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Struggling with my Bachelor's thesis
Struggling with my Bachelor's thesisIn the past two months, I have done extensive research into my topic - probably more than enough, and I could technically start writing now. I have already taken a good 200, maybe 300 pages worth of notes, and the end goal should be 40-50 pages....a coherently formulated 40-50 pages though, which is the main problem right now. There's just so much and I don't know how to organise my ideas or structure them. I've tried to come up with themed chapters and stuff like that, but overall it's still so much and I don't know if I can fit all the things I want to or should say into that structure. Technically, there is no right or wrong and there are literally infinite "right" ways to complete this task....but at the same time, I doubt whether the chapter headings I have selected can properly fit all the things I need to say, and if I say things in the right order.....and there are endless ways to do this, endless ways to arrange specific quotes in different orders...I can spend hours dragging bits of text up or down, but it's not like that would get me anywhere. For some reason, I find it really difficult to write in a structured way about a subject matter that could be analysed from a billion different angles, and there's also a hermeneutics so it does matter what I say first and what next, but in my head it's all a mess and this is so overwhelming.... and the problem is I understand what I want to say, I understand what the academic sources say on the topic (for the most part), but I just can't narrow things down enough to write a coherent essay that explains things in a linear order, because my understanding of the topic is so broad at this point that I see it from so many different angles.
If I just write in a new document from scratch, that usually just gives me an extra twenty pages worth of notes that I will then have to copy and integrate into my long document, where I am repeating a lot of things unnecessarily. I have no idea how to solve this or how to make actual progress with the writing process.
Another related aspect I am struggling with is the communication with my supervising professor. She is generally kind and open to any questions I have, but I feel like I am being annoying. I am also not sure how open I can be with her about the genuine psychological struggles that writing my thesis entails for me....you might say that writing a thesis is scary for everyone, but I think for me it's probably top-notch and enmeshed with an anxiety disorder and so on. I am not sure how to explain my insecurity surrounding the writing process without making her think I want special treatment or I am exaggerating....maybe I don't even have to explain this, but considering that I am weirdly insecure and making this a lot more complicated for myself than it needs to be, I feel like maybe it could help to talk to her about this.
I would really appreciate your advice.
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I can't be sure about truth
I can't be sure about truth"I can't be sure about [the Truth]"
> the "i", i.e. the finite self that "knows" or "doubts", that can't be sure about the Truth, is Truth. (not in the sense that its existence as a separate entity is true in the ultimate sense, but it is what appears) That's what Leo means when he says you can't know the Truth, but you can understand = be = become it.
There's no need to get hung up on the presence or absence of words. You can wake up to Absolute Infinity and then write about that realisation like crazy, and have the literal word "Infinity." written out on paper....but what's so crazy is when you see that you are literally inside it (so to speak) and actual infinity is sitting right underneath that label, stretching out underneath it on the very piece of paper you wrote it on, and including the letters and the ink that hold the symbol, everything... What's frustrating and absolutely beautiful about Awakening is that when you try to talk about it, you suddenly find yourself using all the same words that you heard other people use...but they suddenly mean something completely new to You, and are simultaneously frustratingly insufficient at getting at the essence you want to point to, because again, the pointer is, and will forever struggle in the attempt to point to itself. The pointer (word, symbol) itself consists of "Isness" (= Truth) ...so anything you say about God literally is just more God (Truth, Being). Anything you say about Truth (whether true or false at reflecting what Truth is) is "Truth", by definition:)
Awakening does not require you to formalise or symbolise the realisation, which is the intuitive grasping of the Whole, transcending all dualism, symbolism, and linguistic pointers.
The "you" or "i" that could "have" the Truth or fail to have (know) it, is the obstacle here. It's literally too finite to be in possession of "the Truth" as a whole. Because Truth is too infinite, too whole and too complete (singular, one, already itself) to be pinned down by the finite mind. That is the Realisation of Truth.