Next Nearest Alternative

[TheSpoon]

Thank you for such a fully fledged reply PepperFritz, you've given me much to think about.

The suggestion of recalling each day as if it were a dream struck me in particular as being a useful exercise.

Spoon

 

[Ruth]

Are the (admittedly real) differences between groups talked up so as to avoid the smaller group being "lumped together" with the larger group in the mind of the general public?

Its the subtle differences and any form of new thinking that gets 'squashed' if two groups (or indeed two individuals) are ingaged in being 'diametrically opposed' to each other. The 'opposing' group will get accused of being wrong, evil... or even of engaging in heretical ideas usually in a highly emotively charged environment. Its the highly emotively charged environment that often leads groups, who are nothing more than individuals, to ignore reality, facts and the truth. This makes learning something new or seeing reality objectively, difficult.

Its been going on for centuries and is essentially an STS activity :) I think Tigersoap is correct - its staight out the Machiavellian play book....

I too get frustrated at some peoples attitudes toward 'modern' medicine as being all evil, corrupt and therefore absolutely no good for anyone! That's like saying that all people involved from the politicians who make laws on it, to the researchers who try to discover cures, to the doctors who prescribe and the nurses who administer all have malefiecent intent.... and the only answer is 'alternative' medicine. Some hospitals have taken the step of changing the name 'alternative' to 'complementary' therapies. And yes, they not only allow, but accept its use.

People who think there's absolutely nothing worth having or applying from what passes as 'modern' medicine are no different from the 'love and light brigade' who actively seek to live in "la la" land where seeing reality is not going to happen under any circumstance, simply because the truth is awful and they claim it shouldn't be. Why on earth they should think that is completely beyond me...

 

[TheSpoon]

Firstly, thank you again PepperFritz for putting such effort into fully addressing my position, and in a way that doesn't make me feel "told off". I hate getting told off ;) I'm slowly coming down from my "Oh why can't we all just get along" trip, which is of course an attempt to change others.

You currently see Laura/SOTT as concentrating solely on the "negative" to the exclusion of the "positive"

Yes, totally. It just seems like the Media spends it's time focussing on death, misery and destruction, then this site focuses on the psychopaths causing death, misery and destruction. Doesn't anyone look at noble acts, joy, compassion, companionship and love inherent in the human condition, or is that just not the reality we inhabit? It certainly doesn't sell papers.

If you do NOT agree (i.e., that is NOT your current understanding of the Laura/SOTT position), please explain how your understanding differs.

I don't know PepperFritz, right now I just don't know. It certainly makes sense the way you explain it. What I now need to do is satisfy myself that your take on a) SOTT and b) Love'n'Light is how it really is.

Unfortunately, the Love'n'Light following aren't so organised as to have a glossary of their terms! Reading this Cassiopedia article was useful: http://www.cassiopedia.org/glossary/Love. Certainly I'd agree that Love and Light generally doesn't espouse hard work and honest uncompromising reflection as being the path of spiritual development. Which is akin to our modern day desire to "Learn Java in 14 minutes", "Lose lbs while you sleep" and "Earn a Million Dollars by doing Nothing!"

Trying to find justification for my assertion that SOTT puts down Love'n'Light (or confirmation for your assertion that SOTT is diametrically opposed to "White Ball" methodology) has been similarly fruitless after 20 precious lunch-hour minutes. I'll keep on it once I get home.

ALRIGHT, RECAP: You don't want the WHITE BALL and you don't want the BLACK BALL, because they are both limited, incomplete, and unbalanced views of the universe. You want the GREY BALL. Fair enough.

Hey, I'm sure we all want the GREY BALL. Or I may be looking at a case of Group 1 saying "We're Grey, you're White", and Group 2 saying "No, We're Grey, you're Black". In the same way that Evil people never (?) view themselves as Evil, I doubt that anyone would admit to only seeing or wishing the world as purely white. I think they'd say they're seeking to redress a current imbalance - and right enough, this is an STS environment. They're just missing the point that trying to "make it" STO would be control.

You like the words "Love" and "Light" a lot more than "STO", because the latter seems to lack the EMOTION and SENTIMENT and WARM FEELINGS you associate with the former. And there's the rub, my friend. The C's are telling us that "Love" (i.e. STO) is not a FEELING, it is an ACTION

Intellectually I agree with you, but then this big surge of emotion comes up from my chest and disagrees. I don't know what to do with that. I think it's responding that "Love is the feeling that promotes the action".

Hope the above brings us closer to clarification....

I think it does, thank you PepperFritz.

Going back to that remark Laura made that Vinny pointed me towards above

"Sending love to the earth" is quite all right. But trying to change anything about the earth is a violation of the free will of the earth to follow its own destiny. Sending love to those who have not asked for it is also a violation of their free will.

I'm now reassessing traditional sides of Good vs. Evil phrased as
"We just want you to be happy" vs. "We just want you to be miserable" as both being STS positions and in fact the STO position of "We're going to let you do whatever you choose" is rarely portrayed in Film/Literature/Real life because it's so rarely an active participant.

I agree that trying to change others is an infringement of free will, but the idea of doing nothing is just really hitting up against my intuition and it's making me question the C's nature.

Q: He says: 'I believe that if we do not send love energy to
the world that the egocentric STS energy will be
dominating.
A: Why would one choose to send this? What is the
motivation?
Q: To change it to your idea of what it is supposed to be.
To control it to follow your judgment of how things ought
to be.
A: Exactly. The students are not expected to be the
architects of the school.

It just seems so unfair that STS gets to change/control/manipulate to their hearts contents, but STO is expected to sit back and not interfere.

Why is exposing psychopathic behaviour an STO activity, but reversing the damage they're doing seen as "control" and STS? If it IS possible to effect change by sending "Love" then why not do so?

Consider possibilities that either the C's are closet STS or that this particular line of enquiry was subject to corruption. Isn't it the most likely thing in the world that STS would want to convince STO candidates that sitting back and watching is in their best interest?

But then I'm contradicting myself here, because the C's were all for exposing STS activity...Unless the people who can be exposed are the ones who have served their purpose and can usefully be used as scapegoats and distraction, when sending Love is a true threat to STS? But then "threat" is an STS activity and so Love becomes Hate.

Och I've just talked myself into a right confused pickle now. I feel like Luke Skywalker considering that killing the Emperor might not be a bad thing in the long run.

I'm sorry I haven't got anyone to talk this over with before posting, it's noisy and without conclusion, as am I.

 

[TheSpoon]

Every time you see him, you are reminded of some very unpleasant facts: e,g, he reminds you of elements of your own behaviour

Actually no. I know (and believe) intellectually that the things that irritate us most about other people are the things that we deny exist in ourselves, but I don't actually SEE or accept (at any deep level) it in this case. As far as I'm concerned, he really is just a twonk and I don't share those characteristic. I don't I don't I don't. OK, maybe the criticising thing. Well and maybe the trying to prove he's an expert thing. Oh stuff it, OK then already (woo, I really didn't think this paragraph was going to go that way). I still don't like the guy.

But then if I'm trying to change him, and he contains elements that I don't like in myself, am I not then trying to change myself? Perhaps that's more effectively done through raising self awareness than sending love. But in the meantime, is forgiving him his faults not also forgiving myself for mine? Wow, now I'm really confused, is trying to change myself an STS activity? Would forgiving myself be more STO? Man, I'm just a jar of Branston's right now.

We already know that your meditative technique has done nothing for the "work bloke" and that you don't really care anyway

Well I'm sort of up in the air about that at the moment because I've been convinced that trying to change him would be STS. And I was under the impression that what went on in my head COULD NOT have any effect on someone remotely - that would magical thinking. But then I'm reading what the C's said against "sending" and I don't know where to fit that in:

A: No, no, no!!! In fact, if anything, such an energy
transference even could enhance the effect.
Q: In what way?
A: Imbalanced waves could be drawn upon by the receiver.

Have you really done YOURSELF any good by "getting rid" of those unpleasant feelings? When you practice "self-calming via meditation, it is no different than the self-calming other people practice via alcohol, sex, drugs, video games, television, etc. It still all comes down the same thing: AVOIDANCE.

Ok, I'll take that onboard.

Self-Soothing (which I'm assuming is the same thing as Self Calming) is something that I've only become able to do in the last 4 years. It was necessary because my previous behaviour in relationships was to seek out a new one when I stopped getting what I needed from it - ie a new source of narcissistic supply was required. So Self Soothing allowed me to remain in a relationship where I perceived that I was receiving criticism (I told you I hate being told off ;) ) and bought me time to look at that, discuss it, work through it, rather than just hitting the eject button at the end of the honeymoon period.

But that was an antidote to patterned behaviour that I didn't have under conscious control, so next thing is to look up self calming and work out why it's a Bad Thing. I had hoped to find something helpful in the Cassiopedia, but it didn't seem to cover it. I'll do a forum search tonight when I don't have my internet usage logged.

In that light, the "work bloke" has been a glaring opportunity for you to further the Work, to see yourself even more clearly than you do now, and to maybe identify some Programs that you were not previously aware of.

Yes, that's useful. Thanks PepperFritz.

 

[PepperFritz]

Self-Soothing (which I'm assuming is the same thing as Self Calming) is something that I've only become able to do in the last 4 years. It was necessary because my previous behaviour in relationships was to seek out a new one when I stopped getting what I needed from it - ie a new source of narcissistic supply was required. So Self Soothing allowed me to remain in a relationship where I perceived that I was receiving criticism (I told you I hate being told off ;) ) and bought me time to look at that, discuss it, work through it, rather than just hitting the eject button at the end of the honeymoon period.

But that was an antidote to patterned behaviour that I didn't have under conscious control, so next thing is to look up self calming and work out why it's a Bad Thing.

Please note that I was only talking about "meditation as self-calming" in relation to the "work bloke" scenario, and was not making a blanket statement about meditation in general. I suspect that, like many techniques, it can be a "good" thing in some contexts and a "bad" thing in other ones. It all comes down to INTENT, i.e. what one is trying to achieve, not how one is trying to achieve it.

Here's the Cassiopaea Glossary entry on "Self Calming":


SELF CALMING

This is the process of pushing aside thoughts or emotions that are uncomfortable.

This is a pervasive characteristic of the human condition and is found at many levels.

In the most basic sense, self-calming takes place when one rationalizes and self-justifies actions or inactions which one is not comfortable with. This amounts to putting one's conscience to sleep. This action is opposed to consciousness or conscience and is a way of furthering sleep. Systematic self-calming makes buffers.

However, the more complex forms of self-calming go far beyond simply excusing one's behavior because one was lazy/tired/drunk/in lust/under some other mechanical influence or because everybody does the same thing or because the human is imperfect.

In a spiritual sense, self-calming can take many forms of denying reality. Blind belief in a fundamentalistic deity can be an extremely potent agent of self-calming. It is apt to rationalize murder, genocide, pillage and rape. No human debasement is such that the committed true believer could not do it if the hypnosis of blind belief is potent enough.

A still subtler form of this is found in some practices that seek to induce a state of spiritual bliss as an end in itself. In these practices, self-calming hides behind the noble goal of seeking contact with 'higher realities.' A lot of the New Age talk about 'space brothers' being here to save us or that all is right with the world or that one only needs to think nice to have a nice world are agents of self-calming.

Much of pop psychology teaches ways of self-calming.

In all its forms, self-calming promotes subjectivity and further divides the personality from reality as well as promotes the further factionalization of little I's.

Man cannot function in a state of abject horror. Therefore some means of emotional regulation are necessary. The human organism is wired to naturally provide these through mechanisms of dissociation, repressing memories and so forth. These are to a degree necessary for life in the world.

The division between what is self-calming and what is a survival response is not always clear cut. Generally, self-calming is done for comfort and with a degree of deliberateness, even if self-calming itself were rationalized as yet something else, whereas trauma responses are automatic and in real time.

 

[Jimbo]

Please note that I was only talking about "meditation as self-calming" in relation to the "work bloke" scenario, and was not making a blanket statement about meditation in general. I suspect that, like many techniques, it can be a "good" thing in some contexts and a "bad" thing in other ones. It all comes down to INTENT, i.e. what one is trying to achieve, not how one is trying to achieve it.

A good example of meditation being used productively is in "Myth of Sanity", where in the last chapter, Martha Stout talks about using meditation to remember forgotten or fragmented traumitizing childhood memories so you can integrate them into fully conscious memories. In doing so, you can 'let go' of some dissociative reactions that were originally created for protection, but have become dysfunctional and disruptive later in life.

 

[Kel]

This has been a very interesting tread for me. Spoon, I appreciate your honesty, and you bring up some points that have been confusing for me too.

FWIW:

My personal experience with sending "love and light" to where it wasn't asked, came with ultimately very disappointing results. Before I found Laura and the Cs, I guess you could say I was into the whole new age thing. I had become a 2nd degree Reiki practioner. Reiki seem to be such a miracle that I used it all of the time, but followed the rule and only sent it when asked. And at that time I was also going through an ugly, ugly divorce where my 4-5 year old daughter was involved. My ex-husband's behavior was crescendoing into more and more what I considered evil and I was desparate. I began sending him and his girlfriend Reiki hoping that with the added positive energy they would begin to "see the light" and possibly get some perspective. He NEEDED help! I NEEDED him to get help! He needed to CHANGE. I needed him CHANGE! I had read that this would take care of all the negative energy, and the results would be nothing but glorious.

The results were not what I expected. The Love and Light Reiki I sent seemed to make everything more twisted. So I sent MORE. When someone says "Things couldn't get any worse" I now say, yes, they can, and they DID. So I sent MORE.

Personally, I now think he turned the energy I was sending him into more power and that power was a very evil thing.

Fortunately, it wasn't too long after this that I found out about my big mistake through reading The Wave. I stopped sending energy and things calmed down. But I still felt like a failure. I was very angry. Angry at him and angry at myself. But overall, there was improvement.

I will add, however, that it wasn't until I was involved in a whole body session with a therapist about 3 years later, that it seemed an energy tie was broken and pretty much all of the angst dissolved. This session included screaming and crying and using all of my physical strength to beat a big pillow placed on an ottoman with a tennis racket. Sounds pretty funny and embarassing, but it worked. I felt free, and after years of not even being able to speak to each other (while sharing custody) we actually had some conversations and cooperation seemed to fall in place. His focus is now on others and I get to hear about his ongoing battles from a distance. The distance is very good and I'm not too hooked in either a positive or negative way by the stories. (OK, maybe I get a little thrill when I read about all of his tax leins posted in the business journal of the local newspaper.) They are what they are, he is what he is. My distance is freedom--freedom for him to be who he is without the judgement. Is that STO? Or maybe because the result is freedom for myself, that's STS? I don't know, but it seems the only solution and feels right.

I've even lost the "damn, I wish I could have changed him" regret. All gone.

 

[PepperFritz]

Kel:

Thanks for sharing your experiences, and I'm so glad to hear that you were eventually able to turn the situation around. As I read your post, I winced more than once at memories of my own similar past, missteps, and misconceptions. We've all been there in one way or another.

I spent many years experiencing painful regret about all the time and energy I wasted, but like you eventually let go of that too. How can one regret having learned lessons, which is our only purpose on this earth, after all?

 

[mamadrama]

This has been such a good thread for me to read, too. Thank you all for your contributions; I can relate to many of your experiences. It has been especially helpful as my court battle with my ex nears its conclusion (I hope, but after reading Sandy Brown's book, Women Who Love Psychopaths I am aware of the distinct possibility this could go on indefinitely because making things difficult for me is a good source of narcisstic food for my ex). Anyway, I hope to contribute something more substantial soon but I am so swamped right now, I hope my thanks are enough for moment.

 

[Kel]

You are so welcome Pepperfritz, and yes, I'm, in a way, extremely grateful for my "petty tyrant". What an incredible lesson.

We wince at our lessons and wish none on our friends, but they are, alas, beneficial.

Mamadrama, I feel for you, however I can say is that I'm so grateful that you have access to information which you can turn into knowlege (I mean this as an action verb) which will greatly help reduce the trauma and wasted energy on your current situation.

 

[Kel]

OH, BTW, Mamadrama, yes, they feed off the energy. (My ex is a classical narcissist.) My divorce went on for 3 years. Yes, 3 years. It was only when I decided that the money and custody I thought was mine was not worth the trauma we (my daughter and I) were experiencing that it finally came to an end. She's OK. But she will have her built-in lessons to learn too regarding her father. I found out I can't protect her from that and now I know that proctection is not necessarily beneficial in the long run.

As for the money--well it seems it was a house of cards. Hee hee.

 

[PepperFritz]

It has been especially helpful as my court battle with my ex nears its conclusion (I hope, but after reading Sandy Brown's book, Women Who Love Psychopaths I am aware of the distinct possibility this could go on indefinitely because making things difficult for me is a good source of narcisstic food for my ex).

All the best with that, Laurel. Dealing with narcissists is such a MASSIVE energy drain, I'm sure you are looking forward to putting it all behind you.

By the way, I've posted an update in the Homemade Herbal Tinctures thread, if you're interested....

 

[mamadrama]

We wince at our lessons and wish none on our friends, but they are, alas, beneficial.

Totally agree. This was the biggest lesson of my life (so far). And I'm still learning all the time from it. Still, as you say, I don't wish it on anyone.

Mamadrama, I feel for you, however I can say is that I'm so grateful that you have access to information which you can turn into knowlege (I mean this as an action verb) which will greatly help reduce the trauma and wasted energy on your current situation.

Thank you for your encouragement, Kel. I do plan to turn my knowledge into action. I have been in communication with Sandra Brown, who wrote Women Who Love Psychopaths, and will undergo training so that I can start a support group in my area.

All the best with that, Laurel. Dealing with narcissists is such a MASSIVE energy drain, I'm sure you are looking forward to putting it all behind you.

Thanks for your support, PepperFritz, I appreciate it. And congratulations on your sucessful herbal ventures! Please do continue to keep us updated.
Laurel

 

[henry]

Going back to that remark Laura made that Vinny pointed me towards above

"Sending love to the earth" is quite all right. But trying to change anything about the earth is a violation of the free will of the earth to follow its own destiny. Sending love to those who have not asked for it is also a violation of their free will.

I'm now reassessing traditional sides of Good vs. Evil phrased as
"We just want you to be happy" vs. "We just want you to be miserable" as both being STS positions and in fact the STO position of "We're going to let you do whatever you choose" is rarely portrayed in Film/Literature/Real life because it's so rarely an active participant.

I agree that trying to change others is an infringement of free will, but the idea of doing nothing is just really hitting up against my intuition and it's making me question the C's nature.

What makes you think that with all of the questions you have and the confusion within which you sit, that you could do anything to help anyone?

That is the first thing we each have to admit. Any idea or thought that we can improve anyone or anything else is nonsense. Any act we undertake is almost certainly going to have repercussions that we cannot foresee.

Work on yourself first, foremost, and every day. Believe me, that isn't "doing nothing". It is more than most people will ever be able to do.

 

[aragorn]

This is a very interesting and important thread.

I just want to share a recent experience, hope this is not considered too much as "noise" ;)

Me & my wife just had an ex tempore visit by one of our acquaintances, who I would consider belonging to the "New-Age-Love-And-Light" cohort. She paid a visit because she suddenly had a "strong feeling that she was needed". Well, as soon as she had arrived she began telling about her amazing and wonderful experiences with angels and stuff. Well, that's okay-I can't say that she didn't have these experiences-but the way we where bombarded us with this info made us uneasy. Because of some experience I knew that debating this kind of person isn't fruitful, or at least very tiresome. I'll spare you the details, but the main feeling we got was that because she was feeling so wonderful all the time, she was somehow an "übermensch" who's life purpose is to point out to others what they are missing. Especially my wife felt angry afterwards because of being told that. "Ooh, yes I understand your problem. Well, you still have a long way to go [i.e. you're still at an initial phase of your spiritual development], maybe you should read this and this..."

I can't believe the arrogance of these people. They claim they are "free thinkers" and "alternative", yet they want to decide what's best for you. Well, there certainly seems to be a spider web of disinfo designed for all of us who are "different", and some just get caught in this "New-Age-Infinite-Love" web. That's okay, but I don't feel comfortable with these people telling me what to do. At the same time I feel sad about this, because around where we live there isn't really any "alternative people thinking with their own brain" (not that I know of), and I had hopes that the few "alternatives" we know wouldn't turn out to have fallen into the New-Age trap. Well, maybe they will change. After all, not many years ago I myself bought and read "Infinite Love Is The only Truth" by David Icke. Having said that however, I remember feeling very uncomfortable with the ideas that was presented in this book, maybe I needed that book after all ;)

Now one more last thing. I've been wondering about something concerning the things mentioned above. At some reiki courses I have been talking with some "New Agers" who talk alot about seeing and talking with angels, fairies and even dolphins. And I really believe that they believe it's true. And fair enough, it can be happening. My question really is: could it be that forces/entities that want to deceive and lead "truthers" astray produce these "sightings" and "confrontations" to people, just so they stay on this wrong path? Because these fairies etc. always seem to come with the same message: "You're on the right track...just keep going. Everything is just wonderful."