Confession

[luke wilson]

Explorer, please, learn to control your anger. When you go to university, act like the type of person you'd want to be. Do not binge drink, do not do stupid things and do not get into fights. Learn to control your most immediate impulses of lashing out if you are getting hot underneath the collar. Sometimes it isn't only about you as you could be infringing upon other people and there right to be if you can't control yourself. University will be a good experience but it'll also be a tough experience as you'll clash so many times with should I or shouldn't I. Also, don't be a recluse, find the balance!!

And no, you are not to young to start the forth way (the term work as is used here is essentially the fourth way), you should just be patient and in not so much of a hurry. You still have a brain and it isn't dead yet so you can do some stuff!

Lastly don't forget, not only is your home not the right environment, the whole world isn't the right environment but that is why we are here. So that we can learn from it, it's ok and even healthy to acknowledge you might not be in a healthy environment and see exactly what is wrong with it but don't use this as an excuse. You can always learn something from it and become a better person.

 

[Explorer]

Explorer, please, learn to control your anger. When you go to university, act like the type of person you'd want to be. Do not binge drink, do not do stupid things and do not get into fights. Learn to control your most immediate impulses of lashing out if you are getting hot underneath the collar. Sometimes it isn't only about you as you could be infringing upon other people and there right to be if you can't control yourself. University will be a good experience but it'll also be a tough experience as you'll clash so many times with should I or shouldn't I. Also, don't be a recluse, find the balance!!

And no, you are not to young to start the forth way (the term work as is used here is essentially the fourth way), you should just be patient and in not so much of a hurry. You still have a brain and it isn't dead yet so you can do some stuff!

Lastly don't forget, not only is your home not the right environment, the whole world isn't the right environment but that is why we are here. So that we can learn from it, it's ok and even healthy to acknowledge you might not be in a healthy environment and see exactly what is wrong with it but don't use this as an excuse. You can always learn something from it and become a better person.

Thanks Wilson, but please understand, that was the first and only fight I've ever gotten into, and I got my nose broke for it. Plenty of times I've talked my way out of a fight or restrained myself. Its not like I'm some-kind of a trouble-maker, and I have no interest in a repeat. If anything, I'm more of a push over.

I'm looking at the social side of University as an excellent opportunity to force myself out of my comfort zone, so don't worry about me becoming a recluse.

I guess I just don't feel ready for the Fourth Way yet. It is a huge commitment.

 

[luke wilson]

I guess I just don't feel ready for the Fourth Way yet. It is a huge commitment.

Ok, the forum will still be here whenever you feel like you need to network, discuss current issues or seek advise about whatever issues might be on your mind.

Lastly, I am sure you know this, but your above statement about the fourth way being a huge commitment doesn't give you license to be reckless. Not only in terms of fights (I know you said you don't get involved in such) but other areas of personal responsibility as well!! Remember, you might not be a fully grown adult yet, but you certainly aren't a child either, so now you have a certain level of personal responsibility on your shoulders! Fourth way or no fourth way, that doesn't change! I am repeating this again as you will no doubt forget it otherwise.

For now, just take life easy, look forward to new experiences and don't neglect your mind. Or as Mark Twain said "Don't let your schooling interfere with your education"

 

[Joe]

I guess I just don't feel ready for the Fourth Way yet. It is a huge commitment.

It is, and it's all the bigger (and perhaps counterproductive) when you are in a position where you haven't experienced enough of life to have really learned that hard lessons that eventually bring people to the Fourth Way.

 

[Explorer]

I guess I just don't feel ready for the Fourth Way yet. It is a huge commitment.

It is, and it's all the bigger (and perhaps counterproductive) when you are in a position where you haven't experienced enough of life to have really learned that hard lessons that eventually bring people to the Fourth Way.

Its fear that attracts me, now. The idea of dying with no soul is terrifying.

 

[Divide by Zero]

Its fear that attracts me, now. The idea of dying with no soul is terrifying.

I had a girlfriend years ago who was an atheist, but was raised Catholic.
She knew I didn't want to have children, despite liking kids from the start.
But when she started to get obssed with having kids, she would try to convince me.

One of those was to ask me "What if you died and there was nothing else, just blackness? How could you feel ok that you're gone and you didn't keep a part of you in life (referring to a child)?"

I told her that I don't know what will happen when I die. I have some ideas, some loose faith, but if I die and it is blackness/nothingness, then what have I lost?

I'm surprised that it seems like a lot atheists look down on people who have some kind of faith in the unobservable as being blind or stupid. Maybe religion did mess up the faith thing, turned it from an openness into a closed rigid system.
But, ironically atheists have a faith too, a faith that this crappy world is all there is!


I think this fear of dying driving you to do this is not going to help you solve the problem. "The only thing to fear is fear itself!"

http://www.scribd.com/doc/13047529/The-Last-Hour-of-Life-Gurdjieff-George-Ivanovitch

 

[Lan8r]

I'm surprised that it seems like a lot atheists look down on people who have some kind of faith in the unobservable as being blind or stupid. Maybe religion did mess up the faith thing, turned it from an openness into a closed rigid system.
But, ironically atheists have a faith too, a faith that this crappy world is all there is!

An Ironic statement. Funny how those of the 'Christian Faith' look down on anyone who does not believe in god as an atheist, a blasphemer. When it appears to me that Atheism itself is a religion, albeit an anti-religion, religion. I think it's true that religion does mess up the faith thing. Intelligent design does not equal Monotheism. And faith in the unobservable does not equal Monotheism. But really, what is atheism? (that's a serious question because it confuses me, and I am not sure that even atheists know the answer). Is it really anti-monotheism to the highest opposite degree of the spectrum. Like, either you're with a god, or you're against any god, and to think that if there is anything other than this crappy world it equals some kind of god? What happened to the other 180 degrees? When and How did we loose our faith to religion?

 

[Laura]

I had a girlfriend years ago who was an atheist, but was raised Catholic.
She knew I didn't want to have children, despite liking kids from the start.
But when she started to get obssed with having kids, she would try to convince me.

One of those was to ask me "What if you died and there was nothing else, just blackness? How could you feel ok that you're gone and you didn't keep a part of you in life (referring to a child)?"

And she would wish that on another human being? Talk about narcissism!