Zigzag Idiot

Weekly planner Sunday A day to rest, Sideways Sunday. Spend some time horizontal in bed, on couch or stretched out on the ground. It feels good to lay on the earth. Monday It’s all about responsibility. Pay bills, etc.. Tuesday Wear your coonskin cap day. Local bowling alley closed down. Bummer,,,, Wednesday Throw horseshoes and use mouthwash. Thursdays A day devoted to considering a life more oriented towards chastity, scholarship and good nutrition. Considering is enough. To admit with brutal honesty that I’m the way I am and see no use in wasting effort the other 6 days of the week being torn over these matters. Good enough. Friday T.G.I.F. Let’s bust some glass!!! Feels good. Maybe some old dishes or something,,, Also, reflect some. Do I need to take care of any business at weeks end? Saturday Wild card day! Jokers wild! Go bananas yet remain my expressionless, deadpan self. I may not show it but inside, in my inner world,,,, Life is better than it was twenty years ago. I’m more content and grateful. If the spirit moves me. Speak my truth. Even if it’s cringeworthy.

The Science of Idiotism is about the hindrances to becoming a Self Realized Being, plus other stuff. The term Idiot here is drawing an the old Greek usage of it as: being oneself,,unpretentious ,,,, But it is used also simultaneously as the standard modern usage of fool because until we 'have our Being', life is experienced on the emotional pendulum connected with dualistic thinking and we are pretty much just a torture to the world, of some kind or other. I used to be an a epic complainer in addition to Alcoholic and coward. After that, I went around depressed and with a long sad face because I couldn't drink alcohol and party it up forever. Some people can but I realized I couldn't. The Science of Idiotism is a little known teaching from the mystic George Gurdjieff. Bruno Martins - The Realized Idiot - is about the only book written solely about The Science of Idiotism. It's very good. I recommend it. You can find a little here and there with a google search. Zigzag idiot is #9 on the Ladder of Reason. Of all the Idiots, I thought this one made the best screen name. I've been working on my self for a few years doing self inquiry. Keeping this Journal out here in front of God and everybody meshes well with the Gurdjieff work of Self Observation and Self Remembering. The whole lot of us are just bad full of bullshit, says Gurdjieff. Justifying,,, self deception,,, Kundabuffer he called it in his book Beelzebub's Tales To His Grandson. I really like AH Almaas's The Diamond Approach. It's Gurdjieff,,, modernized plus psychological explanation of things like our defenses against inadequacy. Is it a schizoid splitting off and sticking ones head in the sand? or do we employ a Grandiose self to shield against inadequacy. This work which includes, very much processing our shadow material can be very painful and destabilizing. Being light hearted can amount to good strategy if it can be sincere and natural. This Work teaches we project any repressed guilt we may have out onto others. I've observed this in myself over time. Also, we don't have to be negative. The practice of not expressing negative emotions has shown me the existence of my own spiritual sleep. We wake up and although might never sleep as deeply again, spiritually, we take naps as E.J. Gold put it. It's very difficult sometimes to just simply feel , without repressing negative emotions and not give expression to them. It pays out big dividends in 'spiritual coin' though. Remind me of this, if, in later post, I go off on a angry emotional rant.

It doesn't matter what genre. It doesn't have to be inspirational. It doesn't need to be explained. Everything is welcome. Sad, goofy, angry, happy, inspirational, weird, profound, profane, etc.,,,,

A talk Almaas gave over 30 years ago. “MOST SPIRITUAL PATHS, including the Diamond Approach, involve a certain paradox of realization. We practice, we do exercises, we become responsible for our own liberation, and, at the same time, we know from our experience that realization often happens without being directly connected to the practices that we engage. By exploring this paradox, we can come to understand the relationship between our own intention to wake up and the action of grace. We can come to appreciate the relationship between our own responsibility for our experience and the view that God or Being or true nature makes freedom happen." - A. H. Almaas, Runaway Realization, ch. 1

Maurice Nicoll was the first to be given permission from both Gurdjieff and Ouspensky to become a Teacher of “The Work”.He passed up the opportunity to study with Carl Jung and instead went to France and spent a year with Gurdjieff. Nicoll was a Scottish physician. I get amused at his describing how prevalent self deception is,,,, I well know as a medical psychologist the awkward point where I had to say to the patient: ‘Yes—I can see you have been badly treated, never appreciated, never properly understood. You have told me all that very clearly. But do you think that it is possible that you are not quite the ideal person that you seem to imagine yourself to be, and that there may be some quite serious faults in yourself?’ Now you can all imagine the haughty look, the frozen smile, the magnificent rising from the chair—and the slamming of the door—without, of course, the fee being paid. Yes—but what has happened. . . What has been touched? What would you call it? Whatever you call it, it is this factor that prevents self-change...If he sees for himself something of this factor in him, which is so formidable and the source of so much violence, then it is not aroused antagonistically. He sees himself: he begins to accept what he would never have accepted from another. It is in this way that the Work deals with this otherwise intractable factor in Man.” V. 3, pp. 1165-1166 Another excerpt from Nicoll,,,, COMPASSION II “It is impossible to endure one another’s unpleasant manifestations in the right sense of the meaning of the word unless we see our own unpleasant manifestations and know them and accept them...(We) begin to realize our own helplessness, so we can endure the helpless- ness of others.” V. 3, p. 832 From Psychological Commentaries On the Teaching of Gurdjieff and Ouspensky by Maurice Nicoll

Mental health one-liners Neurosis- It's when you apologize too much for being horrible. It's almost like humility. Innocence feels almost like when you have no conscience. Stupidity can be experienced as constipated reason. Exhaustion is a wonderful help for not reacting passionately about anything. Stupidity and exhaustion can merge minus anger and the experience can be similar to peace of mind. Understanding is the prime ingredient for any state of consciousness that feels royal, supreme and common.

We're all somewhere on the scale of crazy We all have different masks that we wear. Don't we? Consider the small muscles of the face,,, Sometimes you might notice a certain tension in your face. Maybe your concentrating on a detail oriented task. Or perhaps you're in a restaurant and happen to notice a baby being fed one spoon after another by her mother but the child is resistant. This produces that phenomena where by watching you start opening your mouth as the mother opens her mouth while putting the spoon closer the child's face. In both instances, you are in a state of identification. In how many ways can we be identified? I would wager that it would be limited and not endless but none the less a very high number. I may be wrong ,,, I don't know for sure. Throw in intensity of identification which would indicate a deeper state of "attachment" or more shallow state of being identified. I'm not a very expressive person outwardly and by nature, I'm more introverted than extroverted. But the sometimes exaggerated or hyperbolic way I express the attitude of my inner world, often with a degree of irreverence. This makes for a problem for some people who have known me all my life but really don't know me. In the last 20 years I've experienced an inward transformation of sorts but there are still many character flaws that crop up. In actualizing one's potential there are many possibilities in both vertical growth and horizontal growth. As far as I can tell, there is no perfect person achievement award to be had, but there can be an inner quiet that formerly was rarely felt. This inner quiet has a quality of Self remembrance connected with it. But not always,,,, Everyone of us has to move out of the condition of being an unguided Gollum, of sorts. Gollum was very identified with the ring. with "precious", in Lord of the Rings. "Conscious suffering is the medicine to make the automaton surrender to the permanent witness," -Ocke de Boer From there one must self initiate and bring the mind into the heart.

Eschatology is the study of the end of the world, the end of human history, or the end of the current age. It is a branch of theology that deals with beliefs about death, judgment, and the final fate of humankind. The term eschatology comes from the Greek words eschato(s), which means "last", and -logy. It was first recorded between 1835 and 1845. Eschatology is a topic of interest in many religions, including Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. In Christianity, eschatology is concerned with the Second Coming of Christ, the resurrection of the dead, and the Last Judgment. For example, Christians believe that Jesus' sacrifice and resurrection will lead to the resurrection of believers on the Last Day. The concept of eschatology has also been applied to the religions of nonliterate peoples, ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern cultures, and Eastern civilizations.

Dave Chapelle is extremely intelligent .His willingness to say anything combined with a capacity for mimicry that,,,,, what is it? His mimicry is an act of embodiment. No? Makes him hilarious anyway.

There are so many lines of development that can be worked on in Actualizing one's potential that I decided in the past to not pay much attention to some of them. For instance, I'm a terrible speaker for the most part. Especially in front of an audience. Having to speak in front of an audience is a common phobia. I'd say especially so for those who are more introverted. If you try to be everything to everybody, there's a chance you'll just get overwhelmed and end up disappointed with yourself. These people who always say that you need to push out of your comfort zone to make yourself grow. Well, how about me increasing my ability to confront those who say this? Why not? I've always rooted for the underdog. So, I'm going to make arguments in favor of those who would rather not speak and be in opposition to those extroverted brash attention whores who are in love with the sound of their own voice. I do come off as a little too harsh and cynical sometimes. One characteristic of an enneatype 6 is overcompensating. I try to at least observe that tendency. As well as the appearance of cynicalness. In the past I've noticed how a cynical attitude will produce a near constant low-grade guilt. Wishing people well, especially those who you might find offensive is a good counter balance for cynicism. It lifts a burden and changes my inner world when I can honestly have this frame of mind towards everyone. Then again, if I get angry and bitch at someone,,, well it just happens. It means I reacted instead of responded. We're all human. So don't beat yourself up when you miss the mark and behave in a way that you regret. Observing one's mistakes instead of justifying why you did it, makes you grow. That's a Fourth Way concept.

@Wisebaxter That's impressive! Congratulations brother!

@Fountainbleu Just my 2 cents worth,, How about the idea of balancing the intellect with feelings? The system I've been involved with mostly is based on Fourth Way or Gurdjieff. Their are varying lineages. But they are basically the same. The idea is also put forward that the instinctive center needs to be balanced with the intellectual and the heart center.

Update My friend showed up the other day and said he'd been sickly. He also said he'd pulled a dead decaying rat out of the well. The well we had drank out of on July 4th. I said, " damn".

Obvatyl=householder - A somewhat balanced human being who can interact and get things done in the world. When they become disillusioned with life and the trappings of materialism. That is the possible entrance into the “Work”, with a head start. A teacher once said to me, “the Work is for Losers”.

That's it. I agree. The imagination is more of a curse than potential capacity for creativity for a good deal of the human race. Having it as an avenue for escapism enables the needed dissociation to not face uncomfortable aspects of oneself. Unconstrained imagination keeps people asleep in different forms of identification. I don't want to be overly negative here though. Self deception is a major hurtle for people who are interested in actualizing their potentials. By it's very nature, we can see others psychological blind spot better than we can see our own.

Thanks @LastThursday

Personality Style Test Your personality style is: Schizoid Your test scores suggest that your personality style entails: A defect in your ability to form social relationships and an under-responsiveness to all sorts of stimuli. You exhibit an intrinsic emotional "flatness" where the highs don't get too high and the lows don't get too low. Emotions like joy, anger, and sadness do not move you as much as they move other people. Your natural state appears to be one where you have "retired" a bit into yourself, which is one source of the calmness that characterizes your normal state. Unlike what might be expected, your passivity and lack of vitality is not a form of self-protection, but simply seems to be your natural state. I was too retarded to copy the results like everyone else has . I don't think the result was very accurate for me. How do you copy and share the results like y'all have?

Pretty wild,,, 9 minutes

When I understand someone. I'm able to forgive any transgression or overlook a possible grievance. Understanding comes from seeing an aspect in them that l have also witnessed in myself. An aspect that might be considered a character flaw. In having experienced remorse over the 'shared experience', a feeling of empathy arises in myself for their possible uncomfortableness. Understanding becomes a treasure that brings a form of inner peace and makes patience more possible. That may sound a bit self righteous the way I worded it. Beginners mind fits well at this point.

These are my take-aways,,, True wisdom is understanding. Understanding comes about from a combination of knowledge and Being. Beingness and presence are lacking in the contemporary civilization. Time is taking precedence over space where knowledge and information are dominant juxtaposed to Being. Thinking is more often dominating over feeling. Open up to your feelings by becoming empty-headed. Get out of your head by putting attention on the physical sensation of your feet. It can also help to role play a very stupid person. Allow feelings to surface from a place of innocence. A relaxed body is an honest body. Short attention span theatre is eroding the character quality of patience in a fast paced world. Technology is increasing the prevalence of depression in humans. Before you become big hearted in a practical way, you have to experience indulgence and actually observe yourself being a selfish, impatient asshole. It’s not so much the experience of gluttony and satiation but observing it in real time which can aid the healing of addictions in a more enduring way opposed to current culture’s strategy of subtle or blatant shaming. Don’t let other people divide you against yourself. Aloha,,,