Hmm so I think you’re saying your point is that if you don’t see it as a choice how to feel each moment again then it’s ok, do what you can keep exploring trying things etc. i don’t disagree with this. You are where you are, you gotta figure out what you can to go from there.
This is separate from whether it is possible to ever make the choice. You said you don’t think it really is a choice. I was just saying that luckily the AFT isn’t wrong about this and it really is a choice. At first I used the phrase “all a lie” which I think is what triggered the combatitiveness, but I wasn’t necessarily saying you were accusing Richard of lying. It could be all a lie because he is mistaken, for example.
Is it combative to point out that you disagree with what’s written on the AFT site? I don’t think so per se. It’s of course silly to just believe it. But also silly to avoid the fact that you disagree. There’s no moral judgement here though of you “should” agree.
Or you are saying you don’t disagree but you’re using the word “choice” differently than the normal sense?
This morning while I was waking up it became apparent that this type of splitting was occurring. I ‘wanted’ to wake up, in the sense that I wanted to go to work and earn some money, but there was no doubt that I also wanted to stay in bed and sleep in for hours. In this situation I was aware of that occurring, but it’s the same me wanting to sleep in even if I never become aware of it, and just sleep in.
It’s convenient to claim that it’s factors outside of me, but no one and nothing else is moving my arms and legs for me or completely causing me to feel certain ways. In the end it’s just me. Who else could it be? There is no one else in this body than me.
It reminds me of something that occurred to me some years ago… there’s a colloquialism, “that’s not like you” / “you aren’t acting like yourself,” but isn’t everything you do by definition you? It’s just that it doesn’t align with the idea you have of yourself. The idea isn’t updated with the latest activity.
In the same way, everything we do really is us. This flesh and blood body, and then this psyche dreaming away. Any feeling is up to the psyche… no one else than me. No one else than yourself.
For what it’s worth –
RICHARD: ‘Tis not a [quote] ‘premise’ [endquote] that one can choose to be as happy (and as harmless) as is humanly possibly each moment again – it is experientially evident that it be possible – and the main thrust of the actualism method is to be [affectively] aware of the quality of such felicity and innocuity, via enjoyment and appreciation of simply being so delightfully alive at this very moment (the only moment which is dynamic), inasmuch the slightest diminishment thereof is unavoidably noticed as to occasion an immediate attendance to whatever caused that diminution[] and thus resume being happy (and harmless) forthwith.
It all depends upon whether one is going to continue to be a victim of one’s moods or a victor – or, in the jargon, whether one is going to take charge of one’s life, in this regard, or not – and, yes, that too is a choice.
Your felicity and innocuity, or lack thereof, is in your hands and your hands alone.
Richard is of the opinion that not seeing/experiencing the choice is up to being entrenched in victim mentality, and that choosing to take charge of one’s life is the solution.
For my part I can remember a specific day, long before actualism, when I decided to take charge of my own life, and it quickly became apparent how many of the psychological models were built on not having a choice at all - they were all convenient excuses I could use to describe how helpless I was, and how everything in the world had conspired to make me the miserable person I was. Having determined to become non-miserable, it was time to throw all the models in the trash heap. I didn’t know at the time, but that determination / choice is actually pretty simple. But I had to completely want it for it to be made.
One more thing just thought of. I think all the actually free people and people with success with actualism report something along the lines of “if i could do it anybody can!”
Everybody intuitively feels less-than, that i can’t do it, I’m not well suited , missing some magic Ingredient etc. but that’s the whole point. This doesn’t disqualify you from success with actualism! It is rather because you are that way, that actualism makes sense to pursue. If you were already perfect nothing would need doing
I went to bed last night with the thought, “what does Rick need, what does Claudiu need, what do I need”.
The answer was clear enough; freedom!
I could have been better that saying the statement “choice doesn’t actually exist”, because what is being called “choice” does exist.
It’s the nature of “choice” and how one arrives at “choice” which to me is the natural outworking of various factors.
Gravity exists. Clearly. It’s to this day still quite a mystery exactly how, although I haven’t been actively seeking the latest research on it.
Choice exists. It’s the nature of how one gets to this experience which I am thinking about.
To me, I have spent no time lately, apart from the science threads here thinking about choice (and quite a bit a time decades ago) I am quite happy to use the word to describe the moments is usually is used in. Because it wasn’t bothering me.
I think it is worth saying that one can be accurately describing one’s experience, but be wrong about exactly how it works.
In many cases, it simply doesn’t matter how it works, the description is enough to put advice into practice.
Benjamin Franklin’s “discovery” of electricity is a classic case.
He accurately described the results of various experiments. So much so, development of electrical circuits used his descriptions to this day in “domestic grade” electronics.
However, he was dead wrong on the “how”.
The electrical DC current flows in the opposite direction to what he said it did. The charge is moving from the “negative” to the “positive”.
The cool thing is, a circuit will still work, as long as you keep all the “flows” consistent.
In “commercial/industrial grade” electronics, the circuits are labelled correctly. The labels are switched.
In modern quantum terms, there are no individual electrons, but an energy potential which travels both directions like a vibrating string. AC circuits are even more strange.
It’s actually not a bad metaphor for the way i view “choice” working. The impetus is not being generated via some act of will from a ‘being’. A change of mind, an action, can be experienced as a “choice” and can be treated/described exactly like that. In addition, it can be understood that there are a myriad of factors that that “choice” can be attributed too. To the point, there was no “free will”.
I do agree. Just as it is useful to switch on a light and the light goes on.
However, I think it’s better not to be hung up on a point too. I am talking from experience.
I would object on many points for many years.
Blind Nature being the stand out. However, it wasn’t by academics that I got there.
What I was looking for was validation from others that it was OK to explore in a way I saw fit, but more than that, I was looking for a moment in which that thought could even occur to me.
So rebellion against an idea, was me being something of a adolescent seeker.
The issues of life really had nothing much to do with whatever objections I had.
Indeed, I am glad we have had the discussions here, as with all these topics something always happens.
I think Geoffrey had something to say about how all his arguments with other actualists weren’t about the subject itself, they were for him
Edit: it was Srinath
I thought about all the arguments that I had with the actually free pioneers in the past, all the arguments with other actualists and realised that conflict is my very nature. The main reason I was arguing about various things was for myself. I gave not a hoot about the issues themselves. I was locked in the paradigm of belief, because I needed to be reassured and backed up. Both belief and disbelief had to be discarded.
If I could time travel back to the yahoo list, when I first was objecting to being “rotten to the core”, my advice to myself would be “sure! Skip it, what is actually going on in your life right now!”
The issues that are really going on are not “macro”, it’s always very “micro”. The personal circumstances and feelings around different situations which are happening.
I remember very clearly that Richard in person was very quick to align with the objection and redirect it.
I said something about “I was brought up to save the world”, with zero hesitation, he said “you can save the world!”.
He was intent on getting through to me. The incident of him “telling me off” had context too.
He said nothing like that when I was talking about my brother who had died earlier in the year. His response was “It normal to grieve, it takes time”.
When Vineeto “threw her hands in the air” and gave up discussing something with me, he turned to her and said something like “It’s fine! I have been doing this for 25 years!” as she got up and walked away.
What’s the point? The specific feelings that generate an objection are there for reasons which often have nothing to do with the objection.
Remove the objection, and keep talking!
The “telling off” episode was specifically because he could see I was blindly (in his words), “Yes and Amen’ing” what Vineeto was saying.
So, are we to blindly agree?
Edit: that is not the question I want to end on.
Rather, putting aside the entire topic of choice, what is actually bugging @rick ?
What is going on in one’s life is the “meat and potatoes” of things actually affecting one’s “lot in life”.
“I’ve been doing this for 25 years,” that’s amazing.
Yeah it can be slippery business having discussions with feeling-beings, we can’t even really trust ourselves to be completely sincere. Very strange. As always, it goes back to prioritizing what the vibe is ahead of anything. And of course one can only account for one’s own self.
What I have come to appreciate about Richard is he never gives up on anyone. Even those trolls who had attacked him for 13 years, he would patiently pull apart the lies, and aliases and put it all back on the list for everyone to read.
To the best of his ability and growing experience, each objection was carefully explained, sometimes even pulled apart in no uncertain terms.
I actually liked @claudiu posting in the manner he did. A robust counter is great! Got me thinking harder at least.
There is an old proverb; “wounds from a friend can be trusted, but an enemy multiplies kisses”.
Bahaha that’s funny. I remember vineeto saying Richard never gives up on anyone. He seems to be unique in this regard
While this is true , I’m curious , what do you use as a base of confidence to say that you’ve got it right in terms of how it works but Richard is mistaken?
With that being said I don’t think you’re necessarily saying something different from Richard here, eg
Since we’re talking at the level of “how it works” in the sense of it doesn’t matter how (cause the experience , advice , and course of action is the same), for me it always settles it to consider that, although it may be true we never choose anything and it’s completely determined without us having any input , it’s also possible it’s not true. It being the case it makes more sense to consider we do have choices since if we are wrong it doesn’t matter (and it wasn’t our choice to think that). But if we believe theres no choices can ever be made and we’re wrong then we do ourselves a big disservice. This relates to choice in general (eg typing Q on a keyboard) not choosing how to feel in particular.
Another thing I’d say is it seems the issue of choice only really matters when you’re uncertain. If you’re sure something is the best course of action, you just do it. You could choose not to do it , easily , but it doesn’t make sense not to so you just do it. In that sense there’s “no choice”‘really cause one way is obviously best (though I’d say there’s still a choice cause you could do something stupid if you really wanted to lol).
But if you’re not sure then it feels more important to make a choice …
Perhaps it is easier to notice that I make the choice to feel bad? If you observe yourself it is so clear that it is me who chooses to feel bad (not just intellectually but on the level of ‘being’). Is that easier to agree experientially?
If this can be agreed with then is it possible to see that ‘I’ am (usually) simply more habituated to making that choice - to feel bad. As we all have a lifetime habit of doing so.
Yes I agree with this…I’m finding it much easier and progressive to pose the question “Why do I want to entertain feeling bad in such n such situations ?”
Well, considering that you report it be very different now to when you first came across Actualism, it does give me pause to consider that basis being mistaken.
I am again, not bothered by it. Though I am glad to have been challenged to realise I am more talking about “free will” rather than the experience of choice. That is a distinction worth having.
Because it’s not useful to try and trace every possible cause back to one’s child hood and beyond to find the reason a “choice” was made.
In fact, it becomes absurd quickly. Did I choose to be born in the circumstances I was born into?
Which makes me wonder if resentment itself is the key to the experience of “choosing how one feels”, the less resentment, the more of a choice things become.
I know this year has been a big one for various resentments and things surfacing.
The challenge to look again at directly choosing my feelings is a good one.
I am partial to using light switches rather than building a power station.
Right and the situation is that probably most people coming into actualism are to begin with deeply and persistently habituated towards being sorrowful and malicious. Then instead of observing this within themselves so that a different path becomes available they instead try to force ‘feeling good’ on top of this habituated sorrow and malice, and of course the method does not work then…
I want to build this new habit of feeling good so I need to become aware of the fact that I am currently habituated towards feeling bad, to actually see this happen in real time. I see this within me all the time, there is some sort of triggger/stimulus and bam - sorrow and malice, this is just what ‘I’ do. But catching myself each time means that I see that this is a silly path to travel down. And so I am habituating away from this path of sorrow and malice and habituating towards the path of enjoyment and appreciation.
That is why I asked you not to respond in my journal
So, reading you all, I can only say that having spent enough time over the years thinking/wondering (wandering also) about wanting to feel good in the context of AF and its connection to
being able to feel good
choice
agency
free will
…I became more and more serious about adopting the attitude that @Andrew has quoted: not subjecting Richard’s words to “scrutiny for scholarly style and form and content and so on”.
But in spite of that, and perhaps due to my former inclination for philosophy and my background in cognitive psychology (especially in the field of judgments and decision making) is that when writing the first version of the article about wanting/not wanting to feel good, I was drawn into considering also will vs willpower, what can or cannot be considered a choice in that topic, etc. (as I said there in the comments to @rick, when I was getting into the boundaries of agency and free will, I fortunately woke up -or more literally, I came to my senses- ).
Such more comprehensive reflections had to do, as many times before, with an inclination to arrive at absolute and general statements supported by “firm” theoretical foundations (taken from AF or even from other sources). It’s part of what gives rise to many of the forum discussions, but with myself. And, similar to how in the forum we then tend to defend those adopted positions in the face of “attacks”, “I” tended to gather more and more encompassing elements/evidence to face the “attacks” from the imaginary forum -what will be said/thought from potential readers- to try to make “my” position more convincing/correct/true or even bullet-proof .
Well, I have tried to move further and further away from that historical attitude/inclination to seek absolute, coherent and generalisable theoretical certainties/assurances that would explain/support my experiences, the body/whole of Richard’s assertions, and also defend “me” as much as possible from potential or actual opinions/attacks.
Such historical attitude/inclination was part of what led me to various forms of paralysis, to a lot of wasted time musing/rambling, to limits on feeling good that I couldn’t overcome, to not participating in any discussion groups until recently, etc.
So, @rick, what was presented by you here and the discussion it triggered seem to me interesting (and even very interesting!), but at a certain point I want/need to put all that aside and focus on continuing to apply what I know works in my case to feel good/better more consistently.
I don’t mean to say that such discussions/analyses/questionings cannot lead to insights/understandings that precisely allow for a better application of the AF method. Of course they have that potential. But I know that getting too deep/involved into such discussions (with others or with myself) is one of the many ways to make myself (Miguel) feel worse/less good.
I am not saying that this “counter-inclination” is ideal (for example, it can sometimes lead me to prejudge, without giving time/space for another to adequately express what he/she thinks, as sometimes happens to me in life or even here (for example with @JonnyPitt in Andrew - #50 by Miguel). But I also did not want that this “counter-inclination” prevented me from sharing (in writing) certain understandings/experiences that could help others to feel good/better (and myself, since writing clarifies us). Hence, I have preferred to avoid a lot of lucubrations in the article (focusing instead on practicalities) and also here.
That doesn’t mean avoiding dealing with the topics and tribulations raised here and elsewhere about choice, agency, free will, etc., that I was tempted to write about. But I think the best way is eventually to do so in another article .
] and thus resume being happy (and harmless) forthwith.
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