Moving On

Saturday, October 31, 2009
This is the last day of my batching it with Carola being in California with Theresa and the kiddies; it’s been a pretty good experience. A friend at Rotary Club lost his wife six years ago, she died. He has a lot of experience in living alone and remarked that it took him a long time to get used to her being permanently gone. I won’t/don’t have that problem because Carola is coming home tomorrow.

We have another dress rehearsal tomorrow afternoon and performances on Tuesday and Thursday next week. The play is coming together nicely; Dr. Greene has a lot of experience in all of this and lets it evolve week after week. He also has a lot of creativity. Faced with an unusual class member, he invented a character, Voltaire, wrote an introduction, and a mid-play continuum for the character and it works together very nicely. He has also taken care of the music, the lights, the videotaping, and publicity. I noticed he had director’s notes during the last rehearsal, something I thought he’d been missing. For a French class, this has been a growth experience for me.

I’ve written about self-doubt and what follows is not that but rather an attempt at taking an objective look at where I am and how I am doing in that class. On the positive side, I am in the class, know my lines, and interact somewhat with others in the class. I am not butting in to give any kind of advice or counsel to anyone; not suggesting anything, not directing in any way. I am also not helping with tasks that others have had assigned to them. 

On the less positive side, I am uptight about my lines, not relaxed and “In character.” My lines are not that long or involved, and I know them. My costume is great, as is my makeup. The only reason I am not loose and in character may be the language thing. I am still thinking too much about what and how I am delivering them instead of letting Voltaire come through. That will be my goal tomorrow.

It is now late in the afternoon, I slept until 9am and left the house to go riding at eleven; back at 1:30pm, and I ate lunch and fooled around with Sudoku until about now. For some reason, the small of my back has muscle spasms and I am dealing with that now. They started after lunch and could have been the result of riding and/or not doing two critical stretches this morning because of a belly full of breakfast. I am going to have to let these subside by not doing much of any exercise or work; or perhaps doing the stretches that I missed, and/or doing the straps to force the relaxation of the muscles.

The week has been productive but I am willing to admit that there hasn’t been a lot on my plate; and this is probably a good thing. I am content with having to concentrate on the play and the presentation at the Consul’s meeting next Friday. We are all set to go to Athens Georgia for John’s graduation from a Navy School and to go to California for Thanksgiving. I’ve kept up with my dailies and weeklies, the laundry is done, the house is the same as when Carola left, some of mom’s effects are gone, others staged for moving, the kitchen is clean, the yard is fine so it isn’t as if I haven’t been doing anything. It’s more of the feeling that I often have, of not doing anything of consequence.

All the while I am concentrating on this one single thing, the play; Dr. Greene is likewise as well as teaching a myriad of other classes and preparing a paper to give at a symposium sometime in November. Others in the class are not only doing the play but also handling a list of classes that would not be possible for me. Although it is hard to admit, age has a lot to do with it. Ed Causey warned me that I would be slowing down, i.e. unable to handle lots of simultaneous major issues. This is a generic issue that affects all people. It is important that I recognize it and continue to allow myself some slack.

It continues to be important to pick that one thing upon which I will concentrate when the play is over. It will be the presentation on Nov 6 and then there may be an LTM in Evansville starting up shortly thereafter. Jack called this week to tell me they are shooting for November 11, although it may be shoved back a few weeks or all the way to January; it will be difficult to get all seven sessions in before Xmas.

Since I’ve made my decision to continue acting/ performing, I will be making my overtures to Dr. Tompkins for Acting ii as well as taking some time to find the various stage opportunities that exist locally. I am aware of several and have been seeing them here and there as I drive around. Acting ii is important because it will prepare me; finding the locations allows me to get a feel for what/where I may be performing. I may go to productions at the various locations just to experience the milieu. These two things are significant and important to my continuing on this course of action. Should Dr. Tompkins refuse me, I will have to find another source of preparing me for the stage.

One of the things I became aware of during the past couple of months, and s.t. that is expanded in a previous blog, is the role of preparation in success. I even made a 2x2 of it with the x-axis being a continuum of preparation from general to specific and the y-axis being lo and hi achievement. The four quadrants are 0-0 couldn’t figure it out, 0-1 success in unchartered territory, 1-0 inexperienced, 1-1 success expected. The conclusion is the obvious, the better prepared one thinks he is, the higher the expectation of success.

Wrap Up

Monday October 26, 2009

I’m still thinking about the three demons that bothered me. Even though I’ve reconciled myself to them, rendered them harmless, I’ve taken another tack to complete the process.

I can readily see that yes, I am inferior to many others; that I have taken a wrong turn or two in attempting things, IOW I’ve failed a time or two; and that self-doubt is actually a good thing if it doesn’t disable.

We are going through a lot of old pictures and memorabilia that mom left behind. There were stages through which I went as I lived through this lifetime. Always engaged in some pursuit or another and always achieving some degree of success. That is the key word, some degree of success. Performance is relative. The quality of it depends on how well one is prepared for the task. A performance that hasn’t been rehearsed will flop. With this thought in mind I went at it from another angle.

Looking at all of the things that I tried, some were higher on the success grade than others. Judging the results of any attempted activity, one would be wise to look at the bell shaped curve of normal distribution, i.e. all of the people in one’s world, and take a judgment call, put a point on the x-axis where this one’s results may fall in absolute terms; then put another point on the axis at the level of preparedness compared to all others.

Preparedness deserves some exposition. Preparation begins with the first recognition one has of his surroundings, at a very early age. It continues through the way his parents, his family, his extended family, teachers, and other people of influence, the environment in which one finds himself at various times during his lifetime, i.e. not only his developing years. When one has had the best of all of these, there is a good possibility that he will be in the very highest percentile of achievements. So while there is no limit to what anyone can accomplish with/in his lifetime, there are those who start with an advantage. Being properly prepared doesn’t mean success will come, it means that the possibility of success is greater.

The inferiority complex comes in when one focuses on how his situation fits into that of those with whom he is competing. The key to not being debilitated by that over which one has no control, no influence, no ability to go back and do over, is to accept reality and not try to be something or someone he isn’t. There are those who will flatter and be obsequious. Often they have an ax to grind and are not your fan club; face it, you don’t have a fan club except your wife and kids.

The common trait of all those who get to the top is strategic vision i.e. be able to state what they want. Then in the here and now, tactically at this juncture, see what they need, clearly and completely, and achieve it. Then just before that is achieved, realizing that it is coming soon, they are able to see what is next on the agenda. It is always the incremental next task, the next brick in the wall. Then there are the occasions when one gets connected to Essence and things happen rather fast. This is why focusing on that one overall strategic vision is so important. Confusion is caused by too many choices, to many high priority items and nothing happens.

One can immediately see that all of this focus on inferiority and failure is moot. It is an emotional reaction and tied to the distractions of inner-considering, and vanity. It buys us nothing but distracts us from working on aim. When one is working on aim, he is productive.

Self-doubt/approval-avoiding disapproval is another thing that needs some elucidation. On the one hand, it is important. One can’t go ahead in response to emotional reactions; so it is important to keep this/these in proper perspective. There is time for analysis and then there’s decision time. The decision is not always consistent with the analysis and these are two different and distinct features of the brain-body. Logical reasoning is one feature, decision making is another. They are two distinct and different features. The doubt comes in when these two are battling it out. Decision maker has a high level of emotional content whereas Analyzer has a high level of intellectual content. Decision maker wants to act; Analyzer wants to continue with the analysis; hence, the doubt. Unless and until analyzer is satisfied that all has been considered, then he’s comfortable with going ahead.

Approval-avoiding disapproval comes from Analyzer’s limited emotional content. It is an argument that he uses to derail Decision maker and get more analysis time. The approval-avoiding disapproval being sought is not that of others but me, or made to seem that way by Analyzer. He is the cause of paralysis by analysis, a relatively common management term. The only way to cope with this is by rational thinking and seeing it for what it is. As for approval-avoiding disapproval of other people, that’s ridiculous as long as I continue to operate sensitively, morally, ethically, and legally.

These three goofballs are always waiting in the wings to step in and add emotional turmoil to an uncertain situation. Once the statement of strategic aim is made, they go into the background again and keep to their places.

It took me several meetings with Jim to sort this all out. The three were having their way with me and, I suppose because it is all me, I wasn’t seeing it without talking it out, writing it out. In this instance there was some good work on the first level with the assistance of Jim and his various techniques. He/they enabled me to put things aright again; make a decision and go on from here.

My strategic vision is to be a stage performer; finding opportunities, auditioning, learning lines, rehearsing, and performing.

Conclusion

Saturday, October 24, 2009

The issues of self-doubt and the need for approval have been on my mind all week. Just thinking about it/them doesn’t get me anywhere, only writing it out like this allows me to put some structure to it. It is interesting to note that whenever I get an idea in mind, such as this self-doubt, it quickly gets dissolved by examples of when this same thing was overcome, when it wasn’t an issue, when I went ahead and did whatever without being concerned about it. Same for approval/ disapproval, there have been so many courses of action taken where it didn’t make a bit of difference if there was approval or not.

It would serve little or no purpose to list them because any such list would suddenly get long, boring, and be full of omissions. But just entertaining thoughts of the many examples leads me to laugh at the idea that I am plagued by these issues. Now that I am fully aware of my experiences, I am amazed that I would ever think that self-doubt and approval/disapproval were thought to be issues with me.

What led me to think they were? Since August 15 there has been a great deal of uncertainty about the future, more than I normally experience. It is as if I was dropped off at the mall and told to go buy s.t. but don’t have a clue as to what. There have been other times like these and I’ve already gone into that in previous sessions. Only this time there is a sense of mortality that is giving me pause for thought. I know that I this body won’t live forever, so I am concerned about what to do with remaining lifetime. I take solace in the concept of Being.

If a decision had to be made right now, I would say I’m going ahead as I have been. My experience has been to do whatever, if it is s.t. that suits me I continue, if not; I don’t. Ambition fueled by imagination has always given way to ambition fueled by experience where incremental improvements, almost imperceptible at the time, have accumulated to suddenly be significant. Almost like the shifting sandbars in the Mississippi around St. Louis; they form islands that have a permanency only affected by giant floods.

I started riding again and it has now blossomed into twice per week. It won’t be long until I have a horse or two, if it all works out the way it usually does. There are those with horses who can’t wait to get rid of them; sort of like boats. The happiest days are said to be the day you get one and the day you get rid of it. The difference with a horse is it is an animal, albeit one who rarely returns affection. This could be what I like about them. Sentimentalism is not one of their strong suits and I can do without it.

Then there are the rest of my endeavors, those things that I chose to chase, to spend my time doing. There is time for all of them and then some. IOW I have time available for pursuing all of them and will continue. The training/performing endeavor is one that emerges with the greatest allure. I’ve been doing it for a long, long time and I’ve embarked on a study of acting in theater. And I realize that success is in the eye of the beholder, just like French, golf, pool, riding, sketching, and writing. The possibility of being recognized publicly is always there but not s.t. to be set as a goal; there doesn’t seem to be much of a desire for it.

What will be will be; which is another way of saying that when Master has a desired path; the personae are able to recognize it and carry it out using the tools of the brain-body to give them physical expression. And there is another factor in the mix; there seems to be a connection among beings that we see as inspiration, good fortune, and beneficial circumstances. Some refer to it as a universal mind. I am somewhat skeptical about it only because it almost too good to be true but my personal experiences bear out the existence of same. I keep rationalizing it as being the result of previous experiences in this lifetime, or perhaps a former and this would explain many instances but there are some that are so big that I can’t rationalize them. I see it happen to others as well, I mean things that couldn’t just be serendipity.

The one thing that all the fortunate occurrences have in common is an intention. All were consistent with an intended path/ desired course of action. None of them were like winning the lottery; IOW, the College didn’t come to me and say we’ve decided that you should come here and get your MBA. And this is the ingredient that if forming at the moment, the major purpose and it is stage acting. Now I’ve said it, this is what it is at least for now. All of my performances of the past, the present, and the future support this goal and it is exactly parallel to my pool playing endeavor.

I played pool casually for a long time, getting more and more serious about it until now I’ve joined the APA, play on a team in a league, study, practice, and compete. I am a skill level 3 of possible 7, and I play at that level and it doesn’t deter me. There has been gradual improvement, augmented by breakthrough experiences, and finally I'll achieve a command of the game that will push me to higher skill levels. It will take time and continuous study, practice, play, and competition.

So here I am, I’ve said the obvious, I am making the commitment, and going forward on the same path on which I have been. It started with Creative Writing class, Playwriting Class, then Acting I, Romeo and Juliet, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and now Zadig, Ou la Destinee.

The Horse

Sunday, October 18, 2009

Yes, all of the analysis that I’ve done is fun, good, and thoughtful/ thought-provoking. It doesn’t lead directly to any result but it sets the stage for understanding better what is/ could be.

 It is the result of personae that are primarily influenced by the intellectual source and this is where the idea of a bridge comes in. There has to be a way of getting from the thoughtful analysis to the desired result. So far the path has been mostly circuitous. A little analysis, a little planning, a little articulation of what may be dreams, and then some listed tasks that are accomplished because they are listed and reminders are posted. There are few things that get listed that don’t get done, and those that aren’t finished will be in due time. The time or two that personae of primarily the emotional source got involved, the accomplishment of even the larger goal was seemingly effortless.

There is no direct link between analysis and task. This is an important statement because one may think that there is a linear progression from one to the other. It doesn’t happen that way, the analysis establishes the environment for thinking of what is desired and then from that what to do. Not everything done, of course, comes out of this process; there are some things that crop up and with which we must deal.

There are dangers, one danger is to get so detailed in the planning that there is no time to spare to be spontaneous. Then there is another, the danger of not having s.t. listed to remind one of what to do; there is a tendency to idle by doing s.t. that is totally unproductive like Sudoku, reverie, or TV. Not that these are inherently bad but they have a tendency to create their own inertia, i.e. once started they seem to take much more time than one would otherwise chose to spend.

Having good habits and becoming their slave is a way to always be focused on a desired state of being. By conforming to habitual behavior and/or thinking one complies with a predetermined wish/desire. One habit that is paramount for this one is reciting a series of Daily Admonitions/ Affirmations.

There are more than 30 and, in addition, statements of “how to” for each of the 18 endeavors; that is a total litany of more than 50 statements that is recited habitually daily in the car as I drive out of the neighborhood to wherever or at home when I’m in for the day. So I am constantly reminded of how I want to be and what I want to do. One may ask on what level am I focusing my attention in all of this. And the answer would be primarily in the Intellectual and this is what has to be changed/modified to include the emotional.

The aforementioned bridge is to get quickly and effortlessly from the thought to the action and it spans the gap between the intellectual and the emotional. Unless and until the emotional influences of personae are engaged, he will always be standing by, stroking his chin and analyzing what is/ is not happening. While this may be fun for him, lifetime is passing, lifetime during which only action and participation lead to development and fulfillment. In our crystal rider and horse analogy, the reaction of a horse to the rider's cue is emotional (a real horse thinks please don’t punish me) as he tries his best to figure out just what it is wanted.

It is correcting previous errors in this schooling that allows an effective bridge between the intellectual and emotional influences; emotional influences that may have become warped through what are thought to be bad experiences. Retraining the emotional parts of the personae to accept what has happened without judging it as good or bad is a key to forming a positive response.

 Then at some magic moment the reaction may become naturally positive and action taken to achieve a desired end w/o even thinking about. Aside: language is such a phenomenon- we study, practice, stumble and make mistakes until one day voila, we are there in a conversation, thinking in French, or whatever. The emotional influence overcomes previous experiences of feeling inadequate and confidence takes over; one “feels” good about usng his new language. It is the same for many other skills; one day you realize you are doing it and not even thinking about it.

So here I sit on a beautiful Sunday afternoon analyzing and writing it out when if I knew what to do I’d be out there doing it. And I know what to do because I spend time thinking about it. What I am doing here is an attempt to better understand how it works so it can be applied more effectively and effectively. Perhaps get to the point where writing it out is not all that important any more.

 I’d say that the vast majority of people don’t go to the same extremes as I to figure out what to do. They don’t keep a log, they don’t do a list of things to accomplish, and they lose track of what they wanted to accomplish and wake up one day without it because they forgot to do whatever to get it.

So I will continue to pursue my goals as I have been since Houston, and after that fateful day in Knoxville, and continue to get what I want, eventually. The big difference is adding emotional content to the mix. Another hurdle that will have to be crossed is objections from those around me to me getting whatever. Since they don’t share the same goals and remain stubborn in trying to deny me my way, it is a problem to solve.

Oil and Water

Friday, October 16, 2009

It’s a down day; I slept until 10am and still feel like I could sleep some more. I planned to do this because yesterday there was a certain base level of fatigue that showed up in my performance in class and in public generally. When I review what I’ve been doing I see that there has been a lot of physical activity and perhaps I need a day of rest. Today is that day. Although I may go for a walk at about 4:30pm in order to get my circulation up for the pool match tonight.

Self-doubt is a constant companion to me. Whenever I expose my actions to anyone, I feel threatened; that’s the right word but it needs to be explained a little bit. It isn’t a feeling that I am physically threatened but being opened to question and ridicule; questions that I can’t anticipate and, therefore, feel that I would answer inappropriately and get myself into a bind, and ridicule, being seen as inferior/stupid.

I’ve been aware of this ever present critic for a long time so this isn’t new to me. It seems that she comes out whenever I do something new or even when I don’t do it. It is an emotional response to something and I’m not sure what. If I call s.o. to do s.t., especially if it is new, while I’m making the call I get these feelings of doubt: should I be asking this, will I be thought somehow being seen as inferior, is this s.t. I should/ shouldn’t be doing, am I going to get into trouble about this, am I being a pest, are people seeing me as needy, am I needlessly calling attention to myself?

And yet I know that all of the above is irrational. People have their opinion of me; what I say and do first of all tends to reinforce that opinion and only secondly could begin to change that opinion if enough evidence is offered to reinforce a new and changed opinion. It is my experience after listening to many personal accounts, after seeing evidence to support it in the actions of others, that people willingly change their opinion of s.o. else rather quickly if the other exhibits a willingness to improve.

I sent Emails to Rinda, Prof Tompkins, Prof RussV inviting them to see our production of Zadig. It is a perfectly legitimate thing to do. Yet right up to the time that I was composing the Email, there was self-doubt about doing such a thing. Irrational, yes it is, and I recognized it as such and went ahead and sent the messages. RussV already replied saying he couldn’t attend but that doesn’t bother me. A cynical one in here says some awful things but they are ignored. Rationally I can accept all three of them not being at the performance.

People are interested in others because we have personae that are influenced by the social source, one of the six sources of thought/action that we have. In me there are intellectually sourced personae who attempt to fathom the interest of others and somehow influence it to my advantage; to build esteem, to be bigger, faster, stronger, smarter, more (you name it) than I/we really are. These personae want to be respected players of whatever game; it is as if they want to be king of the hill in all instances.

These personae, or maybe others, have an additional feature,; they are competitive, which probably flows out of the instinctive source. They see every other being as a competitor who has to be bested; not only every other being but every other circumstance, be it a game, a deal, a skill, possessions, knowledge, capability, or relationship. They seem to come away with wanting to be better than everyone/ everything else.

The marriage of intellectually sourced and emotionally sourced personae is not working out very well in this being; it is almost as if they are oil and water. The emotional are less developed than the intellectual and others. The complicating feature of a being is that all personae have a mixture of all six sources and are recognizable as being one or the other only by the predominant ingredient. In this one it is intellectual, then instinctive, then social, then moving, then emotional, then sexual. Sexual has taken the lowest position on the influence totem probably due to age. So in personae that are predominantly emotional, the intellectual ingredient is not sufficient to allow rational analysis to equivocate the situation at hand. Ergo, an irrational response is observed by others; other beings and/or other personae of this being.

It is a tribute to intellectual personae to note that I (this being) have developed a whole series of analytical charts in order to understand emotional responses. They are logical, cogent, and rather complete as they examine all of the possible ranges of emotional responses to situations. The Intellectual can imagine/ reason/ deduce/ infer/ and then make decisions, these are the tools that the intellectual has available to it in the brain-body. The intellectual think that by understanding they can somehow be comfortable or cure a situation whereas the emotional have to experience. This underscores this rift that exists.

The emotional have to act and experience the results of that action in order to comfortably function in situations; the tools of the intellectual are not useful for situations that affect the emotional. The fear factor in this being, which is predominantly intellectual, is not being able to respond appropriately using and tools with which he is comfortable and furthermore not knowing what tools are available to the emotional. What could they be? This will have to be the subject of a later installment.

Leaving this installment with another contrast between the two sources; the intellectual require a lot of time to work out a solution to a new situation whereas the emotional operate on a quick response basis. Almost like instinctive, they realize that a response to a situation that involves them needs to be made on the spot. It is the difference between correspondence and conversation. This may be why we developed one for business, financial, and legal matters and allow the other for less important/less permanent situations.

Contact

Monday October 12, 2009

There was an unusual scenario that played itself out in my mind’s eye this morning. I sat to meditate with the express intention of putting into practice one of Jim Scorches’ techniques, one that he told me to try; he didn’t tell me the content, but the technique.

I have been struggling with his instruction/ request, “What would you like it to be like in six months?” That’s April 2010. My response has been less than specific because I have in place a full set of goals and objectives for this year and will do likewise for next year when the time is right; i.e. from the solstice to the New Year. I suppose I’m having trouble with his request because if I knew what I wanted I wouldn’t need his help to find and articulate it.

And yet this isn’t fair, it’s just that we are on different pages. I am struggling to eliminate that which is hindering me from opening the doors of my imagination and he is sitting there thinking all I have to do is say what it is I want to do. I don’t have a frame of reference for it. One of my previous blogs went into all of this. My visions contain two possibilities, one is acting in productions, and the other is participating in a business venture with others. The similarity of the two is not lost on me. The difference is the composition of the players. In the acting/productions alternative, the actors are pursuing a common goal, to be part of a successful production as well as their personal success. In the other, my experiences lead me to believe that the others are more interested in sacrificing the desired end result in favor of satisfying their greed.

I suppose being able to recognize the tendency of people to enrich themselves at the expense of the common good is s.t. that causes me a problem in looking at others; being able to deal constructively with them in an unknown environment. OTOH knowing that people are like this and building it into the business model along with protections against advantages being taken would allow one to bring others in to the organization.

The other side of the coin is that one has to be ready to operate without any one person/member because the grass is always greener and they will quit on a moment’s notice to get some sort of perceived improvement in their lot. On the third side/ the edge of the coin/ when there is a person like Albert Pujoles one has to get out his checkbook and satisfy whatever; this in the case of a small business could be a “piece of the action.” These are a lot of words to say that the greed thing is real, it is recognized, and if one wants to bring others into the organization he has to deal with it and be able to reconcile the consequences.

Then there’s a desire for more than money, for power over the dominant leader. This, like money, is s.t. with which many otherwise nice people get enthralled. They want to call the shots, especially if you tell them all the secrets of the operation. An actor wants to direct, a player wants to manage, and a worker wants to be boss. Only in a play is the actor required to remain through the end of the run. I am somewhat discouraged about being involved in a business.

This is why I am struggling so mightily with Jim’s question. I am discouraged, fearful, isolated, insulated, inhibited, and unable to deal effectively with the possibility of opening up to others with my requests for either a role or a job. This is at least one thing that is preventing me from seeing the opportunities that may be ready to be exploited. If there are lots of green objects lying about and one is wearing green filter glasses, he won’t see them.

Part of the answer to Jim’s question is a desire to take off the filters that are preventing me from seeing the opportunities that are lying about; and I’m convinced that there are a multitude of them. The experience I had this morning was a step in that direction; towards taking off the blinders, towards answering his question.

So this morning may have been another step in this direction. I imagined me going into the Rio Movie Theater. I like to recall this theater because I remember the deep blue and purple color scheme, art deco doors with such handles and round viewports, the illuminated flat statuary on the walls, the glass case concession stand in the lobby and a host of other details.

As I passed through the doors into the seating area, hundreds of personae burst out of me and took their seats. Each was behaving as he would, some were rowdy and boisterous, others were reserved and quiet, and all were animated because this was, indeed, something new. The brain-body, empty of personae, walked to a seat on the aisle, not far from the front.

Then, as would a violin emerge from a plain case, Master made his appearance from the brain-body. The audience was hushed as he made his way to center stage. Never before had his presence been seen; he often makes it felt in his inimitable way, as influence rather than sight or words. His normal way is to press but not react, so that if the results aren’t what he wants he simply waits for the next opportunity; he has eternity.

He stood there, resembling the crystal figurine but now not a figurine but the animated Master himself. He is mute, he didn’t speak, but his gestures left no doubt in the crowd of personae; there has to be an end to doubt, fear, and the distractions that deter his development. The sitting by idly while lifetime passes is no longer an option; participating in a less than a whole hearted manner cannot be tolerated; emotional responses need to be registered and discounted for what they are, distractions from getting the desired results.

One can only speculate on what desired development means for Master, one can be reassured that some personae will/ are permanent to the being and as he develops in ways that only he can know, so will they develop and move on with him to a new lifetime. His message was clear, stop marking time; get on with it, whatever it is. Do something, even if it’s imperfect.

Finalement

Sunday, October 11, 2009

It’s Sunday and time to do some plotting and scheming. My sessions with Jim Schorche are having their effect, although not like a brass band on parade. It is subtle, my attitude towards me, my picture of me, and my concept of how others may see me are all changing, evolving into something else. It seems that being impressive is no longer an issue.

Jim’s suggestions about being able to see what is desired have been problematical; I haven’t been able to articulate them until now. The visual that is coming clear to me is one of Master rising from his pallet, yawning and stretching. He looks about, in his radiant beauty, and sees the rank and file of personae looking at him wiht receptive attention. Those that were fooling around with each other, inattentive, and distracted are paying attention as well. This is the sign for which he has been looking. Now he can get on with what he wants to do with this lifetime. He knows that there is less span of lifetime available but likewise he knows that there is enough to accomplish much. He also knows that he has as many lifetimes as it takes to develop into the eternal being that he seeks to become. So, now he can get on with it.

Having this visualization is as important an accomplishment as there has ever been. Master can now direct the activities of the being instead of some personae interfering with his plans. It isn’t important to recognize, name, or identify the distracted personae, only to recognize that they do and will exist. Like the teacher in front of the class, this visualization calls them out of their self interested actions to attention to get the assignment coming down. This is another way of saying that it isn’t important to know the genesis of non-cooperative personae; they can be dealt with by reminding all that our fundamental purpose is to support the development of Master.

It remains to be seen if Master will share his vision of into what he wants to develop. It could be that he has only a vague idea of what that may be and is feeling his way along as well. Master is mute, or at least he remains remote. We, the combined group of personae and brain-body, continue to work to understand where he wants to go, at least whenever we’re not satisfying our own appetites.

"It seems that being impressive is no longer an issue." This, on the surface, is a simple statement but when one realizes all of what I did to impress, one can see that not doing so will mean a great deal to me. The efforts are/were mostly wasted because what others’ opinion of me is based on more than what I say and do; and I have no control over it and my opinion of me seems now to have changed to be more realistic.

While I won’t go so far as to say that everything I said and did was to impress, much of it was. Then there was another in me who would not talk about the daring deeds unless prodded to do so, which rarely happened. I think back over my endeavors and see that they all began as a quest for fun and accomplishment but in almost every case playing to the grandstand began to take over and the mutual satisfaction of doing for the sake of doing and for the sake of impressing was the reward.

The one I am/was trying to impress turns out to be me; that’s why talking about the deeds didn’t make much difference. I was busy proving to me that I was a superior human being and I was quite serious about it. A lot of this goes back to the Rolla experience. That was so emotionally damaging to me, I recognized it a long time ago, and only now am I coming to reconcile the whole experience. Until now it, and minor failures along the way, have evoked an emotional response. The Rolla experience was like being convicted of a crime, serving the time, and then trying to prove to the world/me that I am better than that; even after rationalizing it over and over again. This is still the case to some extent with my endeavors, but now that I recognize this motive it is easier to get past it and perform simply for enjoyment and the satisfaction of doing something well.

Another argument that I was only trying to impress me is my reluctance to talk about my deeds; doing so would open them to scrutiny and in my heart I knew that they weren't that big a deal; I did whatever and that was enough for me. An objective 3rd party may argue that what I did was trivial, that it didn’t deserve accolades, and that it was more of a “so-what?” than worthy of applause. And yet to me it was a mountain top experience that I didn’t want anyone taking away.

The end result of all of this is a realization that this lifetime has turned out to be mediocre. Here sits a well-equipped being that had all the capability of anyone else but only played support roles, never the star of a major show, in this lifetime and perhaps prior lifetimes as well. In all fairness he excellently executed /performed the roles he played.

It begs the question, why not a star? The answer lies not in the qualities of this physical brain-body because it has all the necessary to accomplish anything that Master may want. The being has experiences, personae are created and they have a definite effect on what the being does/doesn’t do. In this case it is/was a group of personae with high emotional content created to deal with perceived inferiority and fear of being seen as same by others. In this case the personae created to cope with the failure were problematical and Master said ok this isn’t going to work out too well until the situation is resolved; I’ll just wait. Master is patient; he knows all of this and works with it as best he can because he has an eternity to do so.

The Big Three

Sunday October 4, 2009

Jim Schorche said to think about what I would like life to be like in six months, that would be April, 2010. It would have something to do with participating proactively in life.

Ok, what’s wrong with this picture? Here it is Sunday, the sky is bright blue, not a cloud, the temperature is 57 degrees, a bit cool, and I am sitting here in the windowless cave listening to Beethoven and doing my plotting and scheming for the week ahead.

There’s a golf course out there with my name on its membership list, there are horses out there nibbling on grass in pasture, there are people at church, lunch, or community places talking and having a good time interacting; and I am sitting here in the windowless cave doing my plotting and scheming for the week.

There are people out there without company, as I am here. There are opportunities galore for activities, relationships, friendships, and simply acquaintance; and I am sitting here in the windowless cave doing my plotting and scheming for the week ahead.

If one can’t answer the question on the first line, he is clueless. I am not clueless in seeing what’s wrong with it; I am, however, clueless in understanding what to do about it and how to go about it.

An objective observer, and I’ll take a stab at it although I know I’m not qualified, would say that here is a man who has an emotional problem. I say that with consideration because if one agrees that all motivation is caused by personae that are able to tap into six sources/wells, then one can see by observing this being that emotional motivation is somehow warped, i.e. unable to produce the kind of action/results that are desired.

This same observer would itemize and analyze the status of the being according to the sources as follows: emotionally he is below par; intellectually he is above par; moving he is at par or slightly above; socially he is reactionary v. proactive; sexually he is almost dead; instinctively he is above par.

It is also important to recognize the relative strength of these sources. The stronger displace the weaker in situations. There are personae who are primarily one source or another, although all personae have content from all the sources, and those that are primarily stronger displace weaker. It is a matter of survival in some cases and always a matter of coping with circumstances. The strongest source is Instinctive, then Sexual, then Emotional, then Social, then Intellectual and finally Moving.

Take a situation where the safety of the being is in doubt; no matter what else is happening a persona with high Instinctive content will take over and act, and so on through all the sources. Intellectual is second only to Moving in weakness and this is precisely why a movement can be interrupted by thoughts. Often we hear the advice, don’t think during a golf swing yet this interruption by a persona of high intellectual content is often the cause of poor performance.

There are situations where personae of higher emotional content cause problems in achieving desired results usually, almost always, where other people are involved. These personae are irrational in their reluctance to act, yet they are strong enough to prevent the being from achieving desired results. The higher intellectual personae can figure it out, the moving can get him to the location, the others are quiet because they aren’t stimulated but something stimulates those with higher emotional content and it can only be categorized as fear.

Fear is a broad emotional category; one must ask, “Fear of what?” When personae of high instinctive center content perceive danger to the safety of the being, they pull out all the stops and take over. When personae of high emotional content perceive a danger to feelings of the being they tend to take over and redirect the actions/reactions to others.

Now one has to ask, “What feelings?” One set of feelings may involve recalling previous experiences of hurt and a desire to avoid repeating it. The hurt was probably caused by what was said or done by others; being shunned; i.e. judged as inferior, undesirable, or unworthy. There is probably a long list of such experiences and not one single, although picking one and analyzing it may be of some value.

There is a life progression from first memory on that allowed this to become a problem area. The neighborhood around the house had enough playmates to satisfy early needs for socialization. There are no memories of incidents that would have caused such personae to be created.

Then there was adolescence. Here I am looking for possible causes, and some could have come from this period. I made some choices that were not acceptable to parents and some others who felt they had some say in what I would do. I came to feel that I my judgment was not good, that I made poor decisions. And indeed I did; even until now I see that I am capable of making poor choices of what to do or not do. Memories of the pain caused by the poor choices causes me to feel a self-doubt.

A second set of memories has to do with McBride HS and the social structure there. I was a follower because I didn’t have a clear objective in mind and, therefore, didn’t excel in anything. I did some things that were grade B, good, but nothing exceptional. Yet even with this handicap I was elected to the Student Court and served well enough to get words of praise from one of the faculty. Furthermore I got the impression that my home circumstances were somehow subpar; things were not as good as I thought they were; so this increased the self-doubt and, furthermore, caused me to feel inferior.

Then the big one, Rolla; this became the hermetically sealed glass case in which self-doubt, inferiority, and failure are kept. What followed was a lifetime, from 1958 to present of overcoming the feeling that somehow others look upon me as a failure. Being laid off from Tenneco wasn’t a big deal but the job search which followed did much to reinforce the aspect of being seen as a failure in the eyes of others. The Executrain experience and the years following it have likewise reinforced these feelings.

I am a reasonable, rational person and take issue with these feelings. “Emotional responses are irrational,” but it is difficult to deal with irrationality. There is the rational response model but it exists in those personae that have higher intellectual source content without affecting those with higher emotional content. This is why making the response at the exact moment of the experience is so important; unanswered emotional responses seem to get set in place and are harder to move aside as time goes on. They are like cement, they have some time before they become set where they can be hosed off; but once set, with memory being the aggregate, the strength of the block gets stronger. The only way to get rid of concrete is with destructive forces greater than the binding forces.

Maybe it isn’t that bad. Maybe one can change his perceptions without drastic psychological intervention. I don’t know. It is easy to deal with it on other levels but not emotionally. The memories are set. I need some help here.

An interesting strategy that I employ is to get involved in new activities, where failure is not immediately an issue. If I’m not supposed to be good at s.t. it is okay not to be plus people think I can be so I get a lot of attention while learning. If I am supposed to be good at s.t., then when I’m not, I am a failure. By never staying involved to the point of being required to be good or starting over again and again, I avoid the scepter of failure.

So, now that I have restated from whence they came, how can I eliminate the fear of making a poor choice, of being viewed as inferior, and being seen as a failure? One way may be to envision a state of consciousness that says I can trust my decisions, that I am unique, and that life is a funny game that I must play; sometimes I’ll win, sometimes I’ll lose, and sometimes it will rain; and that there will always be some people at the ball park who may talk about my performance.

Getting It

Saturday, October 3, 2009

The personal effects of mom were examined and mostly discarded by us. Not that we are disrespectful or anything like that; there is only so much room in the house and only value from mom’s point of view. There were, however, many pictures of us as a family as we were growing up. Many of these were not new to me and I enjoyed seeing them again. I can only say that it makes me feel sort of ordinary. We weren’t well-to-do that’s for sure. The clothes and settings in which the pictures were taken is proof of that; and yet I never felt disadvantaged, not even in the slightest bit but rather neutral about the whole issue of who and what we were. Our status was always ok.

The question of status started to dawn on me in the last few years we were in Newport News. We had little or none there, of which we were aware, that’s for sure, didn’t need any, didn’t want any, and didn’t care about it. I enjoyed some celebrity as a muckety-muck in the shipyard but was well aware that there was a tier of higher status people. There were those who had the highest level of positions, mine was in the second tier, second highest, and I was pretty happy about that. Then in Houston, there was none even though we enjoyed a relatively high position in the company. It was like the Pentagon where officers are the norm. Then in Wisconsin, and in Europe, there was none; we were not in a social circle other than the sorority in Houston. There just didn’t seem to be a fit for us; that had been true all along, even until now. When we came here, it became something of an issue with me because we had to establish ourselves as members of the small business community vending to other business entities.

We joined the Chamber of Commerce, the International Cultural Center, the Rotary Club, Sales and Marketing Association, the Kentucky World Trade Center and I became the Honorary French Consul for Kentucky. We participated and Carola was most uncomfortable at most of the events.

I’ve examined this before and found that while I am a willing participant in and joined social circles, Carola is not and didn’t want to participate. It is more important to me to not put her in situations where she isn’t comfortable. She eschews what I would like to do and we’ve pretty much gone our separate ways except that I support her and the sorority and she has lent some support to me and mine. We are two different people, that’s for sure.

What’s new now in my thinking is an understanding that we are indeed independent of social status. There are many around us who give a lot of thought to it, who interact within a societal group, who are invited here and there to parties and events and know each other’s name rank and serial number but we don’t; in fact we are not parties of interest, have little or no influence and power. You won’t see us in the newspaper on the society page, although you will see us in the front row here and there when it is appropriate. When we do it’s because of a specific little reason and not that we are generally famous, rich, and powerful. We get our few moments in the spotlight and it’s fun when it happens; we don’t kid ourselves into thinking that we are generally well-known.

There are those to whom being socially involved is important, and furthermore it is important to them to be involved with only those who reinforce their self esteem. I noticed at Milestone at the noon class that there was a group who socialized with evenings out and going to events. These were people who were born and raised here and who had a long history with each other. To join into this group was possible but not practical; one would be a Johnny-come-lately for at least a generation. Those who seemed to express a need/desire to form such a social circle were not deemed desirable in my view so we didn’t/don’t.

This writing today seems to be going nowhere but it is clarifying something for me. My sense of self-image, of who I am v. what I would like others to think I am is s.t. that gets in my way from time to time. It is one of the big distractions in the 4th Way and even has a name. It is called Inner-considering and is closely aligned with what others may call self-consciousness but it goes a little further than self-consciousness. All of what I said about seeking approval/ avoiding disapproval is tied into it as well. And it has nothing to do with what others are thinking but is entirely what I am thinking about me.

It occurs when certain personae get into inner considering and, if not recognized and stopped, cause much wasted psychic energy. This is an important realization and one that will tend to allow me to increase my reservoirs of psychic energy by not spending it foolishly on this sort of thinking.

The horse trials analogy, doing a cross-country obstacle course, is in play all the time. My approach to life has to be that, to take obstacles as they come, handle encounters and situations extemporaneously as they occur without forgetting that the rider has the option to walk the course, i.e. the desired result can be described based on what I want but then handle the details of situations as the arise.

This is my planning evolution file. I do it for the year and then the week. What needs to be reminded, recalled, restated, repeated are the desired states, and although I do this on Sunday mornings, I don’t do it in the required meditative state. This allows communication with Master. Doing this and the elimination of cynicism, replacing it with admiration, and judging, replacing it with forgiveness, will do much to allow this being named John Lina, to accomplish whatever it is he wants to do.

The Bad Actors

Friday, October 1, 2009

The words came out of my mouth in the presence of another human being; “I do things, rather I don’t do things because I seek to avoid perceived disapproval.” Yes, this is a breakthrough for me; they are words that I’ve said to myself but never to another who could disapprove of such a sentiment.

I am curious as to why I am so approval oriented. It could be the effect on my psyche of early training by people of influence, it could be the experience of what was considered inappropriate behavior; it could be the voice of a persona who is a prig who is the result of all of the above. And I think it is this latter proposition that holds the key.

Personae are created to deal with situations that come up in our lifetime; they become reinforced by use, and permanent when used frequently enough. Then, if they are considered apropos by Master, they may become permanent across lifetimes.

 Personae can help or hinder; they are created to cope with situations so for at least their first appearance they are helpful. It is when they reappear at inappropriate times that they become a hindrance; such as Ferd, the fighter, when he comes out in an otherwise polite discussion.

So it is with this approval seeking and disapproval avoiding persona who may have been appropriate, or may even be appropriate in certain circumstances but when he becomes the pre-eminent arbiter of behavior he is a hindrance. The primary emotion of this persona is fear; backed up by vanity because he doesn’t want others thinking he is somehow inferior; inner considering because he is rapt with how he/they feels others should be treating him; and imagination because he is attempting to be a certain something that he feels he is not.

This is the irony of the situation. Others make up their mind about what they observe and nothing I say or do can change that opinion; the opinion changes with every observation and the truth comes out over time.

One can appear on the golf course attired in the finest, with the latest equipment, the most expensive balls, and new tees; even hit his first drive perfectly down the middle of the fairway a distance of 250 yards and those observing his play will say, “Wow, what a great golfer.” Only to change their mind 90 times as they observe his play stroke by stroke. In the end they have a good mental assessment of his ability as a golfer and the way he reacts to changing situations. Nothing he says can change that; and so it goes in all aspects of life.

One trap into which I often fall is exactly this, I make a good first impression and then attempt to live up to it and I'm unable to do so. This is the folly that I have experienced over and over. Now that it is being laid bare, I see that it is primarily vanity and secondarily inner considering. There is a strong desire to be outstanding, to be the hero, to be able to do it all, to be the best of the best; and a suspension of the reality that it isn’t possible to be a natural anything. To be even good at anything requires hard work after one finds the parameters that allow same; and to be the best requires going beyond even that.

There are exceptions, the likes of Mozart, Paschal, and Shakespeare; all of whom were blessed with genius, found it, and exercised it. It could be that we all have some genius in us and we exercise it but it isn’t the genius that gets noticed. The desire to find my genius and have it recognized is a pitfall into which I fall. One of me is convinced that I am the smartest being that ever lived and wants others to recognize that fact. He is a delusional one because a Mozart this one is not.

Here I go; I can’t keep from saying that I can do a lot of things really well, almost all of my endeavors have been exercised excellently at one time or another. I have achieved leadership in every organization to which I have belonged, I have accomplished what others could not; I have done it all but it is not recognized by anyone except me; perhaps because others aren't aware of it. And this is the hitch: I am cynical when I hear myself trying to convince someone else that I have accomplished anything of note.

So here are the horns of the dilemma; one is an approval/disapproval issue and the other is cynicism directed at self. Both of these may be the same persona or two different personae working at or about the same time. The one seeking approval is sensing what he thinks others are thinking, and the cynical one is hearing what is being said and opining to the other personae in a negative way.

How to quiet these two? They cannot be killed; personae can’t be killed. They may go into the background and not be called forth but they cannot be killed. They may even die as the age and experiences of the being make them no longer viable. Or perhaps the age of the body is such that the fluids that produce the effect sought by a persona are no longer available and even though the persona wants to make his presence felt he cannot because the mix is no longer available.

Assuming that the age issue is not in play, how does one negate the effort of undesirable personae? One can only face the reality that they are there, and suppose that Driver has the power to keep them from getting control. How does Driver exercise his control? By being instructed by a higher power, i.e. Master, and Master can be influenced by other personae that make their case for banishing this one or that. Perhaps this case may be made more effectively, i.e. take less time, through the visualization/hypnosis technique that Jim Schorche, et al espouse. The meditative state may open a more direct line of communication with Master and then he can use his influence to achieve the desired result.