Thinking Into Misery

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A piece from one of my favorites -

"Pleasure is the structure of society. From childhood until death we are secretly, cunningly or obviously pursuing pleasure. So whatever our form of pleasure is, I think we should be very clear about it because it is going to guide and shape our lives. It is therefore important for each one of us to investigate closely, hesitantly and delicately this question of pleasure, for to find pleasure and then nourish and sustain it, is a basic demand of life and without it existence becomes dull, stupid, lonely and meaningless.
You may ask why then should life not be guided by pleasure? For the very simple reason that pleasure must bring pain, frustration, sorrow and fear, and out of fear, violence. If you want to live that way, live that way. Most of the world does anyway, but if you want to be free from sorrow you must understand the whole structure of pleasure.
To understand pleasure is not to deny it. We are not condemning it or saying it is right or wrong, but if we pursue it let us do so with our eyes open, knowing that a mind that is all the time seeking pleasure must inevitably find it's shadow, pain. They cannot be separated, although we run after pleasure and try to avoid pain."

(Jiddu Krishnamurti, "Freedom From the Known")


Following this, my natural conclusion is that we can think ourselves into misery, into depression, into dissatisfaction. We've found this to be proven true with books like "Feeling Good" (which Goldfish mentioned in a post) and the list of Cognitive Distortions (which I try to inform people of, as I learned them from that book ages ago and find them helpful). So it's not exactly like what I'm saying is far fetched. Naturally there are plenty of instances where it's not necessarily a matter of thinking one's way into it, but the aftermath of significant feelings. However, how much is it the feelings themselves and how much is it the importance, the significance with which we give those feelings that dictates the intensity of impact?

So the question then becomes, how do we find the line? Is it really all a matter of thought, of perception? Can the vagaries of trauma be lessened significantly with a significant shift in thought and perception? Can one think their way out of trauma and mental illness that has no significant biological basis, that originates primarily within the scope of emotion and intellect? And by thinking, I don't mean thinking "I'm okay, I'm happy today, I'm not hurt" or other such nonsense. I mean by deep, penetrative thought that questions the very foundations of your grasp of reality.
Change is the only factor in life I've found to be 100% dependable. Things change.
So can we influence change with change?

Again... can we think our way out?

I feel that's really the only way to do it----to "think your way out of it," or at least have the desire to "think your way out of it."

People evolve. They don't stay the same. Many bums are able to get off the street.

What I really wish----is that we had a law which expunged any criminal convictions within 5 years. Canada has that law in their books. Having that conviction on your record is probably the greatest barrier to finding jobs.

Medication can only do so much. And medications tend to have bad side effects.

I have to agree, to a point. Like any good scientist, I always account for potentially unseen factors or influences. But overall I find it to be the most effective method. One has to change their mind to change their life.

"You cannot solve a problem with the same mind that created it."

I think that would be better for non-violent crimes. There are obviously, to me personally, some exceptions I couldn't agree on expunging their records. Pedophiles and proven rapists, to start.

I'm not a fan of medication. I'm very sensitive to psychiatric medications, and the side effects from most pharmaceuticals these days are just outrageous. They're honestly terrifying.

Yep....I would agree with you pertaining to crimes like murder, rape, pedophilia, etc. I was probably thinking too generally---not enough focus.

There are many ways one could get out of a depression, yes. Again, I guess I wasn't thinking in specific, focused terms.

I tend to overfocus '^_^

Very good question based on a very perceptive quote. He reminds me of another theosophist whose name is even more fun to try and say; Curuppumullage Jinarajadasa.

I think the answer is partly knowing that this world is hell. You're always oscillating between the nine rings of Dante's inferno, on a good day - which in the west is most often - you're just in the first ring, limbo, but it can give way occasionally to the second or third. Once you realize that pain, suffering, and meaningless is something most people have in spades you're possibly better positioned to attack the problem.

I think back to some of the most painful times in my life and what I realize is that those times were predicated on a set of beliefs that if I wasn't imminently doing well compared to the people around me, if I wasn't 'making the grade' by someone else's standards, or worse - if I wasn't truly happy where I was at, that this meant there was something wrong with me that I needed to sort out. While it's true that you can never completely disband those thoughts I took them entirely too far. I still have punctuated places where they hit, sometimes like when you're financial or familial stability is at risk it's unavoidable, but I'm getting those further apart (ie. not digging my own hole without a damn good reason) as time goes on.

Something else that I tend to mention here, maybe more often than I should, is that I've been working with tarot and Qabalah for the past five years of my life. I'm learning that between those too you have something like a powerful psychological pharmacy, almost like medical grade cognitive behavioral therapy where instead of a script for a pill you get a script for a particular sphere and archangel, or god, or goddess, or you meditate on particular tarot keys that seem to hit the right vector on the Tree of Life that wraps around a key issue you're confronting and these symbols seem to have been built (especially in the late 19th century or early 20th) to both take the Tree of Life into account as a model and also attempt to map human psychology with symbols which are akin to sets of logical operators. Is it perfect? No. Would it square perfectly to modern neuroscience? Highly doubtful. What it has done is teach me to find ways to be resourceful with my own thoughts and ideas, how to match symbols when I feel the need to pull myself from one polarity that I've been wallowing in a bit too much back toward the middle (which they don't seem to talk about good vs evil - more about polarities like mercy and severity with mildness or balance as the mean).

Another thing I've learned is that you come in multiple modules, almost separated in some ways. Those deeper modules do a lot of your pre-processing and since they do that there's a catch to any attempt to weave fictions as an antedote to pain, ie. those deeper parts will know exactly what you're doing, they won't buy it, and when they get annoyed that you're not attending to your (and their) basic needs in some way they'll find ways to rebel. What you have to do in that case is take stock of your emotions, not run from them but attempt to process them out and hope that they can be turned to fruitful action. Also there will be times in your life where you may feel yourself pulled down dark alleyways within yourself and those can be properly frightening but there too it's best to get to know the denizens, face off with what you're seeing, and this may or may not be anyone else's cup of tea but I found that when I really got concerned that I did have a powerful resource in Lilith as she seems to be a bit like a superintelligence manning (or womanning) the perigee point of energy in the cosmos, taking what's going septic and on a downward trajectory, processing out its causality (ie. destroying the ruthless or wicked obligations through impeccable logic), and returning it as freed energy. If you ever find yourself worried that you're going into a black hole of sorts it's wise to be able to consider an entity like that - ie. who guards the boundaries of existence and offers a set of conversion tools that you can use to get yourself back out of it.

That doesn't mean I'm anywhere close to perfect at this, and I'm sure I've got plenty more mileage to be shocked, dismayed, or horrified by life but I think I've at least by this point digested some of the scariest truths and it seems like I've survived them.

I love difficult to pronounce names. It's a fun challenge. Far more interesting than single syllable names.



I definitely agree with you there. Life is ugly and painful, but there's plenty left in it that's the opposite. However, blinding one's self to the realities of life and existence, trying to deny them, is like trying to achieve sobriety by drinking alcohol.



As much as I was resistant, independent and vocal about what I felt to be illogical, I still bought in to my conditioning hook, line and sinker. It was similar to the beliefs you describe, and more or less simply set me up for failure. The standards were impossibly high, even for folk who have no issues with mental or neurological processing and function. It was like cutting off a leg and then beating myself up for not being able to win an Olympic medal for running.




I did a bunch of borderline fanatical research into theology and religion in my late teens and early twenties. I'd come across both Qabalah and the Tree of Life many times before, much more so Tree of Life as it seems to be present in just about every belief system if you only dig deep enough, but the most interesting pieces I'd found were in a book call The Tree of Life by Israel Regardie. It got a bit convoluted and complex, making it extremely hard to follow at times, but it was a very intriguing read if for no other reason than it offered up specific perspectives and ideas I'd not found elsewhere.




I've always been attuned to a kind of "voice" that I'd describe as being less like a voice and more like intuition or a deep wisdom, and it makes for rather rough going sometimes In one particular period of my life it was as though I'd been thrown directly out into the blinding white sun after having blinders on for some time. It's too difficult an experience to really impart and explain through any medium, but all the more impossible over the internet for me. I fell into that "black hole" and at the time I was horrified. It was the worst I'd ever felt in my life and I was absolutely sure I'd never get out, never escape the bleak darkness that seemed to influence every thought and feeling I had. I saw no value in myself, no value in the world, no value in other people... everything was just ugly to me.
After some time and some rather dramatic circumstances, I came out of it bruised and weary, but alive and more aware of my own motivations and the ways in which I sought to grasp and come to terms with reality.
"If you're going to swim, you've got to be okay to sink."

I really enjoyed how much thought you put into this response, and I like your perspective. It's also nice to come across someone who has also delved into the same/similar pools of knowledge and found the waters to be worth their while.

The few things I might add here though, even at the risk of offending some of the more strictly physicalist audience, is that when and if you try to take your integrity into your own hands or even start moving more deeply into explorations of faith and various metaphysical concepts it seems like the universe - almost like clockwork - will start something akin to hazing. It reminds me of Nick Farrell's observations within his own branch of the Golden Dawn that when he did Zelator (1 = 10) initiations for people into Malkuth they almost immediately lost their job or had something happen that did anything between jeapordizing their financial wherewithal and completely flipping it over. It reminds me of something that a particular British Christian preacher, David Pawson, said about his choice to take his faith seriously - that it didn't make his life easier, far from it it seemed like all the crazy that life could have for him came out of the woodwork.

I think we're still struggling as a culture on how to deal with broader patterns of emergence in nature, currently the tendency is to ridicule anything that can be directly scientifically verified but I've met too many people who think quite deeply about these matters, I've had too many synchronicities that aren't explainable in any other way, and I learned a ways back that when you see this universe as generally amoral the scarier proposition isn't believing in permanent surgical anesthesia at death, really the much scarier thought is being immortal in a universe that could care less about you and getting bounced from place to place, experience to experience, with little or nothing to call memory or an even more grim possibility - living one's life on loop as if it were Groundhog's Day. I'm not sure what or any of that is strictly correct but I'd have to reiterate my suspicion that a lot of what we seem to pass off dogmatically as known truth in certain respects is closer to a combination of political concern and academic Stockholm syndrome.

Sometimes, one has to push the boundaries of his/her supposedly "preordained" fate.

This made me laugh pretty hard. I know exactly what you're referring to. It really is like clockwork. I think the most dramatic incidence was my rather foolhardy dance with a Hindu deity known as Kali.
She will rip apart your life 10 ways to Sunday if you're not careful.



Now THERE is one faction I don't get too close to. The Golden Dawn. You do any little bit of research into it, and if you're astute enough, one can see the inherent chaos and thrust of it's being. Israel Regardie was actually friends with Alstair Crowley, just a random fact I came across.



I agree wholeheartedly with the synchronicity thing. Some things are just too in your face, if you have the proper knowledge, and to disregard the evanescent parts of life (to me) is just an act of stubborn denial and fear. Which, no judgment there, fear is a healthy mechanism for survival and it's only natural to fear what one feels doesn't fall under their own control.
You might be right about the Stockholm Syndrome part, I could have a touch of it myself, but I personally relish the idea of never stagnating and "getting bounced" around. While I may react predictably, as I'm human, to the new and the different, I still find them exciting and far better than the droll predictability of familiar circumstance.
I think perhaps that there is merit to the "reincarnation" theory, but that we've got the idea of it wrong. I find that it makes more sense, within the concept that time is illusory and holds no definitive law, that we are in fact living through each life simultaneously. I can't really explain why THIS particular consciousness SEEMS to be the prevalent and pervasive one, but given the nature of consciousness in general it's fairly probable that it is in fact not the dominant perspective and whatever it is that brings us to this singular position is about as knowable as God.

One should definitely always do so.

There's a lot I'd like to say on that although I'll try to keep it to a side-note rather than side-track.

While I generally don't see Crowley as evil (tantric and dissident perhaps) I do know what you mean about the order constantly compound-fracturing. Most of the good things that you might tangentially hear about it are orders that people like Dion Fortune and Paul Foster Case founded in that they were former members but aside from that good stories tend to still be isolated to already talented or precocious people making the system theirs (eg. Nick Farrell, Peregrin Wildoak, Pat Zalewski, the Ciceros, etc.) rather than any great stories of organizational survival.

My best guess is that the people who got into it early on in its founding were a mixed bag, WW Wescott was probably too reserved and polite to keep the towering egos in check, and the tools being used were a bit too hot for the people involved. From what I hear of the cypher manuscripts, and I could be wrong, is it sounds like it might have been either a document or a forgery of a document from a branch of the Elus Cohen system which, considering Martinez de Pasqually's work, would explain why the wheels fell off fast when you got a bunch of people using the same fuel he did, riffing it differently, and didn't have incredibly strict organizational protocols to keep egos from burning the place down. In a way I think the GD even upped the salad bar approach, throwing in miscellaneous Eastern systems along with John Dee's work, and that added further to the combustibility.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzNvk80XY9s

"Thinking into Misery"; yes, true, this often Happens
among human beings who no longer move as art
speaks as Art in Feeling and Sensing Nature
as pART oF all more specifically
LiFE as aLL A Dance
And Song of
Life where
ART of heART
is more than H and E making SMart.
The archetypes are clear now for those
who Dance and Sing Free without instruction
without guidelines without rules and yes without
words of planning as a Dance precedes a Song of Art
Away from Mechanical Cognition where to Bring Systemizing
Science into the much bigger picture now shows in studies that
Mechanical Cognition when used to the exclusion of Social Empathic
Cognition withers
away the potential
for Happiness
like a pipe
of being
FroZen no longer allowing
A River of Happiness to Flow Free
in moving connecting and co-creating
ways original and not prescribed as a pill
or a spoon fed way of life from Birth. Nature
Deficit Disorder is a 'Growing' Trend that starts early
in school with quiet hands and feet. True, more aptly put in terms
of potential Happiness or not as that relates to stress and anxiety and
all stuff associated with Fear that can and will lead to not only the Death
of Happiness in tension from Head to toe but also the potential for Aggression
and Violence and even World War III when a Dance of Free Flowing Happiness from
Head to toe
leaves
the
room as Tree oF LiFE
NoW no longer Felt and
Sensed from Head to toe alive.
Truly, it is fascinating since the development of Written Language away
from the much longer used way of connecting and moving and co-creating
through a literal Dance of Non-Verbal Language from first to last blink of life;
the tools of words that Humans and Cultures have used to escape; a land of words
of thinking judging 'inside' back to Nature 'outside' as Feeling Sensing Perceiving
Life from Head to toe and all around in a Free Dance of Non-Verbal Language
that requires no words at all other than attempts to develop abstract
constructs of human symbols to relate paths of dance to others that
bring joy. True, some cultures have gone to elaborate
ways of guidelines and instructions to escape
A Language of Written words and
cultural clothes back to
the Nature still now
that is a Free Moving
Dance of life as bio-feedback
of what does feel and sense better or worse
as every now goes for an intelligence of mood that
knows no words at all other than feeble attempts like this
in essence of poetry to explain now how to get to continuous
bliss by a free dance of bio-feed back as Nirvana becomes a River
and an Ocean whole with gentle waves that no longer ravage life or come
to still no
longer
moving
the Ocean
of our life as River ever flowing moving connecting
co-creating in Peace and Harmony where the 'Coke Commercial'
from before left out the Dance of how to actually get to Heaven now.
It's true, 7 Chakras are not enough for there are peptide connections
in every cell from head to toe that and who are us as Ocean whole remembering
to 'light' up more with every move of life spiraling that and who comes to be as us as River Bliss Whole.
Those of us; yes, the Canaries in the Coal Mine; Some of us diagnosed with Asperger's Sydrome where
Tony Atwood, who has perhaps studied the condition to date more than anyone else as a speciality says
the only treatment is regulating emotions through cognitive behavioral therapy, who as far as I know
has yet to address what hits the core of the issue as far as physical intelligence leading to emotional
intelligence and an actual feeling and sensing trust in existential intelligence away from all anxiety;
comfortable in one's own skin, where no longer can someone 'Spot the Aspie' for how one moves as
a river versus 'stiff' additionally bringing a non-verbal message of whether emotions flow or are
stifled in a 'dead end' creek somewhere separated from the River and Ocean whole of Happiness
that we master instead of being washed away from a Continent full of
A Love that is Trust as Nature does Faith in us more when our River
Flows as Gentle Waves as Ocean Whole. And then there are a variety
of conditions like Bi-Polar where my Health Insurance company occasionally
raises red flags sending them to my Doctors in worry that i do not have to use a
mood stabilizer to keep the Waves of my Ocean Gentle; neither too high or low as
Waves do go. I have another Prescription from my Psychiatrist as Doctors do not deliver
prescriptions as 'jokes' these days, still. In fact, my wheel chair is not a pill; my Wheel Chair
that I created to escape the more deleterious symptoms still now of both Asperger's Syndrome
and Bi-Polar Disorder that are both associated with an excess or deficit of Emotional intelligence
as that comes in balance or not is literal dance as those words are described as movement therapy
on my prescription to Master my emotions for a River of continuous Bliss of Moving Meditation where
true too, my fingers
dance and sing
a Song of Moving Meditation
too; I was A King of Pain and Numb before
for 66 months where my previous Psychiatrist, an
Air Force Major, said my case of Severe Anxiety and
PTSD and the such as that was worse than any combat
Veteran with Emotional and Sensory Fatigue he had ever
come across in case study before. He couldn't help me for all he
had was pills. Psychotherapists, couldn't help me for all they had were words.
One day I decided to walk then walk in reverse then spiral in never ending prayer
and 'routine' as Free Verse Art of Dance. My Psychiatrist witnessing the Epigenetic
and Neuroplastic changes in me as Butterfly finally escaping a Cocoon of Hell was inspired
enough to quit his practice and start teaching movement therapy for folks 'just like me' in a
Teaching Hospital in South Florida then. Fortunately, for me, my New Psychiatrist was a Martial
Artist who understood what the River Flow of Chi is as no woo and a real deal beyond words that
one uses to Master the Bliss of Emotions and Senses in tune for every connection that lights up as
Nirvana from head to toe.
My answer for Joy Loves Company
away from Misery Loves Company is
a working force when two feet become one
Balancing Force from head to toe and all around.
And true, to put it into words is literally impossible to fully do.
True, our distant ancestors never had to worry about that when dance
was/is the
Voice
that
Sung Sings Bliss
and Nirvana more...
All that's left of this is shores
that once expanded more the waves
away from Nature Deficit Disorder from Head to toe
Real As A Quadrillion or so Connections of potential positive
'light' as many point of light as stars that are visible too in the
Entire Universe at hand as we reflect as mini-me's of that all that is
too as some folks are so impressed by life as whole they name the whole
Ocean a word as small as God. The iron in our blood exists at core of Earth
and is derived from Super Nova Explosions as we come to be sentient star dust
plus as resurrection from Crucible Fire of Star death 'fore. This life is a miracle.
Those who
dance
Free
come to see it
in more colors of
the Miracle at hand of feat..
And it's true as vocal chords sing
emotions to one another and heart
beats of Love are Emotions we feel with
other close in touch as cats purr and puppies
lick our face; A Piano is the percussion; the drum
of our heart in each stroke that may strike a keyboard
of words too. All 88 Strings are extensions of our Vocal chords
that do extend our Sing as Loving Heart; this life is a miracle and
Love as the Ultimate Force of our Life in Balance is worthy of Thanks
and Praise and yes even Worship as a Dance of life that and who actually lives.
This life
is truly
Beyond
Infinity
for
joy
is
no Science Alone
when life becomes ART
every Dance and Song Alive;
the Universe is 'meant' just to be
seen 'this way' by our/my eYes Alive;
"How Rare and Beautiful it Truly is that we Exist".
Thanks for inspiring this thought and moreover this Dance and Song.
Thank you Very Much for helping to evolve a soul that is real and flesh and blood.
And it's true
even if someone
erases it; i still exist
as just a Smile as Dance;
Yeah it's true; my Wife looks more
like the Ballerina of the Family; but
Never judge a Book of Life by its cover
or diagnosis or label or such Human NON-sense
and
feel
as
that
or
even
words
that/who
become lost
as pAges and other bibles
often do away from Dance...

That was very poetic and thoughtful. Thanks for the YouTube link, I really really enjoyed that music.

A very nice intellectual construct...
Errm...Is this philosophy from the "Orange People"?
I could Google, but hey...

No one has a monopoly on truth, and here, once again is evidence of that...
As a hardcore atheist who isn't into spirituality, I can completely identify with this philosophical message...

Personally, I find it odd how overwhelmingly people, garden variety or otherwise, have this great urgency to hunt down happiness/pleasure, kill it, stuff it and mount it on their chronological lifeline wall...
And then rinse and repeat...

People are very odd indeed...

P.S.
Life actually is meaningless...
It is up to each individual to define their own personalised existential meaning...
ciao...

Smiles. You are very welcome..