thinking
- avoid slander and cheap talk
- avoid making requirements of others
- transform negative thoughts of others into positive thoughts
- see all negativity as a gift
- put oneself in another's position
- find in oneself a state corresponding to that found in others - remember that you felt like this once
- discern the other persons needs and try to meet them
- remember that people are asleep, they know not what they do, they are machines
- "In relation to other people, you must not act without thinking. Think first, then act. If this person would prefer you to act in some manner and not another, it is all the same to you, so why not do what he likes?" - O
I'm into the 12th day of this year long work effort, and though I do not intend to document a running commentary here, I appear to have succumbed to my need to make some brief note. The first seven days revealed some difficulty in meeting my own quota of three daily efforts to externally consider. That's worth putting on record because I'll be here at the end of 2009 assessing this effort. I also recognise some significant slippage (or perhaps levelling out on a plateau) since the previous work octave ended in Easter 2008. It's a truth: aim prevents drift. And finally, I intend through each successive 7 day period of activity to introduce additional work efforts to those outlined above. Currently I am giving up self-will 10 times daily. But at any rate, I'm circling in on all those features of false personality that never truly go away. (150109)
7 comments:
On your last list regarding external-considering I've always been impressed with how strong the simple thought of 'new thinking' can be. Because we already sort of know intellectually what to do, but remembering just the term 'new thinking' shocks us into actually doing what we already know we have to do.
Like, I'm thinking thoughts about what a person has done to me (and they are things that are real and bad) then I think 'new thinking' and you think, of course, forgive others so that God will forgive you (the Lord's Prayer) and negative acts towards you are a gift and opportunity to not be identified, and so on.
The practical point though is: bringing to mind just the term 'new thinking' provides a foundation to immediately stand on in the moment to *then* engage in what G. called 'active reasoning.'
So it's like: foundation first then particulars.
And, to sum up, this is why I included 'new thinking' in my anagram SANE SONNETT
Separation
Aim
New Thinking
Effort
Self-Remembering
Observation of features of false personality
Non-Identifying
Non-Internal-Considering
External-Considering
Transforming Negative Emotion
I put an extra 'T' in SONNET up there...
When these things seem too trivial remember that when we observe a rare example of someone doing just the slightest little act of self-awareness or Work-related act or Christian act it surprises us and we can really see explicitly how it is not the norm and that it is special to be able to act from something other than life and our fallen nature.
You are right to flag up New Thinking. I should've put it on that list (I'll add it now) - it is the key to transforming those negative thoughts and mechanical patterns. Sometimes something as simple as New Thinking can seem abstract and distant but whenever you apply it to an event, it really is the essence of simplicity. It is almost the natural thing to do, especially emerging from a state of identification/internal considering.
On your last note, which I agree with, I always find it curious how much emphasis the Church gives to the act of Charity. There is nothing wrong with that but it really is self-serving if it isn't tied to a real act of transformation such as External Considering. I do believe Charity at essence implies this transformative act but I'm not entirely convinced it is what happens - everything we do is mechanical unless we make a special effort. I may be too sceptical but I see a lot of 'charity' as an act of social conformism. No doubt someone somewhere still benefits but it falls short of conscious love and is still acting from below. I shouldn't be too critical of these things really and I don't think I am, it's just an observation that life offers us all ample opportunity to transform ourselves and others and mostly we waste or misuse it.
By the way, SANE SONNET is an acronym not an anagram! You know that of course.
Acronym, acronym, acronym... I keep forgetting that word.
Just like it took me forever to spell relevant right. Or competent. Or siege.
That's a striking contrast.
An example of something real in what we would call exoteric Christian environments would be when the parents or family of a murdered child forgives the murderer, in the midst of all their pain and suffering.
We could be cynical and say that can be a worldly calculation too. Like, what's the point, it's over, we don't want to get into trouble ourselves, write it off. Also, if that same family actually had the opportunity to inflict revenge they might do it. But that's a bad example too because a murderer is an ongoing threat that needs to be dealt with one way or another. But still.
Sometimes the forgiveness is striking and real.
It's all mixed up. I can even see the example of the liberal Christian who forgives the murderer and condemns everybody else. Thanks.
But anyway, your contract between charitable acts and real self-awareness is striking and shows that there is a real teaching within the Bible that one needs to connect with through real teachers.
(Here I switch back again...) But that describes exoteric vs. esoteric, and perhaps at the exoteric level there is something *real enough* for many...
Oh undoubtedly the exoteric is the real REAL to many. I understand that. I don't have a problem with the exoteric. It's obviously not a level I'm comfortable within and besides it's dangerous territory but it has to exist in some form and it will always fill a need, a very basic instinctive emotional need. I never really thought that I was setting up an exo v eso schism. It was just that I observe a lot of charity, a lot of support for charitable acts and I see a natural connection with external considering and charity. But heck, there's no need to reason these things. It's a blunt fact, it doesn't matter what your state of being or the level you're at - exoteric or esoteric - all of our possibilities are given to us from God on High. So long as we are aware of this relationship, so long as we aim to act top-down, we are recovering the Self that is above self, ie remembering Real I.
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