Channeling the energy

I channel my pent up energy into my writing. Sublimation FTW. Quite interesting, how the mind works.

I copy a very old Tarot journal (from 2003!) into my computer. It is so interesting to see, what I thought back then, how I related, how it's all about finding a girlfriend, and a lot about that one particular girl with BPD who had made me so unhappy. It's quite the trip.

Entitlement, privilege, and motivation

When you say that "millenials are so entitled" *), what you are really saying is that they create suffering for themselves and others. And now, you create suffering by doling out your righteous judgment, feeling very much entitled in the process.

Of course, there can be tendencies for certain groups towards destructive attitudes or behaviours.

I think that the motivation with which you say something, and the way you say it, is important. Fundamentally important.

You can spew absolute judgments with hatred, bigotry, resentment and fear.

Or you can carefully try to describe and understand what you see as a destructive behaviour, and look out for solutions.

There's a difference between those two, and I think it is all important, especially in the times of social media and hair-trigger indignation.

It's a difference in tone moreso than content. It's hard to spot. It's easy to hide the one under the cover of the other.

It's important to learn how to listen, without judgment, and then rephrase the message so it becomes more productive.

In my experiene, stoicism, some parts of buddhism, and meditation can help with that goal.

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*) etc. etc. ad nauseam

Group characterization, a.k.a. prejudice

"The pharisees were hypocrites."

"Millenials are lazy and entitled."

"Feminists are ugly, fat, man-hating bitches."

"All men are rapists in waiting."


The moment you put people into those neat little categories, you have already lost.

Thinking in groups, and then pitching them against each other, is one of the worst mistakes human beings make - every one of us, including myself.

And we make it an awful lot.

Why is it a mistake? Because it simply ain't true, that's why. It makes us make bad decisions.

Beliefs that don't accurately reflect reality, can cause bad decisions.

My favourite example is from the New Testament: The pharisees are consistently characterized as hypocrites. But, wait a sec - the pharisees were a group of maybe 2000-3000 people or so... can you honestly say that you believe that that many people were being hypocritical, and nothing but hypocritical, for all their life? While everybody else was superduper honest and good?

The answer is, of course, no. It's a piece of ideological hyperbole, of rhetoric.

Some pharisees sure acted like hypocrites in certain situations.

Just like everybody else. Just like I do. Just like you do.

The categorization of a group as hypocrites, or as "entitled", is simply wrong.

The categorization of a specific action as hypocritical is possibly correct, and can be productive.

Yet, we need group categorization for fast decisions, especially in semergency situations: "Can I trust this guy in uniform?" - "Should I run from this guy who looks like a drug addict?"

We do it more when we are emotionally upset. As long as there's no "clear and present danger", the right thing to do would be to let the emotions settle, and only then engage in thinking and decision-making.

We also do it out of sheer mindlessness, intellectual laziness. It takes effort to correct one's prejudice. It's work, actual, real, hard work, to get over it. And you can't ever say that you've finished your work. Never.

I suggest that we learn to be aware of our neat little categories, and whenever we meat someone from one of those groups, allow them the chance to prove us wrong.

I suggest that we learn to attack actions and opinions, with vigour and even mercilessly at times - but never people.

What actual insight stems from meditation?

I woke up this morning with a lot of anger. There was no reason for it, I didn't even have particularly bad dreams, it's just one of those days.

I'm sure there is a secular, physical explanation. Hormones, the male period, whatever.

It makes me wonder.

2500 years of buddhist meditation alone, which supposedly not only calms people down, but gives them insight into "how things truly are", and what really goes on inside. Direct insight into the mechanics of the mind. Direct observation of emotions and thoughts.

Assuming that, in all that time, not everyone was a phony posturing jerk such as myself; assuming that a few of those people were close to "enlightenment" (whatever that is), there should be some useful advice gained from all that meditation, right?

Advice which does not boil down to the boring repetition of a religious doctrine. Advice for people who would never ever meditate, who wouldn't assume a lotus position if their life depended on it. Advice that actually helps.

I have a hard time finding that advice.

Dream Symbols

For almost 20 years now, I have kept a dream journal. Somewhat sporadically, and I lost it all about halfway through, but I guess I can rightfully claim to have more of an overview of my dreams than most people I know.

For much of that time, I tried to decipher them, to find some kind of meaning, symbolism or the like, inside them. I even kept lists of "symbols" to be able to do a little bit of statistics on them.

Ultimately, what I came up with was precious little. Nothing, really, that I wouldn't have come up simply by looking over my journal once in a while.

For quite a few years, I kept dreaming about elevators that failed in all kinds of dangerous ways. I also dreamed a lot about public transport crafts. Invariably, those drove around the whole town in all the wrong directions, and I never reached my goal. This was a time when I was rather insecure and pretty depressed, so it made sense.

I dreamed a few times about an ex girlfriend, where the breakup had been rather dramatic. Understandable.

And a few years later, at a new job that made me the most money I had ever earned, I dreamed about very big and respectable houses, such as museums and the like.

When I was out of a job or concerned about my professional future, I tended to dream about my very first profession (as a bookseller).

I had the usual dreams about flying, which were fun, and very few, but rather intense, nightmares.

A few times, I dreamed about uncanny twins, and it seemed to coincide with upcoming big decisions.

People from my past and present show up in my dreams, of course, and there seem to be certain (very odd) rules.  For example, I never dream about my current girlfriend, I often find myself with an anonymous "group of friends", etc.

And that's about it. It's not an awful lot, certainly no prophecies or clairvoyance. No out-of-body experience or astral projection. In all those years, despite some efforts, I had exactly one lucid dream, and one that was somewhat semi-lucid. I was never able to find any "special" meaning. My dreams never told me anything I didn't already know. They never offer any guidance or insight or spiritual experience.

So, my conclusion is that there is nothing to dream symbols, and there is nothing supernatural going on in dreams. Dreams can be fun, they're certainly interesting, but they have no meaning.

Most probably, they are just a way for the brain to reorganize its internals.

It's a bit sad, perhaps, but that's how it is.

Kundalini Danger - The REAL Dangers Of Tantra

I knew a woman, and we got intimate, and at some point I suggested that she try out a little tantric breathing.

It took her about 30 seconds to break off the experiment in alarm.

What was going wrong?

Well, you should probably know that this woman had suffered through some severe trauma. And while, in theory, I knew that tantra might wake up buried emotions, at that point I just didn't think about that, or didn't quite realize the connection with the situation at hand, and suggested it anyway. Luckily for the both of us, this woman has put lots of time and energy into her therapy, and - partly as a result of that, partly because this is just how awesome she is - she is reflected and mature enough to know what is good for her, and what is not.

So, this stirring of arbitrary emotions without any controlling instance, without a carefully set-up safe environment, definitely counts as a danger to me. What if this hadn't happened with a woman in her mid-30s, but with an insecure twen suffering from bipolar disorder? What if it hadn't happened at home, but in a tantra course, with some "instructor" pushing people into the exercises? Stuff like that falls under the category of a psychotherapeutic intervention, and stuff like that is definitely not to be fooled around with.

In short, tantric breathing can trigger re-traumatization in victims of childhood abuse, people who suffer from PTSD, torture victims, etc. If this is your history, you'd better consult with a trained professional before venturing into tantra.

The other real danger I see is that a so-called "kundalini awakening" seems to sometimes trigger a state similar to perpetual arousal syndrome. From what I know, this is quite rare, so it won't keep me from venturing further on this path. One thing I shall say is that there were a few moments when I was a bit afraid of what might happen if the state of arousal wouldn't wane off by itself. If having a few orgasms doesn't get you off your arousal, then what are you supposed to do? That doesn't sound like a healthy thing to me at all. But as I said, I figure the chances of that are actually extremely slim, so I see no real issue.

Interestingly, some of the symptoms seem to be consistent with what some fundamentalist christians describe as the result of the demonic influence that they see behind said "kundalini awakenings".

If you'd like to learn more, the following article relates a personal experience with that issue - it completely turned the lady in question off sex for several years:

http://www.salon.com/2013/03/17/my_tantric_awakening_turned_me_off_sex/

Instant Gratification, Guilt, Shame, And Romantic Love

Not only among catholic priests, but also in the whole "spiritual community", whatever that may be, the impact of our culture of instant gratification is often lamented. And when it is, it often has to take the blame for our fragile, serial-monogomous relationships.

Now, I don't think that this is entirely wrong (and I don't think that monogamy is the only valid relationship concept, either).

One obvious issue with this argument is that the ideal of romantic love predates consumerism, capitalism, self-help and all the other nice features of modern globalisation by about 2 centuries. Sure, things might have taken their time to catch up, but is that really convincing?

My main contention, though, is that I feel that this is only one part of the whole picture.

I think that, yes sure it is about us not getting the pleasure we think we deserve, and always hunting for the next emotional kick - but I think it is also about us judging our own feelings as not good enough, not strong enough... not enough.

I think we measure ourselves against a romantic ideal that reality just can't keep up with... or that can't keep up with reality. We expect our feelings to guide us in our relationships, and we expect ourselves to "love" our spouse in one very specific way, with one very specific set of emotions being the sign that "everything is okay". And when those emotions wane, not only do we feel sad and lonely, but also guilty.

As if we had an awful lot of control over our emotions!

It's a double-bind of sorts. We are trained to expect love as an overwhelming force, and then when that same uncontrollable force decides not to overwhelm us any more,  suddenly wer are supposed to be able to change that. We can't, so we get frustrated. And then we kill off a perfectly healthy, reliable, wholesome relationship just to get off of a bad trip.

It's so crazy it's decidedly funny, as long as you're not stuck right in the middle of it.

"Cyclical Impact of Porn"

In the above video, youtube user anewchristian72 essentially tells us that porn affects young men's sexuality by filling them up (npi) with unrealistic expectations about female sexuality. I won't go into the fact that he equates porn with heterosexual porn, and bad het porn at that (and how about written erotica? How about comics?). Let's let him pass on that.

While it's not surprising that a christian rants against porn, I would like to point out a few aspects that I found particularly interesting with this little video:

One is that he only talks about the unrealistic portrayal of women in porn. I won't deny that this is true for the  vast majority of heterosexual pornography (one absolutely amazing exception being comstock films - if you have additional examples of porn that is actually good, please let me know). I would like to add, though, that the portrayal of men in het porn is at least as unrealistic. If we are to assume that this wrongful imagery influences young men in bad ways by way of false expectations, then shouldn't we assume that the portrayal of their own gender, with extremely huge cocks that are always ready, always erect, and their owners always horny and willing no matter what, is even more devastating to those young souls?

I was about to write, in accordance with anewchristian72's opinion and feminist mainstream, that the portrayal of women in het porn is a lot more denigrating than that of the male protagonists - but is this indeed true? Men are reduced to sex machines who have nothing on their minds except fucking women - how is this not supposed to be denigrating to my gender? Maybe there is some difference in quantity here, but certainly not in principle.

A second observation: He does not present any facts, he doesn't quote any studies, he doesn't even reference personal experience. I'm always amazed when that happens. How does he know what he claims to know? How can we test his claims to be true? As mentioned before, I like it when people qualify their claims with regard to their supposed ontological status.

Thirdly, I find it interesting how people just assume that young minds are impressionable, and therefore, whatever they see in whatever erotic product of their choice will be directly reflected in their sexual behaviour. I wonder if that is indeed the case. People don't go all panicky just because of some sci-fi flick. People don't run into the streets with guns after watching Die Hard. On the other hand, people are affected by advertisement, of course. I would like to know things like that in a little more detail, before starting off with sweeping judgments about the whole erotica industry based on a lot of ideology and little factual knowledge.

So, yeah, that's it. No punchline here, as I have to go home now and spend some quality time in bed with my girlfriend, the porn star.

Let's Turn It Into An Art Form!

It just dawned on me... in all my attempts at dealing with my own emotions, all the personal-development stuff I've tried, with whatever success... one thing was missing all that time.

Just look at it. Picture me dealing with some "difficult emotion", whatever it is.

The buddhist doctrine will tell me that it just "is what it is", and then to focus on my breath and meditate.

The NLPers will say that I have to break it down into its various sensory qualities, then create a new feeling from scratch, anchor that, yadda yadda yadda.

Tony Robbins will tell me I have not yet succeeded in making "feeling better" a MUST, that I should shift my pose and focus on the right things. Father Barron will want me to rejoin the catholic *cough*cult*cough* church, and Steven Pylarinos will make another video.

The psychoanalyst will try to find the root cause for a few years, the christian will find my lack of faith disturbing and tell me to pray nonetheless, Marshall Rosenberg will offer four stages (not three! not five!), the advaitin will say that there's nothing to learn anyway...

And they all have exactly one thing in common: They offer me one (or maybe two or three) recipes, based on a few ideological premises that are to be accepted. When you cut to the chase, there is One True Way, and by necessity the others are false, or at least not the best way.

There is a certain... fearful timidity to that approach. As if my inner life was like an ancient chinese vase about to fall and break into a thousand pieces!

Do you, my dear reader, share my impression that the best things in life generally tend to make you feel free, spontaneous and creative?

If so, why don't we start being creative about our own emotional development? There is this troubling feeling. I can yell at it to go away. I can consciously choose to identify with it. I can name it, externalize it, picture it as a color. I can breathe into it. I can dance around the room, or at least visualize myself doing so. I can try and add warmth to it, or else push it away and make it appear smaller and in black-and-white. I can focus on my breath. I can come up with a few fun affirmations...

I have all those things to try, and then some.

Doesn't that feel tremendously more empowering than sticking to one method devised by some clever guru? Even if that guru be the christ, or the buddha himself...

Let's reclaim our own relationship with ourselves! Let's turn our self-appreciation into an art form, our self-love into an eternal dance, a fire of passion, creativity, unabashed recklessness. Some things will make us feel divine for a short time, some things will help us in the long term, and some attempts will blow up in our face like a big old jack-in-the-box. Let's learn from our experiences, mistakes and successes, and let's share our insights.

I'm not a broken vase. I am my own art project.

Why Rituals Matter

Practically every life coach and self-help guru will go on about rituals, and how important they are. As one popular example, watch the following Tony Robbins video:

(Note for clarity, added after my discussion with Brent Mosher in the comments section below: I do not endorse Tony Robbins; he's a self-help guru, and he keeps raising unrealistic and false hopes in his followers. However, I think he's right in this regard, and I believe in separating the wheat from the chaff, even with gurus.)

He's right, of course, and they all are: Rituals are good for you!

This posting is about what they don't tell you, perhaps because it's not trendy and not "positive" enough. Or, more probably, they simply don't know it. (*)

There is a well-documented psychological effect called decision fatigue. It describes how decisions are physically exhausting. The following quote from a NYT article (quoted in an excellent article aptly titled "Decision Fatigue: Why Willpower Isn’t Always Enough") explains it nicely:

Decision fatigue helps explain why ordinarily sensible people get angry at colleagues and families, splurge on clothes, buy junk food at the supermarket and can’t resist the dealer’s offer to rustproof their new car. No matter how rational and high-minded you try to be, you can’t make decision after decision without paying a biological price.

It’s different from ordinary physical fatigue — you’re not consciously aware of being tired — but you’re low on mental energy. The more choices you make throughout the day, the harder each one becomes for your brain...

(Highlights by me.)

And that is precisely why it makes sense to ritualize our tasks - especially those we don't like. Daily workout, I guess, is one of those for most of us. You get up in the morning and your brain and your whole body goes noooo, not again... I'm tired, I want ten more minutes in bed, it'll feel terrible... And that odd behaviour will continue day after day after day, even though you repeatedly have the experience of being more happy after the workout than before. But when you're used to doing your morning exercises every day at the same time for so long you don't even remember a time when you did not do them, it's much easier. It's one thing you don't have to think about.

Perhaps more importantly, if you know the dynamics of decision fatigue, it gets easier to handle those situations. It's not a question of guilt anymore, but a question of acquiring the skills. Instead of calling yourself a failure for not having enough willpower, now it's time to learn how to ritualize all the things you want to do on a regular basis.

And it gets even better!

'Cos you can apply the same principle on a much lower level, too.

I find that workout gets easier if I do the same set of exercises every time. Sure, every now and then I add an "extra", just to make it more interesting, but in general, I have my 10 or so moves that I do every day.

Okay, almost every day. Probably 5 days a week. Except last week, when there was all this christmas business, and then sometimes I just don't get to it, so let's say it's probably a solid... 7 days out of 10...

I hear similar stories from people who decided to go vegetarian. There is no question about ordering that rare steak. One more decision they don't have to take with every single meal.

Venturing into philosophical terrain, I find it plausible that our identity, the labels we attach to ourselves and then attach ourselves to, are yet another way to get rid of decisions. If that is so, my decision never to go 100% with any dietary philosophy has a severe drawback here, and I will rethink it in the next few days.

So, in case you were wondering why your grandma always insisted the dishes be done right after the meal, now you know - she was perfectly right. Sometimes, a lifetime of experience can make one a great psychologist.

What tasks can you think of right now that you would like to ritualize in this way?

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(*) To be fair, some of them probably do tell you, I haven't ever heard it though.