2009.06.21 13:00 - Interconnectedness

The Guardian for this meeting was Maxine Walden. The comments are by Maxine Walden.

Another wonderful Sunday 1300 discussion with close to a dozen of the PaB group and a newcomer who fit in beautifully.  In fact, Sunfire asked a question which got us all focussed on the issue of interconnectedness and the concerns which interfere with its full recognition.  Some, but probably not enough recognition to Adams for the splendid presentation on two mosques which occurred just the hour before this meeting.  A lovely discussion which merits at least one read through by us all.

Maxine Walden: hi, Wol
Wol Euler: hello maxine
Maxine Walden: 'cunning planner'? (referring to her bubble title)
Wol Euler grins. A party-organizing group :)
Wol Euler: we are conspiring and conniving behind the backs of a wedding pair
Maxine Walden: ah, I see:)
Maxine Walden: oh, sounds rather intriguing and fun
Wol Euler: :)
Wol Euler: as so often in SL and RL, it requires that somebody do an awful lot of pushing.
Wol Euler: so far hat person has been (a) mostly missing, but (b) myself
Maxine Walden: oh, yes....
Maxine Walden: ah, more than just intriguing and fun then...also a bit of entropy to overcome perhaps
Wol Euler: mmhmm
Wol Euler: yes, inertia is vastly unerestimated as a cultural force :)
Maxine Walden: that was the word I was reaching for -- inertia
Maxine Walden: thanks
Maxine Walden: hi, Tarmel
Wol Euler: yw
Wol Euler: hello tarmel
Tarmel Udimo: Hi Maxine & Wol:)
Maxine Walden: and seeing the balloons of Scath, Eliza and Wester
Maxine Walden: hi, Eliza
Wol Euler: hello scath, wester, eliza
Maxine Walden: hi Scath, Wester
Eliza Madrigal: Hi everyone :)
Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Maxine, Wol, Tarmel, eliza
Tarmel Udimo: hi Scath, Eliza, Wester:0
Tarmel Udimo: :)
Wol Euler: aloha pila
Maxine Walden: hi Pila
Tarmel Udimo: Hey Pila
Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Pila
Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Wester
Maxine Walden: meditative today?
Pila Mulligan: om
Eliza Madrigal: soaking in the art history workshop a bit...visited two mosques today :)
Wol Euler nods
Maxine Walden: oh, wished I could have gone. Bet it was really interesting...
Scathach Rhiadra: yes, I missed it too:(
Wol Euler: I can give you the notecard, adn the bits of Adams' talk that he repeated in text chat
Tarmel Udimo: nods too early for me
Maxine Walden: oh, that would be great, wol
Wol Euler: sure, just a mo.
Pila Mulligan: me too please Wol :)
Scathach Rhiadra: ty Wol
Wol Euler: despite the date, that has today's landmarks :)
Wol Euler: textchat coming up ...
Maxine Walden: thanks, Wol
Tarmel Udimo: and me:)
Wol Euler: just a mo! anyone else?
Pila Mulligan: yes please
Pila Mulligan: you propbably have an entire audience awaiting one
Pila Mulligan: each
Wol Euler: :)
Pila Mulligan: :)
Scathach Rhiadra: thanks Wol:)
Pila Mulligan: thanks Wol :)
Wol Euler: yw
Maxine Walden: thanks again, wol
Wol Euler: hello sunfire
Pila Mulligan: hello Sunfire
Sunfire Langer: hi, everyone
Maxine Walden: hi, sunfire
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Sunfire
Maxine Walden: and here comes Adams
Wol Euler: I see you know Kira. have you been here before?
Pila Mulligan: greeting Mullah Dubrovna
Adams Dubrovna: Hi everyone :)
Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Adams
Wester Kiranov: hi adams
Wol Euler: hello adams
Maxine Walden: Sunfire, wondering if you have been to these meetings, where we talk about a lot of things, including the nature of reality. And we also post the chatlog. Would you mind having your comments included?
Sunfire Langer: this is my first visit, I have attended other discussion groups, wanted to try a new one. No, I don't mind being recorded at all
Pila Mulligan: :)
Wol Euler: ty
Adams Dubrovna: welcome Sunfire :)
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: take a seat, few of us bite :)
Pila Mulligan: Wol was just distributing material from the earlier tour
Eliza Madrigal: haha Wol
Eliza Madrigal: It is interesting to me that one can just stand in a setting and learn quite a lot...that the setting itself seems to ask questions
Eliza Madrigal: and then thoughtful teaching has context..comes alive
Wester Kiranov: which applies to both mosques and pavillions
Eliza Madrigal nods :)
Maxine Walden: yes indeed.
Sunfire Langer: almost like the space includes both the setting and all the people there is as one entity
Eliza Madrigal: yes, really nice thought
Pila Mulligan: interconnectedness :)
Wester Kiranov: good, good, good vibrations :-)
Wol Euler: :)
Sunfire Langer: I have a question
Wol Euler: fire away
Sunfire Langer: I've introduced interconnectedness as an idea in a few topics, and its usually met with resistance, why would people resist it?
Pila Mulligan: :)
Wol Euler: because it challenges their world view?
Maxine Walden: agree, and it softens the edges of difference which many of us like to maintain
Wol Euler: there's a lot of territorial defence that happens when disciplines abutt. Interconnectedness threatens that
Pila Mulligan: some actually fragile world views can seem very solid
Maxine Walden: thoughts about the protests in Iran come to mind
Pila Mulligan: but Sunfire, let's follow the topic further, would you like ot say more
Wol Euler: please do
Sunfire Langer: it seems to me that people cling to their anger or indignation, thinking it to be their individuality, or their story. But I've found that anger retained for a long time leads to blocking your own energy, and also blocking interconnectivity...
Wol Euler nods
Pila Mulligan: true
Maxine Walden: It Can feel so importat to maintain an 'enemy' or 'wrongness' as part of the other
Maxine Walden: and thus keep the 'rightness' as part of the self
Eliza Madrigal: Certainly. We are possesive of our 'independence' ... the idea that we can know things...
Wol Euler: hello eos
Eliza Madrigal: Hi eos :)
Wester Kiranov: hi eos
Pila Mulligan: hi Eos
Adams Dubrovna: hello Eos :)
Maxine Walden: hi eos
Tarmel Udimo: Hi Eos
Eos Amaterasu: hi all :-)
Eliza Madrigal: and Maxine, especially that word 'rightness' seems to apply
Scathach Rhiadra: Hello Eos
Wol Euler: there may be an element of self-protection too. If everything is interconnected, then I had better stop squandering resources and adding to mountains of garbage - and there goes my lifestyle.
Eos Amaterasu: Hi Scath
Maxine Walden: yes, 'right' vs 'wrong' can seem so important, especially when one feels vulnerable or uncertain about oneself
Tarmel Udimo: Read a very interesting article yesterday adbout Intergral Life Practice and interconnectivity
Maxine Walden: oh?
Wol Euler: mmm?
Tarmel Udimo: Four Authors including Terry Patten, its based a round a concept put forth by Ken Wilber
Wester Kiranov: I was wondering if this was wilber...
Tarmel Udimo: nods
Tarmel Udimo: talks aboutthree ways to interconnect with spirit (Being)
Tarmel Udimo: not quite the topic but close:)
Wester Kiranov: Only three?
Wol Euler whispers: http://www.integral-life-practice.com/
Sunfire Langer: its an oft neglected part of self, the spirit
Tarmel Udimo: hehehe
Pila Mulligan: the pervasive nature of interconnectedness may be more than some modern assumptions of reality can handle -- Jung postulated the collective unconscious as a start, but even that may be too much for the existing culutre -- but science is getting some hints, such as theories of quantum entanglement and mirror neurons
Sunfire Langer likes quantum entaglement
Pila Mulligan like mirror neurons, also
Wester Kiranov: mirror neurons are cool ;-)
Tarmel Udimo: ty Wol yes that is the book (only read the article about the book)
Pila Mulligan: Tarmel, the interconnectedness is probably there already, and the three practices may be just opening the shutters
Tarmel Udimo: well it talked about three kind of templates
Tarmel Udimo: the first is closer to what we do in PaB where there is no seperation with Being/Spirt - one is
Eos Amaterasu thinks a a pattern language for appreciating the presence of appearance
Tarmel Udimo: and one can appreciate the greatness
Maxine Walden: 15 min bell info. Gives info about this aspect of our study
Tarmel Udimo: nodsthe third is nature worship when we are in awe
Tarmel Udimo: and the second is what we seemed to have lost touch with was an intimate relationship with spirit
Maxine Walden: sorry, was writing an Im to sunfire...
Tarmel Udimo: if one no longer holds God/Being Spirit in an abstract way but interconnects and has an ongoing personal dialogue
Tarmel Udimo: they perhaps seems like all the same but found the discription interesting
Wester Kiranov: Do these three map onto I/you/it (trying to make wilberian sense of this)?
Tarmel Udimo: not sure.... I was interested in the second approach as this is the one I use least:)
Eos Amaterasu: How would you describe the practice of that second one?
Tarmel Udimo: its the path of devotion
Wol Euler: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Wilber#Quadrants (i/it/we)
Eliza Madrigal: ... thinking of Wol's earlier point in that context, that it is hard to hurt anyone/anything you truly experience as being 'self'..and maybe that experience only comes through that sense of 'intimacy'/trust in what seems more 'true' ?
Tarmel Udimo: nods
Eos Amaterasu: I trust you/your neurons / as my neurons
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Wol Euler: good point.
Sunfire Langer: there is no distance between one's thoughts and another's
Wol Euler: do mirror neurons activate when you are watching somebody you dislike or distrust? Probably not :)
Wester Kiranov: I think they do...
Eos Amaterasu: Oh, I would think they would - that's why you feel yucky!
Tarmel Udimo: I think they do too
Maxine Walden: Yes, but we project onto those we do not like the parts of ourselves we do not like, a kind of negative mirror, perhaps
Maxine Walden: and we would like to call them 'different' from me to gain distance from those unwanted aspects
Tarmel Udimo: I am curious why we only do this n ceratin people and not others
Tarmel Udimo: *on
Eliza Madrigal: we often amplify what we dislike in others because they trigger our own fears?
Sunfire Langer: us and them dynamics are always harmful
Tarmel Udimo: yes just carrying the thought further, we project our negativity or see the mirror of it in others, why certain people and not everyone?
Maxine Walden: and yet 'us and them' dynamics are ancient herd and tribe stuff which is really hard-wired and we seemm to reflexively return to it when we are stressed
Tarmel Udimo: nods
Wol Euler: mmhmm
Pila Mulligan: herd-wired :)
Eos Amaterasu: They might trigger neurons you're repressing, don't want to ackknowledge the mirror
Eliza Madrigal: hahaha
Sunfire Langer: perhaps we see a similarity in those people with ourselves and that is what bothers us about it, Tarmel
Adams Dubrovna: :)
Maxine Walden: so I find it useful to consider that I carry all that primitive tendency to the 'herd-wired!' and appreciate I have to work to overcome that at times
Eliza Madrigal nods.. let go as able and natural... as arises
Maxine Walden: yes, Eliza
Maxine Walden: have to go in a minute...lovely conversation today...so many topics see 'to arise' here...
Tarmel Udimo: and yet we all have the same negative states just in varying degrees
Wester Kiranov: bye maxine - I will leave pretty soon too
Maxine Walden: see you all soon, I hope.
Adams Dubrovna: bye Maxine :)
Eliza Madrigal: Thanks Maxine :)
Eliza Madrigal: Bye for now
Wol Euler: bye maxine, take care.
Scathach Rhiadra: Bye maxine, ty:)
Tarmel Udimo: nice to see you again Maxine :)
Pila Mulligan: bye Maxine
Adams Dubrovna: I need to head out too. bye everyone. Nice to mmeet you Sunrise :)
Adams Dubrovna: Sunfire
Pila Mulligan: bye Wester, pretty soon
Pila Mulligan: bye Adams
Eliza Madrigal: Bye Adams :)
Scathach Rhiadra: bye Adams
Tarmel Udimo: bye Adams
Wol Euler: bye adams
Sunfire Langer: It was a pleasure Aaron
Eos Amaterasu: bye Adams
Pila Mulligan: :)
Eliza Madrigal: Oh, and Wester...missed saying bye... thought I had a minute :)
Tarmel Udimo: me too, thanks for the links, Wol and good chats all
Wol Euler: bye tarmel
Scathach Rhiadra: bye Tareml
Pila Mulligan: bye Tarmel
Eliza Madrigal: Bye Tarmel
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Eliza Madrigal: Thank you everyone. Pleasure to meet you Sunrise.
Eliza Madrigal: Sunfire...
Eliza Madrigal: :) Bye for now Eos, Wol, Scath, Pila
Scathach Rhiadra: I must go too, good night all, Namasté
Wol Euler: bey eliza, bye scath
Eos Amaterasu: Ciao Eliza, Scath
Sunfire Langer: why did you both get it wrong in the same way, Eliza?
Pila Mulligan: moi aussi, bye ybe
Wol Euler: bye pila
Eliza Madrigal: Yes odd Sunfire...maybe I just read the text alone :)
Wol Euler: power of suggestion, maybe, sunfire?
Eliza Madrigal: yes perhaps :)
Pila Mulligan: see you next time Sunfire :)
Eliza Madrigal: Bye for now
Eos Amaterasu: bye Pila
Wol Euler: (I admit I paused adn read your name before typing)
Sunfire Langer: interesting...
Wol Euler: some mistakes are contagious
Sunfire Langer: as thoughts are
Wol Euler: but I too must leave, my bed is calling :)
Wol Euler: nice to meet you, sunfire. bye eos, take care
Eos Amaterasu: Bye Wol..
Eos Amaterasu: Dinner time here, ciao!