I stick it between my ears, but sometimes they wanna listen to other things like aspirations and rationalizations, but the wasted excursions at least give some experience points.
I think the balance is to keep moving (gyroscopic-duuude), then you’re harder for reality to hit.
And yes; I dare. I dare whatever life might throw at (or offer) me. Because what do I gain, but a home in my own personal hell, if I cop an attitude that my denying reality will parse as any kind of asset for anyone, in whatever time I have left?
I think it was Commander Riker who said in one Star Trek episode that facing death was the ultimate test of one’s character (ie, what they believed in, what they lived their life professing was important not with their words, but their actions).
@Jear77
Actually it was the “Shades of Gray” episode where he is infected by an alien parasite on an away-mission and fights for his life over the span of an hour while his nervous system is increasingly co-opted by the organism.
But the point is that if one’s beliefs (a function of one’s character) let one down (crumble) at what we see as life’s most critical moment, what value are they? And if they let one down repeatedly even before this, failing to provide sufficient “meaning” to off-set the inherent suffering that is self-aware “Being” . . . what value are they?
The “Two Rikers” episode was also an interesting one, exploring role of experience in shaping character over time; and also in facing the “what if’s” and “could be’s” of one’s own life.
@griz realizing that everything will cease to exist, you… me… society… the entire world…. the whole universe… it makes no sense to have any care, any attachment to what happens here, ultimately.
@Jear77
The most pessimistic assessment only has the asset of protecting against disappointment. And this only for the short-term.
Because Humans have the unique ability to make a terrible situation even worse by approaching it with the most pessimistic assessment!
So bad in theory, that it still manages to disappoint us.
It’s a feedback loop of negativity. Looking just a short span forwards, renders only death. One becomes a “death-eater”, trying to subsist off of decay.
But we already know reality is valanced, having both positive and negative components/concepts.
An optimistic assessment might risk disappointment. But that is a manageable risk. And in return, possibilities and outlook can remain open and forward-looking.
@griz a realistic assessment will always beat out one that says everything is hunky dory when obviously it is not to me. And there are some situations that HAVE no positive outcomes, nothing EXCEPT bitterness and warning… you yourself agreed to that in the “lemonade” question
@Jear77
An optimistic outlook doesn’t try to say “everything is hunkey-dorey” . . . it just makes the current points of reality that ARE . . . both a focus and a guide. And one tends to walk more completely into the best aspects of life.
The opposite approach is to make the current points of reality that are bad the focus and guide. So one walks deeper into the worse aspects of life.
A very few scenarios in life don’t have a totally positive outcome to choose from. So does one’s chosen philosophy guide them to the best of a bad situation . . . or the worst?
This isn’t rocket science. But these “ideologies” (particularly the darker ones) tend to blind us to obvious truths — just for the sake of keeping a dark hold on us.
@griz i am beginning to think you can’t see the forest for the trees here. By focusing solely on the positive you can become blind to the negative such that you ignore relevant things that need improvement on. You say “it’s fine, because I have these good things over here.” Yet is it really? Not always, or at least not to the extent that you want to believe. This example is particularlyrelevant to you. I saw a picture of an OTR trucker. One side was exposed to sun, the other was shaded because of his truck. He became SUPER aged from the sun. Takeaway: use sunblock daily, don’t ignore simply because it doesn’t belong in your optimistic POV
@Jear77
The negative doesn’t need, or deserve, our focus. It’s just there, whether we worship it or not (I used worship intentionally, and accurately). And if we do, it infects our attitude and outlook.
I focus on the positive, without the delusion the negative doesn’t exist. The negative isn’t defeated by defeating it in battle. The Allies fought fascism, and here it still is today in our Universities. And if we defeat it there, it will recreate its evil somewhere else.
One deals with the negative by embracing and participating with the positive. As it grows, the negative naturally retreats — because it cannot tolerate the light.
You’ve become infected (by that religion) because you cannot tolerate the light. Darkness substitutes itself over any vision of light in you and makes it something to be demonized (by twisting words and reality, cherrypicking context) and cast out.
And the only solution is exactly what the darkness has poisoned you against doing.
That’s forest AND trees.
Back to our regularly scheduled program of discussing ideas and concepts.
@Jear77
Extremisms are for extremists. Is that really where you want to end up?
Just adjust common sense so one isn’t trying to turn even positives just negative.
If you’re unwell, take care of yourself. You miss a day’s pay . . . but after you’re rested you can read one of those book things that are so good for you.
@jear77
Consider your last line taken to the logical extreme… If the negative won’t exist in any way unless we focus upon it, the Utopia is it within grasp! Just stop focusing on the negative!!
An extreme point can make a point. But if we are always jumping to the extreme or just an extremist.
@griz that’s one of the points that “the science of getting rich” says. It says to thank God for or the wealth you will have and envision your life as if you’re already in possession of it. Use the wealth in your mind as if it’s already yours, never wavering an instant that you have it. Another book (something about making thoughts reality) states that you should act as if you have the thing you want and by doing so, it will mannifest in your life, even to the point of spending $ you don’t actually have. So perhaps if everyone had a crystal clear vision of what they wanted, exercising their will to get it, we actually mivht have a utopian society
@Jear77
They are experimenting with ways to tap into potential that scientific empiricism cannot see.
That is why we need more than one tool in our toolbox. Science deals quite well with matter and predictable response. but it is utterly blind to the human spirit.
Scientism can only conclude that we have no potential; and that’s why it tends to spin off into nihilism and depression.
20 responses to “How do you build upon the past?”
I stick it between my ears, but sometimes they wanna listen to other things like aspirations and rationalizations, but the wasted excursions at least give some experience points.
I think the balance is to keep moving (gyroscopic-duuude), then you’re harder for reality to hit.
By integrating it as fully as possible and extracting all possible goodness from it.
If it was bad that means reconciling it, forgiving it and being at peace with it.
@griz can you integrate with cancer, AIDS, or (don’t ask me the name of it) the “fleah eating disease” ? Do you dare?
@Jear77
Ebola, iirc.
And yes; I dare. I dare whatever life might throw at (or offer) me. Because what do I gain, but a home in my own personal hell, if I cop an attitude that my denying reality will parse as any kind of asset for anyone, in whatever time I have left?
I think it was Commander Riker who said in one Star Trek episode that facing death was the ultimate test of one’s character (ie, what they believed in, what they lived their life professing was important not with their words, but their actions).
@griz it was also his unfortunate doppelganger due to a transporter mishap who tried to reignite a long dead romance!
@Jear77
Actually it was the “Shades of Gray” episode where he is infected by an alien parasite on an away-mission and fights for his life over the span of an hour while his nervous system is increasingly co-opted by the organism.
But the point is that if one’s beliefs (a function of one’s character) let one down (crumble) at what we see as life’s most critical moment, what value are they? And if they let one down repeatedly even before this, failing to provide sufficient “meaning” to off-set the inherent suffering that is self-aware “Being” . . . what value are they?
The “Two Rikers” episode was also an interesting one, exploring role of experience in shaping character over time; and also in facing the “what if’s” and “could be’s” of one’s own life.
@griz realizing that everything will cease to exist, you… me… society… the entire world…. the whole universe… it makes no sense to have any care, any attachment to what happens here, ultimately.
@Jear77
There’s an interesting psychology that emerges when one’s entire meaning becomes the assessment of meaninglessness to everything.
“Interesting”, not in the good or pleasant sense. You spoke in another thread of the idea of people that perhaps don’t even qualify as “people”.
Perhaps this is where the idea of wraiths originally came from? Something lacking meaning (and therefore reality) in this world?
@griz unfortunately, it’s the truest assessment of the situation, regardless of whether or not it’s depressing to think about
@Jear77
The most pessimistic assessment only has the asset of protecting against disappointment. And this only for the short-term.
Because Humans have the unique ability to make a terrible situation even worse by approaching it with the most pessimistic assessment!
So bad in theory, that it still manages to disappoint us.
It’s a feedback loop of negativity. Looking just a short span forwards, renders only death. One becomes a “death-eater”, trying to subsist off of decay.
But we already know reality is valanced, having both positive and negative components/concepts.
An optimistic assessment might risk disappointment. But that is a manageable risk. And in return, possibilities and outlook can remain open and forward-looking.
@griz a realistic assessment will always beat out one that says everything is hunky dory when obviously it is not to me. And there are some situations that HAVE no positive outcomes, nothing EXCEPT bitterness and warning… you yourself agreed to that in the “lemonade” question
@Jear77
An optimistic outlook doesn’t try to say “everything is hunkey-dorey” . . . it just makes the current points of reality that ARE . . . both a focus and a guide. And one tends to walk more completely into the best aspects of life.
The opposite approach is to make the current points of reality that are bad the focus and guide. So one walks deeper into the worse aspects of life.
A very few scenarios in life don’t have a totally positive outcome to choose from. So does one’s chosen philosophy guide them to the best of a bad situation . . . or the worst?
This isn’t rocket science. But these “ideologies” (particularly the darker ones) tend to blind us to obvious truths — just for the sake of keeping a dark hold on us.
@griz i am beginning to think you can’t see the forest for the trees here. By focusing solely on the positive you can become blind to the negative such that you ignore relevant things that need improvement on. You say “it’s fine, because I have these good things over here.” Yet is it really? Not always, or at least not to the extent that you want to believe. This example is particularlyrelevant to you. I saw a picture of an OTR trucker. One side was exposed to sun, the other was shaded because of his truck. He became SUPER aged from the sun. Takeaway: use sunblock daily, don’t ignore simply because it doesn’t belong in your optimistic POV
@Jear77
The negative doesn’t need, or deserve, our focus. It’s just there, whether we worship it or not (I used worship intentionally, and accurately). And if we do, it infects our attitude and outlook.
I focus on the positive, without the delusion the negative doesn’t exist. The negative isn’t defeated by defeating it in battle. The Allies fought fascism, and here it still is today in our Universities. And if we defeat it there, it will recreate its evil somewhere else.
One deals with the negative by embracing and participating with the positive. As it grows, the negative naturally retreats — because it cannot tolerate the light.
You’ve become infected (by that religion) because you cannot tolerate the light. Darkness substitutes itself over any vision of light in you and makes it something to be demonized (by twisting words and reality, cherrypicking context) and cast out.
And the only solution is exactly what the darkness has poisoned you against doing.
That’s forest AND trees.
Back to our regularly scheduled program of discussing ideas and concepts.
@griz and so if you’re unwell you tell yourself it’s nothing?
@Jear77
Extremisms are for extremists. Is that really where you want to end up?
Just adjust common sense so one isn’t trying to turn even positives just negative.
If you’re unwell, take care of yourself. You miss a day’s pay . . . but after you’re rested you can read one of those book things that are so good for you.
Make it a meaningful one.
@griz i was talking your idea to the LOGICAL extreme. If you can’t focus on the negative, you can’t acknowledge it exists in ANY way.
@jear77
Consider your last line taken to the logical extreme… If the negative won’t exist in any way unless we focus upon it, the Utopia is it within grasp! Just stop focusing on the negative!!
An extreme point can make a point. But if we are always jumping to the extreme or just an extremist.
@griz that’s one of the points that “the science of getting rich” says. It says to thank God for or the wealth you will have and envision your life as if you’re already in possession of it. Use the wealth in your mind as if it’s already yours, never wavering an instant that you have it. Another book (something about making thoughts reality) states that you should act as if you have the thing you want and by doing so, it will mannifest in your life, even to the point of spending $ you don’t actually have. So perhaps if everyone had a crystal clear vision of what they wanted, exercising their will to get it, we actually mivht have a utopian society
@Jear77
They are experimenting with ways to tap into potential that scientific empiricism cannot see.
That is why we need more than one tool in our toolbox. Science deals quite well with matter and predictable response. but it is utterly blind to the human spirit.
Scientism can only conclude that we have no potential; and that’s why it tends to spin off into nihilism and depression.