2009.01.10 13:00 - How Can We love If We Are Afraid of Losing It?

Aurora Kitaj was the GOC. 

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Aurora :)

Adams Dubrovna: I am fine

Adams Dubrovna: how about you?

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Scath :)

Aurora Kitaj: Great thanks... went to a panto with daughter this afternoon,

Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Adams

Aurora Kitaj: Hi Scath

Adams Dubrovna: What is a panto?

Aurora Kitaj: It's something we have at Christmas in the UK

Aurora Kitaj: hold on

Adams Dubrovna: Oh :)

Aurora Kitaj:

http://www.hackneyempire.co.uk/817/shows/mother-goose--hackney-empires-10th-anniversary-panto.html

Aurora Kitaj: there we go

Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Aurora

Aurora Kitaj: Oh half my chat isn't coming out

Scathach Rhiadra: I was at a panto here in SL a few weeks ago:)

Adams Dubrovna: :)

Aurora Kitaj: http://www.hackneyempire.co.uk/817/shows/mother-goose--hackney-empires-10th-anniversary-panto.html

Aurora Kitaj: Mother Goose was the best thing I've ever

seen at the theatre, really... the singing was out of this world

Adams Dubrovna marvels...always something new learn :)

Aurora Kitaj: it was brilliant, it is a traditional

story of the triumph of good over evil specially for children and families

Aurora Kitaj: this is very strange, chat is coming out in the wrong order lol]

Adams Dubrovna: that happens sometimes

Aurora Kitaj: what have you two been up to?

Adams Dubrovna: I have been having a bit of an intense time of learning about myself :)

Scathach Rhiadra: me, doing the housework, then I go to Tibetan language class here in SL

Aurora Kitaj: Really?

Aurora Kitaj: Tibetan, and self knowledge.. tell me more

Scathach Rhiadra: I would like to hear about Adams' self knowledge:)

Adams Dubrovna: It is kind of a long story

Adams Dubrovna: :)

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Jamie and fefonz :)

Jamie Palisades: Good afternoon :)

Aurora Kitaj: Hi Jamie, thanks for coming

Jamie Palisades: May I join you?

Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Fefonz

Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Jamie

Aurora Kitaj: Just so you know that Play as Being sessions are recorded on chat log and then posted on a wiki

Fefonz Quan: Hi everyone

Adams Dubrovna: I had a rough time of it this fall and lost touch with what I had learned in PaB this summer.

Aurora Kitaj: Hi FeFonz, thanks for coming along to

Pab...

Adams Dubrovna: I learned that I have two identities kind of on polar ends

Aurora Kitaj: Listens

Adams Dubrovna: While I was closely watching my thoughts

Adams Dubrovna: I began to see memories that were not

part of these identities

Fefonz Quan: Hi Aurora :)

Adams Dubrovna: I realized this morning when I woke up

that that is the neutral level

Adams Dubrovna: I was thrilled and excited

Aurora Kitaj: so if you prefer to remain anonymous, just let me know

Adams Dubrovna: Then all my selves and avatars began to act up

Adams Dubrovna: wondering what that meant for them

Adams Dubrovna: Over the course of the day I began to realize that I now have to find the neutral in the present

Jamie Palisades muses on this a bit. I know that some friends in SL find multiple avatars a useful focus for different aspects of a personality that ... we must stuff into one body in the phsyical world.

Aurora Kitaj: Hello Kimbo, nice of you to come along to the session.

Aurora Kitaj: You know about the fact that these sessions are recorded and posted up on our wiki

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Kimbo

Kimbo Scribe: Hello

Aurora Kitaj: so if you would prefer to remain anonymous, just let me know. ;-)

Jamie Palisades waves

Kimbo Scribe: good to be here

Aurora Kitaj: We are talking about different states of being. I wlll post you the chat before you arrived

Kimbo Scribe: ok... please let me just observe the discussion for awhile

Adams Dubrovna: I am afraid of I quieted everything down

Fefonz Quan: adams - what did you mean by quieting down?

Adams Dubrovna: I finsihed Fefonz

Aurora Kitaj: Kimbo, we are happy to hear what you have to say.. but you are welome to observe too ;-)

Jamie Palisades: mm - silence not necessarily a bad thing. Has its uses also. (grin)

Kimbo Scribe: Thanks... this is all new to me..so I am appreciative of the opportunity to learn in a quiet way of observing and reading

Scathach Rhiadra: quieting down can mean allowing

everyone time to think

Jamie Palisades: Aurora, I also might have missed some of the tone-setting beginning comments.

Aurora Kitaj: for me, these sessions are also about having fun, enjoying what we do in a light hearted way. Yesterday I was

Aurora Kitaj: ...hold on Jamie will send note card... you didn't miss much

Aurora Kitaj: yes was with a friend yesterday evening. We were talking about what it meant to become older. She observed that as she grew older

Aurora Kitaj: she found she was less concerned about what othe people thought

Aurora Kitaj: and more with having fun

Aurora Kitaj: and she found herself having more fun and enjoying life as a game

Aurora Kitaj: it is not much fun being an angst wridden teenager

Scathach Rhiadra nods

Scathach Rhiadra: I like the idea of enjoying life as a game, not being so involved

Jamie Palisades smiles - I adored it, actually, teenage years, but becoming more effective has been welcome too

Jamie Palisades: What would it mean, to approach life as "a game" and thus *not* as we do otherwise?

Jamie Palisades: To care less? (Jamie wrinkles his nose a bit)

Aurora Kitaj: probaby a lot more successful, if weapproach every job interview as a game we would probably get every job 

Aurora Kitaj: when the pressure is really on, it's hard to treat life as a game

Fefonz Quan nods

Kimbo Scribe: and what part of your identity do you lose when you are treating it as a game?

Aurora Kitaj: stress?

Fefonz Quan: and treating it as a game might result with being detouched, or feeling meaningless

Aurora Kitaj: but the risk of being driven by stress alone is bad for me. Don't know about other people?

Adams Dubrovna: I think there is a difference between being playful and treating life as a game

Fefonz Quan nods

Adams Dubrovna: Games have their own rules

Adams Dubrovna: not necessarily the best way to see through identities

Aurora Kitaj: well observed

efonz Quan: right, games have the tendency to create identities...

Adams Dubrovna: Hello Tarmel

Fefonz Quan: hi Tarmel

Aurora Kitaj: Hi Tarmel, nice to see you again. Will send note card

Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Tarmel

Tarmel Udimo: sorry time lag hi all

Scathach Rhiadra: maybe we need a middle way, not so self obsessed, but not meaningless either

Fefonz Quan: :)

Adams Dubrovna: our neutral

Fefonz Quan: that sounds familiar

Fefonz Quan: "no nihilism, no eternalism" say the buddhists

Scathach Rhiadra nods

Fefonz Quan: i think it's one of the most difficult tasks - to be playful, but care about something,

Fefonz Quan: to be involved - but let go when nessecary

Adams Dubrovna: yes

Scathach Rhiadra: yes, avoiding the extremes

Adams Dubrovna: or finding the extremes :)

Adams Dubrovna: then letting go

Scathach Rhiadra: yes

Fefonz Quan: and the miracle that happens so rarely, is that when it happens, we get more able to connect to actions, feeling and emotions

Fefonz Quan: it's a kind of paradox, to me...

Tarmel Udimo: my computer seems to be playing up

Adams Dubrovna: please say more Fefonz

Scathach Rhiadra: yes do:)

Fefonz Quan: since many times, the things that stop us from doing, feeling, rejoicing even

Tarmel Udimo: I am going to log out and log in again

Adams Dubrovna: OK Tarmel

Fefonz Quan: are our fears,

Fefonz Quan: our refusal to accept things that happen to us

Fefonz Quan: so we fight reality instead of joining it, fully, in pleasure but also in pain at times

Fefonz Quan: our misperceotion, 

Kimbo Scribe: sorry ... must leave to provide RL child

transportation... thanks

Adams Dubrovna: bye Kimbo

Kimbo Scribe: bye

Fefonz Quan: so i feel that this fear, and other thought of "what was ought to be" (Jamie)

Jamie Palisades: mmhmm?

Fefonz Quan: create a distance between us and the reality, the being

Adams Dubrovna: yes

Fefonz Quan: (just quoted you jamie)

Jamie Palisades nods, listens

Fefonz Quan: and this "playfuness", acceptance, equinimity maybe

Jamie Palisades: "driven by fears", or "stress" is an interesting concept ... I *think* that stress and fear are just instantions of things we think we ought to be doing, or avoiding ... so it's still being driven by your goals ... but perhaps internalized ones ... in a way that permits them to slip out of your conscious control.

Aurora Kitaj: Hello FO, I will drop you a note card

Fefonz Quan: if they succeed in tearing apart some of

those curtains of fear and expectation and hopes even

Fefonz Quan: bye kimbo

Jamie Palisades: cheers, nice to meet you

Scathach Rhiadra: bye Kimbo

Fefonz Quan: then they result in getting us closer to that reality of ours,

Fefonz Quan: those experiences, emotions and actions that we do

Fefonz Quan: but that is very hard to achieve,

Fefonz Quan: i think

Adams Dubrovna: Yes, it is very hard to break down the walls

Fefonz Quan: yet i can see how they act on us

Fefonz Quan: how can we really love, if we are afraid of losing it on every moment?

Fefonz Quan: how can we be content, if we feel that we lack so many things

Fefonz Quan: ?

Adams Dubrovna: yes

Scathach Rhiadra nods

Adams Dubrovna: our identites are concerned just with themselves and can not love

Adams Dubrovna: and hard to be content when they are clamoring for attention

Adams Dubrovna: Hi Pila

Fefonz Quan: yes, i think i know tht feeling ;-)

Pila Mulligan: greetings

Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Pila

Aurora Kitaj: Hello Pila, nice to see you again. I will

Pila Mulligan: I hope everyone is well and happy

Adams Dubrovna: Thanks Pila. Hope you are too :)

Pila Mulligan: yep :)

Jamie Palisades: Hm. Love is more difficult if one is afraid of losing it?

Adams Dubrovna thinks English should have more than one word for love

Jamie Palisades: :)

Aurora Kitaj: and German

Adams Dubrovna: :)

FO: In german we also only have one word "Liebe"

Adams Dubrovna: Ja

Fefonz Quan: i think so jamie

Aurora Kitaj: I've been told that there is a difference between falling in love and love itself, and that the falling in love is a lesser love

Aurora Kitaj: I probably have a lot of chat about it somewhere ;-*

Jamie Palisades: :) a lesser love. I like that phrase

Aurora Kitaj: I don't

Aurora Kitaj: like 'puppy love'

Jamie Palisades: does it mislead?

Adams Dubrovna: I was thinking more in terms of love for human beings in general

Aurora Kitaj: words can have their meanings manipulated to suit the occassion

Aurora Kitaj: whether something is to be a positive or a negative

Aurora Kitaj: is open to interpetation

Jamie Palisades smiles slowly. Can't disagree with that, but they are what we have, words.

Scathach Rhiadra: is there not a difference between unconditional love and loving to be loved in return?

Aurora Kitaj: yes

Fefonz Quan: a big difference, but the second one seems so natural

Jamie Palisades: certainty Scath - but you just clearly described both, so the words seem not to be getting in our way :)

Adams Dubrovna: yes, and even in love between partners there is a neutral level which is more permanent beyond the positive passions

and negative jealousies

Aurora Kitaj: i've been told that one love is blind and deaf, that is unconditional love

Aurora Kitaj: and that is a 'lesser love'

Scathach Rhiadra: but unconditional love is very hard to achieve, I think

Aurora Kitaj: and that love with you eye's open is true

love, or words to that affect

Fefonz Quan nods

Fefonz Quan: (to scatch)

Aurora Kitaj: I don't happen to agree

Adams Dubrovna: Unconditional love exists alongside the conditional parts I think

Adams Dubrovna: they are all there together

Aurora Kitaj: yes, but giving value judgements to the strength or rightiousness of one over another is unhelpful I feel

Adams Dubrovna: value judgements?

Fefonz Quan: I will have to leave this fascinating discussion, it's past midnight here:-\

Adams Dubrovna: night fefonz :)

Jamie Palisades: be well :)

Scathach Rhiadra: good night Fefonz, namasté

FO: good night

Fefonz Quan: noght all, hope to see your insights in the wiki site

Aurora Kitaj: Fefonz, thanks so much for coming along

Aurora Kitaj: night

Fefonz Quan: namaste :)

Pila Mulligan: bye Fefonz

Pila Mulligan: and then there is filia, eros and agape -- in the non-English world of love-word-descriptions

Aurora Kitaj: oh?

Pila Mulligan: love of one's sibilings/fellows, sexual

love and divine love

Aurora Kitaj: what would the divine love be for an atheist, how should I feel this?

Pila Mulligan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_words_for_love

Aurora Kitaj: should I look at the universe and use this love?

Pila Mulligan: maybe unconditional love is close to agape

Jamie Palisades smiles

Jamie Palisades: Well, it was a rhetorical question, Aurora, but yes.

Aurora Kitaj: ahhhh

Jamie Palisades: A related one might be "how can I do so while still feeling safe?"

Jamie Palisades: heh

Aurora Kitaj: Thanks for clarifying these different states Pila

Adams Dubrovna: Interesting question about agape and atheists

Adams Dubrovna: maybe it is the wonder we feel at the birth of a child

Aurora Kitaj: yes

Adams Dubrovna: or the wonder we feel when we look at the stars

Adams Dubrovna: or when Spring comes and the flowers open to the sun

Aurora Kitaj: We can reject everything else: religion, ideology, all received wisdom. But we cannot escape the necessity of love and compassion....This, then, is my true religion, my simple faith. In this sense, there is no need for temple or church, for mosque or synagogue, no need for complicated philosophy, doctrine or dogma. Our own heart, our own mind, is the temple. The doctrine is compassion. Love for others and respect for their rights and dignity, no matter who or what they are: ultimately these are all we need. So long as we practice these in our daily lives, then no matter if we are learned or unlearned, whether we believe in Buddha or God, or follow some other religion or none at all, as long as we have compassion for others and conduct ourselves with restraint out of a sense of responsibility, there is no doubt we will be happy. ~ Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama ~

Adams Dubrovna: wb Tarmel

Aurora Kitaj: I feel a quote coming on...

Aurora Kitaj: hello again Tarmel

Adams Dubrovna: I must go to RL. bye everyone. Thanks for the chat :)

Pila Mulligan: hi Tarmel

Pila Mulligan: bye Adams

Scathach Rhiadra: night adams

Aurora Kitaj: thanks for your contribution Adams

Pila Mulligan: I have a feeling that agape is cloesly related to what Hindus call ananda -- or bliss

Pila Mulligan: being very happy :)

Pila Mulligan: so to speak

Aurora Kitaj: what about the questions about what is making the lover happy,

Jamie Palisades: well, that's compassion, Aurora.

Pila Mulligan: in the Hindu phrase sat chit ananda, the answer would be reality

Pila Mulligan: reality makes them happy

Aurora Kitaj: I'm told that we must love out selves and not be reliant on he love of others

Pila Mulligan: we ourselves must love, to rephrase it

Jamie Palisades smiles- oh dear, I'm in trouble then.

Anonymous: hey what are u doing here

Anonymous: are u budist

Aurora Kitaj: sorry?

Anonymous: norry?

Aurora Kitaj: hello Anonymous

Anonymous: hello

Anonymous: :)

Pila Mulligan: love

Anonymous: i love you

Pila Mulligan: :)

Anonymous: ok. nice to meet you all

Pila Mulligan: :)

bazalt Solo: what is the discussion subject

Aurora Kitaj: I've sent Anonymous the wiki and note card

Anonymous: yes i am new

Anonymous: hmmm

Aurora Kitaj: have you received those Anonymous?

Jamie Palisades: gone, I think, Aurora

Scathach Rhiadra: I think he is gone Aurora:

Pila Mulligan: Tarmel seems to be having problems getting here

Aurora Kitaj: oh, i'm too slow off the mark...

Aurora Kitaj: hehehehe

Scathach Rhiadra: :)

Pila Mulligan: nice to visit with everyone -- I also mustvbe going now

Aurora Kitaj: well I think if eveyrone agrees, we should call it a day

Scathach Rhiadra: ok, night Pila

Pila Mulligan: bye bye

Aurora Kitaj: so thanks for coming everyone, I'll do my best to get the chat log up on the wiki asap...

FO: good night to all of you

Jamie Palisades smiles. nice to meet you all, Thank you for sharing the time and thoughts.

Scathach Rhiadra: night FO

Aurora Kitaj: this evenings discusssion has been really interesting

Scathach Rhiadra: night Aurora, Jaime, namaste

Aurora Kitaj: thanks for your contibutions everyone

Aurora Kitaj: Night scath,

Aurora Kitaj: Thanks for coming along FO, it's really nice to see you after all this time

FO: ...you are hitting your bed?

Aurora Kitaj: and the same for Jamie, who I think we've met just once before

Jamie Palisades smiles. be well.

Aurora Kitaj: great of you to come along and for you contribution.

Jamie Palisades smiles and waves

Aurora Kitaj: Jamie are you ok about having your name

mentioned?

Jamie Palisades: Hm?

Aurora Kitaj: on the chat log

Jamie Palisades: certainly

Aurora Kitaj: fab!