LastThursday

I thought I would review my learning style as both an example of one and as a meta-analysis of the pros and cons of it (<-- always use punctuation). My innate tendency is that I don't try to force learning or remembering. Instead I graze. I was in the lucky position as a kid that my father was into several different disciplines and hobbies: music, chemistry, electronics, horticulture, maths. I was never forced by my parents into learning anything. Instead my father (mostly) would attempt as best he could to answer to my curiosity: I learned to read Spanish that way. And nor was I restricted from playing with stuff. I remember distinctly playing on my father's new HP21 calculator (which I now have), which would have been an expensive toy for a kid to break! This also taught me to be self sufficient in answering to my curiosity - as well as having respect for things. I do remember having an intense curiosity about everything as a kid. But it was a virtuous circle. I was free to practise that curiosity using the things that were around me and to have all my questions answered. One of my greatest assets as a kid was a dictionary with small illustrations. This made the dictionary accesible to me, and I would often just scan the pages looking at the illustrations and wondering what it all meant: I had to read the text to understand the drawings. This ingrained in me a habit of looking up information to satisfy my curiosity. I've always had a good memory. If I was interested in something deeply enough I would remember it, or at least know where to go if I couldn't remember it. It's not something I had to work at until I started doing A Levels at 16. My A Levels and afterwards degree, required forced learning and went completely against my preferred style. I coped but the results were mediocre (I was also a party animal). My attention has as far back as I remember been scatter-gun. I can focus for long periods, but even now it takes effort and is done out of necessity. Instead left to my own devices I will pick up something, put it down, pick it up some later time and so on. I have some programming projects I have been working on for over ten years which are exactly like this. I do wonder if I have some ADD, but I never really cared enough to investigate it, I also vehemently disklike been labelled. My journal here is scatter-gun. I can't stand schedules, deadlines and organisation, but I can do them if forced at gunpoint. So following my nose has allowed me to organically learn everything, including the very thing my life depends upon: my IT skills. Some things I'm very bad at however. Rote learning and remembering facts and figures requires tedious effort on my part. You'll notice in this journal I don't reference anyone else directly, that's because I'm very bad at it. Instead I remember concepts and ideas and systems extremely well. Also, because I'm very self-directed in my learning, I'd much rather work things out or invent things myself than blindly just trust what someone tells me. That can be inneficient because there's not enough time to re-invent the wheel every time. Can I improve on my learning style? It's obvious to me that my ability to focus on a single area has improved drastically over time. This has allowed me to get depth in my learning. But I also know that there isn't really such a thing as "a single area", everything is connected or is a part of everything else. This is what attracted me to Actualized.org in the first place, everything Leo talks about is just a part of a big whole: like seeing parts of the mountain appear out of the mist. So what I'm getting at, is that synergy is very important for improving my learning. Synergy is just noticing and using connections between disparate areas and pattern matching and coming up with new configurations. Play and fun and humour ought to play a greater role in my learning. It may seem counterintuitive in our culture of rigidly measuring learning with exams and grades. What is play after all? It's self-directed learning! It is scatter-gun and improvised and collaborative. Ah, yes, collaborative. That is one area that I'm very weak on. I'm a loner in terms of learning. I find having to share the learning process with other people excruciating. Collaboration is seemingly always attached to formality and process and systems zzzzzzz I think too fast to either be bothered to explain in slow motion to others or to have the patience to try and decipher someone else's ramblings. Posting on this site has been a big exercise in improving myself in this way, although I still find collaborating with people to be a big PITA. What does humour have to do with learning? A lot of forced learning is very serious: PhDs and law exams and medical exams. Seriousness, whilst functional is the wrong approach and mindset. The best learning happens in a relaxed informal atmosphere. Is learning humourous? Yes, I think so. There is paradox and contradiction in learning which can be funny. Also, there is an inherent joy and reward for learning something novel, which sometimes breaks out into humour. Noticing the odd unexpected connections between things can be suprising and humourous. I think humour can also underpin the approach to learning, to keep it light and informal and interesting. What else? Learning by letting things bubble up. That's completely new to me. Ok, yes, if I'm working on a difficult idea or project, I can have an epiphany as if from nowhere, but that's directed epiphany. What about just letting stuff come up seemingly out of nowhere. I think this does naturally happen all the time, but personally I either don't pay much attention to it or it's too etherial and I forget it straight away. In order to capture this process, I would need to immediately write down the insight. But that doesn't work for me. It could be that simply meditating for the purpose of insight might be the way to go, but that's very odd to me: non-directed learning? Hmm.

One way to peace is getting into a mindset of not giving a sh*t. Anxiety happens because you care about the outcome of your own performance. It's a deep love of thought forms and self preservation. But it's much more peaceful to love the here and now deeply, and use your intuition and wits and confidence to lead you. (To sort of paraphrase what @Leo Gura said).

I don't do it for the views. 10000 views! Whoop whoop!

"Happen" is defined in terms of the "future". Just as "happened" is defined in terms of the "past". So yes, but only because happen belongs to the future.

@Zigzag Idiot even empires come and go. I've probably mentioned sometime before that I'm not into "systems" for living or divining life. That's not to disparage others who do, it's just never been a personal preference of mine - that includes numerology as a system. Although I'm about to contradict myself. Where I think there is value in using a system is if the particular system is loose in its interpretation and has an element of randomness. Something like Tarot, or the I Ching (although I don't know much about it). The randomness allows you to make observations or choices you normally wouldn't have, which is good for pushing us out of our comfort zones or stuck ways of thinking - so it keeps us flexible. The loose interpretation allows our intuition (and by extension potential paranormal abilities) to kick in and override our normal every day thinking. The upshot is to lead better lives. Also, in using some of these systems there is an element of ritual to it. My ritual abilities are very underdeveloped, but they are superb for putting consciousness into altered states and so allow our abilities (intuition etc.) to shine through. So there's my recipe: loose interpretation, randomness and ritual. I ought to actually try it myself! What would you suggest? As far as Gurdjieff goes I think I read that he would inhabit different characters as part of his "method", that really appeals to me. And thanks. I read loads of journals here, including yours and I get something different from each one.

What past? Does/did the past exist? What is the past? Is it just memories or something else? Is that a blind belief you hold? Maybe we don't do anything in the first place? We invent context so that we pretend to do things within that context? Dunno, more questions than answers.

The truth is always there in plain sight. You just have to look long enough. Yup. All our beliefs are blind faith. I wonder what would happen if you gave up the blind faith? @Holygrail you should definitely start here: Nearly missed it in the YouTube comments is embedded homework as well: https://www.actualized.org/downloads/the_mechanics_of_belief_worksheet.pdf

How do you know that? How do you know it was a direct experience that you had in the past? Do you think you've had direct experiences that you can't remember now?

If you can't trust your mother, can you trust yourself? Did all your memories really happen?

Yes, but the idea of being "smart" comes from people not experience (as if they're different!). It's a very good point about experience or smartness in our DNA. The body has had 4 billion years to accumulate knowledge. It is way smarter than we give it credit for. I'm sure I've seen a Sadhguru video about this very thing.

Sorry I was being a drama queen. What I meant was that people can and will believe anything they like, including thinking that they're are now more smart than they used to be, even though it's not true. Otherwise known as self-delusion. It's trouble because you think you're getting somewhere when you're not.

I'm into numbers and maths. I'm definitely not into numerology. For me it's like a see-saw with maths on one side and numerology on the other. Here's an elaborate example I cooked up one day, just to show how a numerologist's mind works and why a knowledge of maths undermines it. 19: I am a child of the moon The Metonic cycle is 19 years in length which is 235 lunations (full moons if you like) nearly exactly. After which the sequence repeats. It can be used to predict eclipses (nothing weird here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metonic_cycle) My year of birth is 1972. Adding the digits we get 19 (getting weirder, but there's loads of these sorts of numbers). When I was 19 the year was 1991 (nice, a palindromic number. Adding the digits gives 20: go figure out why). Lets multiply: 19x91 = 1729 (more weirdness, the digits are rearranged, it must mean something right?), obviously still adds to 19. 1729 is a very famous number, it's a taxi cab number. It's the smallest number that can be expressed as the sum of two cubes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1729_(number)). Or for a numerology angel, I mean angle: http://sacredscribesangelnumbers.blogspot.com/2014/06/angel-number-1729.html Multiply again 17x29 = 493. So? Then multiply by 4 again = 1972. Lovely. Total coincidence, mathematically though. For all those riddlers and numerologists out there, when was my birthday? And other than my birth, what was momentous about that day? What phase of the moon is it? Numerology: just say no. You can find any patterns you like in numbers to justify your beliefs. Numbers are just that, a way of counting things.

By whose standard? I suppose you could compare your new self to your old self and use that as a standard, but it's asking for trouble and delusion.

If it were to suddenly happen, they would probably call it enlightenment.

The circularity makes me feel queasy. Adults teaching children who become adults teaching children... I guess the idea of being smart must come from somewhere though right? Although, it's totally possible that my thought that I'm smarter than a child is actually bogus and I'm utterly deluded. Although, I was using the analogy, so that @rnd could get a handle on what it's like to think you're smarter than someone else, the sensation of it. The potential for smartness is already there in the open awareness. The only thing that changes is that the open awareness gets to know itself, in ever more intricate ways and actually becomes smart in the process? Maybe smartness is mostly just a cultural phenomenon and not real in any sense? Dunno, all just ideas.

@rnd it really boils down to awareness. A smarter person is more aware. If you want to know what it's like, talk to a child. See how you understand what's going on much more than they do, you're smarter than them.

@Leo Nordin I appreciate your sentiment and I'm grateful for you taking an interest in me. This journal is a place for me to dump my ideas, so I don't really want to fill it up with conversations discussing my own development, that should happen somewhere else (PM me or post questions in the forum). However, if you just want to comment on my ideas here then please feel free.

Nothing Arising From Something What gets missed when asking the converse of this question is what exactly the nothing is. Can and does nothing exist? Does the word "nothing" point to anything at all? With my programmer head on, is the word "nothing" a dangling pointer, and what happens when we try and dereference it? It's super obvious that there is something. That something is all around us all the time. Where does nothing sit in all this somethingness? It's a concept duh. If you have a box full of something and you take out all that something, you're left with a box of nothing. The only way to explain nothing is to remove something. That removal is a finite process, otherwise something wouldn't exist if the removal were an infinite process. Nothing is always framed by something. How about a special "nothing" not couched in something? Can a word in fact not point to anything at all? Yes. Here's one: ughert. But you can tell already that it's pretty useless as a word. Ironically it's a better word for spiritual nothing than "nothing" itself is. Really, we have no idea what spiritual nothing is. So we're free to equate ughert with something if we like, but it's meaningless. Something does not arise from ughert.

@Leo Nordin enlightenment can't be forced. That's like trying put a leash on a cat.

05:47 I've always liked that synth choir effect. This is simply beautiful: Ok there's a theme. At least I remember the second directly, the first not, I was too young and in living Spain. I only caught it on repeat. Not quite a chorus. But it's a similar effect, breathy vocals. I still love it. Don't forget for a few years around 1980, French was very in, thanks to Blondie: You can taste the Punk and Ska (Carribbean ) influence in this Frenchified song. One, two, one, two, one, two.... Proper Punk: Which kind of transmuted into: Which lead to a slow motion Punk: Sun is up. Going for a cold walk. 06:21 am.

@PureRogueQ No, well spotted. It just arose from nowhere and subsided into no-nothing.

@Inliytened1 thanks mate. These free will questions drive me to insanity. My personal opinion? No free will. More accurately, God has free will and you are God.

Ah Jesus. For the first time in what like literally decades, I've decided to stay awake all night. It's super tempting to go for a walk at nearly 2 am here in UK land. But it's probably effing freezing. One day I may well recount my story of tonight on here in this uber-public journal. But not right now. Read my journal in depth and between the lines to get behind the story. 2am walks were de rigeur in my twenties, usually home from a club. I've broken several @LastThursday rules today, and engaged my kink. Three double shots of brandy and a pint of beer, so far. Gotta admit I'm feeling kind of liberated, not so much by the alcohol, although that helps. Let's just say expressing a side of my identity I seldom express is a relief. At least I haven't engaged with caffeine, that's a sweaty lightheaded wide eyed bunny insomnia I've avoided. Lockdown has been brutal. I've just looked at these four walls for a year solid. Human contact has be 2d for the most part. But I've been able to connect 3d with some friends and my mum (bless her). I've patrolled the environs of Tunbridge Wells like a security guard during lockdown, mostly as an exercise in exercise. There's a historical phrase for patrolling county boundaries but for the life of me I can't find it on my favourite search engine. I find myself here more often than I find myself at work. What does that say? Whatever it is being here brings me, is more important than work. My intuition is literally screaming at me and yet my rationality is saying fuck off, stick with job, earn money, have warmth and anaesthesia. I have previously succumbed to intuition and not particularly regretted it, but it wasn't sustainable. Like it or not I'm inculcated in Brit society, there's a lot of lateral leniency in what I can do, but not quite enough for me. I must get my fucking Spanish dual nationality, that way I can bypass the Brexit bollocks. But I have to live a year in Spain to do it. Try doing that at 48. No gracias, es muy dificil. 02:42. More browsing.

@Preety_India girl, your written use of English is superb, forget the disorder. Ok, alright, naturally, there's always room for improvement in any discipline. Here's a few things I use in writing, for what it's worth: Three word lists. Sex is like sunshine, thunder and rainbows. My favourite foods are omelettes, sushi and steaks. Alliteration. Sensusal suffering sadists. Improvising imperious imps. I often succeed in social settings. I think I thought that I was intelligent. Five or six sentence paragraphs. Interjection. Despite my hunger - which was self induced - I held off from eating. I enjoy dressing in pretty clothes, mostly on Sundays, but my boyfriend hates it. My religion (Islam) doesn't allow me eat pork. Metaphor, analogy and simile. Self developement is like a tomato plant, it always bears fruit. She sang like a nightingale. Skating on thin ice is dangerous, you're skating on thin ice Mr. Tell a story, beginning, middle and end with punchline. Morality stories are good. Metaphors are good, where the metaphor is realised at the end. Story tryptich: tell them what's coming, tell them what the story is, summarise or recap what you said. News stories are invariably delivered this way. Disjointed concepts. She whispered with her cherry red lips and my love blossomed. Repeated phonemes. What's not anticipated in today's culture will suprise us in future. I'm sure there's loads more. Practise, practise, practise (three word repeation for emphasis).