Hi Psalesost. I think you have said many valuable and enlightening things in this thread so far. Thanks for continuing to contribute. :)
Psalehesost said:
I fairly recently re-read this post. While I'm not completely certain of the type of man I am, I think this remains the best explanation - in terms both of what I can recall that supports it, and the current overall pattern in life of how I judge, make decisions, and what generally drives me.
I want to write of one thing that I have noticed - an intellectual weakness, and also what, thus far, seems to help with it. Perhaps this may be useful for some other men no. 1. If not, I think it still matters to network, as it concerns the way I function.
I think what you’ve said about a failure to think and ask questions of ourselves is valuable to everyone because, like you mentioned, it’s about System 2’s inactivity in the face of System 1’s negative automatism.
Laura said:
You must understand that the three principal centers, the thinking, the emotional, and the moving, are connected together and, in a normal man, they are always working in unison. This unison is what presents the chief difficulty in work on oneself.… It means that a definite work of the thinking center is connected with a definite work of the emotional and moving centers—that is to say, that a certain kind of thought is inevitably connected with a certain kind of emotion (or mental state) and with a certain kind of movement (or posture); and one evokes the other, that is, a certain kind of emotion (or mental state) evokes certain movements or postures and certain thoughts, and a certain kind of movement or posture evokes certain emotions or mental states, and so forth. Everything is connected and one thing cannot exist without another thing.
"Now imagine that a man decides to think in a new way. But he feels in the old way. Imagine that he dislikes R." He pointed to one of those present. "This dislike of R. immediately arouses old thoughts and he forgets his decision to think in a new way. Or let us suppose that he is accustomed to smoking cigarettes while he is thinking—this is a moving habit. He decides to think in a new way. He begins to smoke a cigarette and thinks in the old way without noticing it. The habitual movement of lighting a cigarette has turned his thoughts round to the old tune. You must remember that a man can never break this accordance by himself. Another man's will is necessary, and a stick is necessary. All that a man who wants to work on himself can do at a certain stage of his work is to obey. He can do nothing by himself.
{snip}
"Then work on moving center can only be properly organized in a school. As I have already said, the wrong, independent, or automatic work of the moving center deprives the other centers of support and they involuntarily follow the moving center. Often, therefore, the sole possibility of making the other centers work in a new way is to begin with the moving center; that is with the body. A body which is lazy, automatic, and full of stupid habits stops any kind of work."
{snip}
If a man attains perfection of a moral and spiritual nature without hindrance on the part of the body, the body will not interfere with further achievements. But unfortunately this never occurs because the body interferes at the first step, interferes by its automatism, its attachment to habits, and chiefly by its wrong functioning. If the development of the moral and spiritual nature without interference on the part of the body is theoretically possible, it is possible only in the case of an ideal functioning of the body. And who is able to say that his body functions ideally?
"And besides there is deception in the very words 'moral' and 'spiritual' themselves. I have often enough explained before that in speaking of machines one cannot begin with their 'morality' or their 'spirituality,' but that one must begin with their mechanicalness and the laws governing this mechanicalness. The being of man number one, number two, and number three is the being of machines which are able to cease being machines but which have not ceased being machines."
The chief obstacle to forming a magnetic center and awakening positive emotions is that our lower emotional center is always running on H24, that is to say, it is scrambled with, or absorbed into, the regular instinctive functions. Hence the paralysis of one’s empathy and emotional life with preoccupations based on fear, anger, egocentricity, and other internal considering. From this perspective, as far as we should be concerned we are
ALL man number one. We
ALL struggle against the naive notion of "what you see is all there is", and that basic conceptual perception that pretends to come from thinking, but really doesn't engage the prefrontal cortex at all.
I think this is part of the reason G. dropped teaching the enneagram later on, once he was in France. As he gradually became further acquainted with western culture, and how asleep it was, he realized that tools for training the mental center would not help without first correcting the habits of the moving center. They in fact would distract and pervert The Work into mere philosophy or theory (as was the case with Ouspensky’s school).
[quote author=Psalesost]I seem to have a hard time, in general, asking myself questions about things. Unless one pops into my mind "on its own", all too often I have none. Generally, however, that does not mean there is certainty -
System 1, through its intuition (pattern matching formed in part through experience), provokes doubt in many kinds of situations. But doubt in itself is a feeling. It can occur in itself without being connected to any clear question - and then it gives rise to indecision.
{snip}
So, to solve this, I have had to practice deliberately asking questions. On this depends productivity, and actually doing something useful, instead of running off along one track for a time, then another, then another... Which has been the picture of the past years of my life.
The habits of System 1 dominance are hard to break. The area where I have long been able to break them concerns questioning my judgment regarding information - and in general my conclusions when explicit thought is involved. All the areas where System 2 is engaged.
The problem comes when System 2 is not engaged. And it is generally dis-engaged in decision-making. This is something I have been struggling with, and still have to struggle to change. While I more often make decisions according to rational thinking, System 1 still dominates all too often.
{snip}
System 2 needs to be trained - not only its engagement, which must be made a habit, but also in
how it is engaged. For it to question and disbelieve things is not enough - it must be able to construct something; an estimate. And if questioning is only directed towards the intended object of thought, there can be a problem. There can be preconceptions that limit its work, so that it won't produce anything useful. As one example, in trivial situations, it often happens that in reality, it doesn't matter what I choose. Yet the choice can become a huge concern, wanting to do the "one right thing", which may not actually exist - yet it is assumed that it "must" exist. System 1, operating from this belief, rejects the rational conclusion (that in these cases, I can just pick something) or blocks it from even being produced in the first place. In such cases, questioning the false belief is the first step - then, System 2 can go on from there to decision-making.[/quote]
So true. I wonder though, what is the distinction between training and using? I have always thought the problem with system 2 was, like you said, is that is it simply unused. That too often we rely on system 1 to let us sleepwalk. But then you say it must be engaged in a certain,
constructive way. I always thought that all incorrect system 2 functioning (which I tend to associate with converse, fallacious thinking) stems from some problem in system 1, the way a prism refracts light based on its own crystalline structure and deformations. Is this wrong? Do I misunderstand? I'll have to think more on this.
[quote author=Psalesost]Asking myself questions is the starting point - from there, I can actually begin to think "for real" instead of just processing intuitions and vague mental sensations.
I've experienced that asking myself questions seems to go very well with journaling. To sort out ambivalences and/or major indecisions in my life, I sometimes ask myself questions and work through the issues with pen and paper. In my experience, the answers come surprisingly quickly, end up being clear and "obvious", and soon the issue is sorted. In theory, that is - I usually have to remind myself time and time again and resist the impulses of System 1. In this way, I can e.g. form and stick to a plan with more discipline, and also put an end to low, depressive moods that inhibit work.
There is usually a question to be found, and this is the means of beginning to arrive at an answer. The mistake I made all these years, in nearly every area of my life, was to try to arrive at an answer without really asking questions. Often I drew a blank. Sometimes, intuition provided an answer - sometimes good, sometimes bad - but it cannot be relied upon, something which it took several years of distraction and failure in life to realize.[/quote]
This reminds me about what the Cassiopaeans have said about STO providing assistance to all those who ask in the
true sense of the world, and open up to the unknown.
[quote author=Psalesost]There is now one specific challenge ahead of me which seems to help with training System 2 and becoming better balanced. It may not suit everyone, but perhaps someone else may benefit from it: Mathematics and similar subjects. I mentioned mathematics "becoming hopeless" in my previous post. Since then, I think in part thanks to the paleo and ketogenic diets as well as tobacco, it has become easier. (Brain works better.) Still, understanding is very limited in certain areas, such that they are very hard for me to learn. But there is always at least some area of study open to me - something which, though challenging, is doable. In this way, I find I gradually build up what I have been lacking all along - real strength of intellect, and ability to comprehend. (Being enslaved by System 1 seems to make for rather poor comprehension.) And with growth of comprehension, new possibilities open up - in my further studies, in learning in general, and when it comes to making decisions in life.[/quote]
I too found mathematics to be quite enjoyable. I’m not brilliant at it, but it’s that very fact that makes taking it on and overcoming its challenges so rewarding. The one thing to watch out for would be trying to keep the challenge up, since drilling problems and formulas gradually causes problems that used to be mentally stimulating to become solved more mechanically (think of how you can instantly recall multiplication tables).
Re: poor comprehension, I found that several books that I have read that I would classify as negative dissociation all have in common a very base sort of wording that allows instant associations in the imagination, especially those tied to dramatic and emotional content. This allows me to cruise through whole paragraphs without really thinking about what I’m reading, since the author hands everything to you with denouement in case you fell asleep during one of the parts where subtlety and intrigue played a part.
I have found that not all authors are like that, and some books, while also being more educational in general, actually word things in ways that actually have to make you think and orient yourself more. I’m sure professional literary hacks would accuse those books of worse prose, but I think that sometimes says more about the critics than the authors. :P
I don't get it... How is it possible that I had all this info gathered and 'saved' for years without making a proper connection, relations to one another?!? Like looking at something but not really seeing it and therefor being unable to follow it through. As if I missed a proper 'wiring' to connect the pieces into a meaningful image. That 'separated knowledge' may have done more damage than good, in a way of throwing me back deeper into the old loops, cause of the misunderstood fears and emotions which were arising and instead of working with them I was drowning in it and blocking it (while believing I'm doing it right!!!) and then blaming the Work and EE and who-knows-what or whom for it. 
