Jim D.

Just wanted you to know that UPS had me sign for a VW Beetle.

Silly person, the story about the door was a ruse to get the UPS guy to give up the car. You're are not really behind the door...and I don't have an Advanced Directive from you. I forged it. But I have to tell you that my son wants to be an Army "lifer." That means, it will be about 25 years before he gets out. You will be dead, and so will I. 

Might Will it to my grandchildren. By then the Bugatti will have about 800,000 miles on it. 

Your Bugatti came to me instead. I got it about five years ago. UPS delivered it to my door. I signed for you because I couldn't resist being dishonest. I told the UPS guy that I was your caregiver and that you were upstairs behind a closed locked door which kept me from entering. So, no personalized signature...just mine. All I had to do was show the guy my business card and an Advanced Directive signed and witnessed by me...and that was that. 

Nice car. Little hard to get into. I am sorry for all the dog hairs but Sweeper, our dog, likes car rides. The Bugatti only has 325,000 miles on it. We change the oil every 10 months, and it gets great mileage. I would get it to you, but I don't know where you live. Oh wait, that 's a lie too. I am giving it to my kid when he graduates high school. So far, so good. He is doing great on his permit. Only one ding to the front left panel of the car. I think that he sneaks out at night and takes the car. He hides this guess by running the odometer backwards. I don't know how he is doing this but he is getting it done. He is also smart enough to fill up the gas tank back to where it was when he took the car out to see his girlfriend. There is a funny smell inside the car...kind of a sweet smell...you know like Church incense. The windshield is all gummed up with fine smudge marks and cigarette smoke. He doesn't clean out the car either...lots of wrappers in the ask tray...no not an ash tray...just a make shift coffee cup acting as an ashtray. 

Been thinking about sending him to a military school involuntarily. Turn him into a man that can drive a Humvee and carry an assault weapon. After all, we need to grab hold of those oil rigs and real estate that they are on.

We will keep you posted friends and neighbors. 

2 hours ago, manitou said:

 

 

I'm still waiting for my Bugatti.  I began the manifestation technique in 1971.  Seriously.  

Try wishing for a VW instead and see how that goes. 

Addendum: On vibrations. I say give me those good vibrations the Beach Boys were talking about. 

Sigmund Freud is the Father of the concept of subconsciousness. I think of subconscious as a submarine that is lurking just below the water. When the periscope is up it can look at conscious awareness material and stored unconscious material. Unconscious material would be the stuff on the bottom of the ocean...just laying around waiting to be discovered. Subconscious material could be equated to seaweed just floating up from the bottom. I don't think that the unconscious and subconscious communicate with each other as we would with each other. Unconscious material is held down by defense mechanism. Whereas, Subconscious material is free floating. Freud believed that there were three components that made up our personalities: Id, Ego, and Superego. Now remember that Carol Yung, a student of Freud's, disagreed with Freud and came up with a different Theory of Personality. So, there is nothing written in stone. We can all guess and speculate about the above postings until we get tired and move on to something else. But one thing is for sure, we are not going to reinvent the wheel on this matter. If one of us does come up with a new and tried theory of personality, then we better publish it and book a spot on the "View."

In all the years I have treated distressed people, not a one responded to any didactic I gave on any matter that was theoretical. People just want to be heard, and maybe given tools to help them get to their goals. Most just wanted to "feel" better.

5 hours ago, manitou said:

 

 

I don't see it as self consciousness, as we're not talking about the egoic body.  It is more an awareness that you are not who you think you are, and the point of awareness seems to be a few inches behind the head; a sense of 'seeing' yourself engaged in the affairs of the world, but not really falling into the illusion.  If this produces second guessing, I can't imagine what one would be second guessing about.  Second guessing is a result of worrying about what others think, and when we're really in the zone, (ie. in consciousness) this just doesn't come into play.  You know that everything that is happening, or what you are doing, is exactly as it should be.

I am aware that there are layers of fogginess, but I can't think clearly. Is this fogginess from hunger, lack of protein or the right sugar level? Is it a matter of depression or anxiety? Is it a matter of grief or a sense of loss. These can be a matter of self recrimination, and judgement. I am aware of these negative emotional states but cannot escape until I accept that these too are me, my experiences. It is a journey only I can know. Others can only speculate, second guess, emphasize...But when I practice taking a look at my motivations and decide what it is I can control and manage, and not manage, there and only then will I be free of the bondage of self. This I believe is true freedom...an absence of negative thinking. 

If I think that I can stop it from raining and it does, then I am arrogant. If I think that my consciousness is ever expanding, then I am delusional and arrogant. Timothy Leary tried to check in and check out through the use of LSD. And it was fun watching and listening to someone that thought he was different and special because it gave us hope that we too could expand our minds. Many of us lost ours and ended up dying spiritually until the survival instinct kicked in. 

It is correct, not even the best trained psychiatrist can know himself completely. That is how it is that it is important to be accountable to someone who has our best interest at heart. 

Fancy words and descriptors are meaningless. It is when it is simple that it is profound. And most importantly, does it work. This is the true test. 

In the beginning it sounded as though you were describing what is known by the Recovery Program as God consciousness. And then it sounded Existential in the matter of becoming...then nihilistic...and then it became the Universal Consciousness. 

I have been meaning to address manifestation. I ready a book early on in the 80's called Psycho-Cybernetics written by Maxwell Maltz MD, 1960. He said that if a person concentrated on something long enough...something they really wanted it would eventually materialize. They way I understand this concept is I make subtle adjustments to my behavior that helps me get to my goal. Maltz describes this entity within us as the "Servomechanism." This mechanism is always working on the solution when awake or sleeping. 

2 hours ago, thelerner said:

hmnn.. I don't focus consistently on my consciousness.  I don't want to set up a cycle of being so self conscious I end up with 'feed back' always second guessing.  On the otherhand it's good to spot check it, see where I'm at.. some judgment of my actions and emotions.  

 

My sense of inner peace, comes and goes.  I think its always there but I'm not always connected to it.  Maybe I shouldn't be.  The world requires some emotional responses- good bad ugly.. thus I screw inner peace and reach for inner child to express my distaste for the worlds madness and inconvenience. 

I agree. Self consciousness as this descriptor implies is conscious of the Self. This dynamic will paralyze a person...always second guessing, or wondering what the other person thinks of me etc. Peace comes when we allow ourselves to make a decision and make corrections along the way. There is no absoluteness about making a decision and now I am done with it. 

Let's take for example a man or woman makes a commitment to marry. In the first year they are still checking each other out...and so on. There are many decisions to recommit made...sometimes on a daily basis. This way of living is healthy. It's using the intellect rather than emotions that makes it objective.

I think the Eagles band had a line in one of their songs addressing the inner child..."Shut the f..k up and get over it."

It feels like the world demands an emotional response, but I still have a choice to respond the way I want to. Feelings are not facts.  

4 hours ago, Everything said:

Yes, you or I are re-membering, thought forms, but this still happens here and now, within our consciousness. Is it not so?

This is correct. Pre-conscious pushes forward into our awareness or consciousness.

Pre-conscious: Imagine that you have watched the "trailer" of a movie you want to watch, let's say last week. When you decide that you want to watch the whole movie there are little nuisances to the movie you have forgotten. As you go through the movie you might say to yourself that you have seen this scene before and remark, yes it was in the trailer I watched. You connect the dots but not automatically. It takes some time.

It would be helpful to have a personal experience from you. 

I experience consciousness, pre-consciousness, and unconsciousness material that has been stored from past experiences...especially those that have been traumatic. 

I am aware of my typing now...which is consciousness.

I can tell you my Aunt Sadie's middle name after a few minutes of thinking about it...pre-conscious..."It is on the tip of my tongue."

I may remember being hit in the face with a golf club after watching a someone swing a golf club...unconsciousness...feelings of pain and what happened afterwards. 

Plato tells us that the ideas we have about life have already been there in the "World of Ideas." We need only be reacquainted with them. 

I don't know that I can compartmentalize my self. The self that defines who I am has experienced the spectrum of feelings that come along with being human. If we are speaking of physical pain...well I have. If we are speaking of emotional pain...well than I have. If we are speaking of spiritual pain...I have. If we are speaking of a lack of spirituality...than I have. If we are speaking of the feeling of complete isolation...than I have. 

In this scenario, there has been no time where I stopped to wonder if there was a part of me that did not feel pain when pain was present. I am not even aware of you when I hit my thumb with a hammer. 

At my age, I am always in some kind of pain, somewhere in my body. Now my toe is not in pain this morning. Nor is my left arm, or my head, or buttocks. But my right hand is swollen of which the cause I cannot determine. I can only guess. 

But a burn victim is in excruciating pain. The question that begs for answer or contemplation of what part of the burn victim's self does not experience pain seems rhetorical. 

Although at times I looked upon Mr. Rogers as an ideal father figure, but the one I had was the one I knew. I depended on my dad in ways that I could not understand completely. He was just there. Today I prefer to remember him as doing the best he could do with what he had. 

There are moments when I could tell him about my gratitude for him, and the sacrifices he made so that I could be fed, clothed, sheltered. 

I would have taken the time to hear his story. 

That is all a dad needs to hear. 

When I look to someone else to nurture me, I am headed for trouble. I can only nurture myself through my relationship with God. This nurturing comes out of my childhood and I must leave these childhood notions there. Examine my motives. Breaking this solicitous pattern was replaced by manipulating to get what I want.  Is there anyone capable of nurturing? Did they receive when they were a child? Than how can I expect it. We are not willing to give anything to anyone. Not even to God. (Ed Rowe, 1985).

A school bus passing. 

The people standing around not noticing the clanging cymbals remind me of the bars I use to patronize. 

It is off my own opinion and experience that mental illness is pathological self absorption. I was zigging when everyone else was zagging. Steve Martin played a character whose inside governed his outside behavior...totally two different entities attempting to do what they wanted when they wanted. What was seen was someone unable to walk down the street from A to B unencumbered. His outside wanted to go here, while his inside wanted to go there. Each had an influence on the other. It appeared totally chaotic. Poor man! To have to live like that. 

I am concerned that if a man has to observe his awareness observe his awareness, he may be flirting with developing Schizophrenia. If two components of the psyche equal two positives with positive energies, than exponentially the outcome will be negative and unhealthy.  Where is the positive in that I ask myself? 

For me, when I felt anger and acted upon it, it led to risky behavior and then confusion. When I felt determined to do something, I knew the outcome of its opposite...this is equal to personal growth. 

Chi is the intent and jing is the manifestation of the intent. For instance, stand in  front of a wall and think about pushing it (chi) and then push it (jing). 

I do not know your gender or age but an antidepressant ,Wellbutrin,  may be the course of treatment for what you have reported as issues for you. I have been told that this medication has relieved symptoms of nervous leg syndrome. 

The Japanese archery form is Kyudo. 

Let me clarify that martial arts being taught today is not taught in a way that a boxer would be taught. Sparring in boxing involves real time contact...you are really getting hit with the  blunt force of your opponent. And it goes on for the length of the round(s). Even with equipment on your head and body your are being traumatized.

In martial art training, you stop just short of hitting the face and body due to possible injury. The habit created is to not make full contact. Even in Aikido and Aikijutsu the person receiving the technique trains to fall in a way that helps to prevent injury. But there is no guarantee. Both systems use submissive locks to subdue the opponent. It is very painful to experience. Even if you go with the flow. 

So, even though I have experienced a variety of martial art systems, I don't feel prepared to handle myself in a street fight especially if it goes to the ground and there are a few guys trying to use my head as a soccer ball and my body as a Makiwara. And even if I got the best of one of them, there is the legal system I would have to encounter. So, there had better be someone who witnessed the conflict to vouch for me.

I got into martial arts because of ego. I got out of it because it could have compromised an earlier back injury. When I took a look back, it all seems silly.  

In Philosophical Daoism, not of that defines who I am. My true self is Dao. 

The hardest part of leaning a martial art is relaxing when the instinct to tense up is natural when we feel defensive.