The Guardian for this meeting was Zen Arado. The comments are by Zen Arado. Present were Calvino Rabeni, Milakel Resident, Zaldaan Smirnah and myself

Smiling:

Zen Arado: Hi Zal :)
Zaldaan Sirnah: Hi
Zen Arado: how are you Zal?
Zaldaan Sirnah: I'm wondering what the difference is between treating people friendly, with a smile, or not
Zaldaan Sirnah: I wonder on what should I base a smile
Zen Arado: sometimes our moods follow our physical actions I think
Zen Arado: so smiling can meake us feel better
Zen Arado: and vice versa of course
Zaldaan Sirnah: it makes others feel better too, when you smile
Zaldaan Sirnah: but, what is the point of that? is my presence, purpose, and goal, to make others feel better?
Zen Arado: do we have a goal or purpose?
Zen Arado: that is an assumption?
Zen Arado: it's just nicer to feel happy
Zaldaan Sirnah: that goes back to my mood -- perhaps I too-readily smile when I am not feeling it within
Zaldaan Sirnah: so it's not true to myself and doesn't necessarily make me happy. This places the physiological effect on the side for now (the deliberate act of smiling will, in the brain, and/or feedback within the muscles/brain) still cause some happiness
Zen Arado: maybe you are looking at the outward act too much
Zaldaan Sirnah: but it also, if not really felt, comes across as ingenuine in some cases
Zen Arado: are you sure you don't feel happy?
Zen Arado: how does unhappy feel?
Zaldaan Sirnah: I believe I habitually have certain behaviors which are not truly presenting my feelings
Zaldaan Sirnah: nor my thoughts, and while that is all being expressed, I don't want to express an ingenuine smile
Zen Arado: yeh investigate the feelings
Zen Arado: I know what you mean about falseness
Zen Arado: someone smiles at you but you know they are seething inside
Zen Arado: it comes across as phoney
Zaldaan Sirnah: lol, yes, but for those in spiritual pursuit I don't mean such a vast difference :)
Zaldaan Sirnah: just you and I
Zaldaan Sirnah: no seething :)
Zen Arado: yeh...well even insincerity comes across... :)
Zaldaan Sirnah: what others do you still can see usually.. in general people pick up most of it, even if they delude themselves from their own sensitivity and awareness
Zaldaan Sirnah: yeah... I think I'd prefer to not smile if I don't feel like smiling.. it can still be more subtle..
Zaldaan Sirnah: I can nod, without it being an upset nod.. a mona lisa smile, or a feeling of respect
Zaldaan Sirnah: like if you're passing someone you know somewhere
Zaldaan Sirnah: I smile as a greeting, but I don't feel like it's what my system really wants
Zen Arado: well...if I don't feel like smiling I investigate that
Zen Arado: why don't I ?
Zen Arado: what upset me?
Zen Arado: amI clinging on to what somebody said?
Zaldaan Sirnah: is smiling our stable state of being to return to?
Zen Arado: I think so
Zen Arado: our natural happiness
Zen Arado: just we let something cloud it
Zen Arado: we let something obscure it
Zen Arado: we like to ruminate on judgements of situations
Zaldaan Sirnah: but.. to the point of an actual smile seems extreme
Zen Arado: but a smile is just the surface of how we feel
Zen Arado: it reflects our inner state
Zen Arado: and maybe you are right to just be natural
Zen Arado: not forcing it
milakel Resident: hi :)
milakel Resident: new zen :)
Zen Arado: but also look at why you feel a bit unhappy
Zen Arado: Hi Mila :)
Zen Arado: that's what we practice in Zen
Zaldaan Sirnah: but.. always smiling?
milakel Resident: nice suit, zen
Zen Arado: no feelings escape our investigation
Zen Arado: a lot of bad feelings are just habit patterns
Zaldaan Sirnah: I don't mean unhappiness.. the unhappiness can come from giving an ingenuine smile :)
milakel Resident: i know of a "sad" song that makes me feel at ease and smile :)
Zen Arado: but out thoughts tell us things that aren't true sometimes
Zen Arado: yes Mila :)
Zen Arado: sadness and happiness are complicated things
Zen Arado: if I have the thought that I feel down...I challenge it
Zen Arado: or ask why?
milakel Resident: tears of happiness :)
Zen Arado: of course there is natural grief like if someone close dies
Zen Arado: no use pretending to be happy about that
Zen Arado: just let the grief run its coiurse
milakel Resident: although some cultures do dance and sing when someone dies
Zen Arado: yes
Zen Arado: thinks of Irish wakes
Zen Arado: it's a lot about awareness
Zaldaan Sirnah: maybe we don't love properly, for it to be uncomfortable when someone dies
Zen Arado: well....why complicate it
Zen Arado: ?
Zen Arado: aren't we so ready to put ourselves down?
Zaldaan Sirnah: I approach so much wrong in life, I don't see why my loving is beyond the scope of my misunderstanding.
milakel Resident: people grief in various ways
Zen Arado: I like what you said about phoney smiles
Zen Arado: we don't allow ourselves to express our natural feelings so much that we have lost touch with our real feelings maybe
Zaldaan Sirnah: I think so
Zaldaan Sirnah: because I recognize the difference in what I want and experience at those times.
milakel Resident: yea
Zaldaan Sirnah: and also, another approach in considering this, is how we feel when we see someone else do it
Zaldaan Sirnah: let's say someone we know walks by us, both of us handling our tasks
Zaldaan Sirnah: and they smile a fake smile -- again, we do detect this
Zaldaan Sirnah: they mean nothing wrong with it either
Zaldaan Sirnah: it's just another expression. I'm the type who smiles at people as a greeting -- and if I'm not really happy, or even if I'm upset, I still might smile, and my face should show it as such
Zaldaan Sirnah: the issue is that our perceptions are not perfect.. and that internal discomfort I feel is ALSO the lack of coordination
milakel Resident: cause being unhappy is a bad image?
Zen Arado: he yes MIla ..that is a bad case of smiling...just worrying about what impression we give others
Zaldaan Sirnah: Mila, that's a good point
Zen Arado: I think if we really notice a person and get past our initial stereotype of them we can feel some empathy for them and want to make them happy
Zen Arado: (and get past being wrapped up in our own thoughts)
Zaldaan Sirnah: all that which we recognize, like "worrying what they think" or "being concerned for the impression we are giving," is not necessarily wrong -- but the issue brings up the more core issue, of us being who we truly are
milakel Resident: that person should also open himself to help
Zen Arado: yeh we can avoid showing our true feelings as a defence measure
Zaldaan Sirnah: I could say it's "being responsible for what you present", however, I honestly believe the pursuit is to harmonize our being
milakel Resident: most people will deny any problems and smile
Zen Arado: being guarded
Zen Arado: so...we should try to be more 'natural'?
Zen Arado: more 'our true selves?
Zaldaan Sirnah: which brings greater peace and balance to the system, in unity?
milakel Resident: zal, "worrying what they think" can be a real curse if gone too far
Zen Arado: agree Mila
Zaldaan Sirnah: a father not smiling at his son might assist in his son's self-correction
milakel Resident: zan, being natural is a good approach :)
milakel Resident: *zen
Zen Arado: yeh and noticing how much I still classify things as good and bad
Zen Arado: they just are what they are
Zen Arado: being natural is just being what you are
Zen Arado: though others will tell you if it is good or bad in their eyes
Zen Arado: I remember a woman on a muscular dystrophy forum
Zen Arado: she has the same type as me
Zen Arado: she can't smile because her face muscles are so weak
Zen Arado: I have a problem with that too but not as bad as her
milakel Resident: i think for being natural, it's important to also perceive it as being natural, without good or bad. otherwise it may not work.
Zaldaan Sirnah: which type, Zen?
Zen Arado: she reckons that has ruined her entire life
Zen Arado: she lost jobs as a receptionist because she coulsn;t smile at customers
milakel Resident: :/
Zen Arado: and boyfreiends
milakel Resident: that's sad
Zen Arado: they called her 'sourpuss'
Zen Arado: so smiling is an important social action
Zen Arado: if you are introduced to someone and they dont' smile back at you you think there is something wrong
milakel Resident: true
Zen Arado: I have FSH MD
Zaldaan Sirnah: the internal state of a system is not the same as the outside blatantly obvious interactions
Zen Arado: so in a way you can be gald that you actually CAN smile :)
milakel Resident: yes, indeed
Zaldaan Sirnah: I would hope that some of these situations are potentially useful as potent sources of spiritual growth
Zen Arado: yes
milakel Resident: something we don't even notice in our daily life, but we do smile a lot come to think of it
Zen Arado: but better to get out of the mind and analysing I think
Zaldaan Sirnah: can a family member, interested, develop a recognition of the delicate nature of the smile, so it must not be shown with muscles?
Zaldaan Sirnah: how would we do that? focus on our heart? pay attention to our passing thoughts? pay attention to our deeper visual perception (not the reactive one)
Zaldaan Sirnah: Mila, smiles, laughter, etc. are all very social. Being on the computer more, I smile less.
Zen Arado: first question...you can smile with your eyes
milakel Resident: yes, zen, true
Zaldaan Sirnah: does FSH affect the chewing muscles?
milakel Resident: remember the qatar airways commercial?
Zen Arado: and yes ...family members or friends would become accustomed to you and accept the inability to smile and compensate..but so many judge from first impressions
milakel Resident: there's a woman smiling and you can not see her mouth
Zaldaan Sirnah: Zen, oh it's very difficult -- and not everyone is interested in order for that capability to be developed. Tensions then build.
Zen Arado: and I think we if we feel unhappy we try to discover the source of it...where you feel the pain
milakel Resident: hmm
Zen Arado: yes MIla...and what beautiful eyes :)
Zen Arado: we can only change ourselves
Zen Arado: and a lot of that is through challenging our thoughts and assumptions
Zen Arado: sometimes I have a bad dream just before wakening
Zen Arado: and if I let that it could make me feel grumpy
Zen Arado: but I think...it isn't true..only a dream
milakel Resident: for the record: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtoHacarGBA
milakel Resident: :)
Zen Arado: and if I do feel feel down....well that;s the way I feel....accept it
Zen Arado: but it is always material to work with
Zen Arado: intewresting to work with our moods and feelings
Zen Arado: why do I feel like that?
milakel Resident: it also helps to acknowledge that someone has it much worse than you and keeps on living
Zen Arado: and I think that if we feel good we smile ...we can't even stp smiling
Zen Arado: yes ...the old Christian adage...count your blessings
milakel Resident: some people lose the ability to use a corporate jet and it's a disaster for them
Zen Arado: yes
Zen Arado: :)
Zen Arado: did you hear about the 'happiest man in the world' ?
milakel Resident: um, no
milakel Resident: who is he?
milakel Resident: *ponders if it's pema*
Zen Arado: Mathieu Ricard
milakel Resident: oh
Zen Arado: he is a Tibetan monk
Zen Arado: wrote a book called 'Happiness'
Zen Arado: he has little material wealth
Zen Arado: he was a PH D in biochemistry
Zen Arado: but gave it up to become a monk
Zen Arado: he is intersted in the brain and analysying brain states in meditation and suchlike
Zaldaan Sirnah: re
milakel Resident: it's good to see a man who found his happiness

Zen Arado: sorry I crashed
milakel Resident: hi :)
Zen Arado: silly anti virus program
Zen Arado: it aske me if I allow something from SL and freezes me up
Zen Arado: think I'l go back to the free one

Individualism and separation by language:

milakel Resident: i was just saying how eastern communal practices are communism-like :)
milakel Resident: no possessions, quiet life in hard work and meditation :)
Zen Arado: Eastern societies are more communitarian
Zen Arado: individualism has grown in Western societies
milakel Resident: zen, isn't in innnate in us?
Zen Arado: a lot came from the American rugged individualism that was need for pioneers
milakel Resident: i wonder if there are languages without "i" in it
Zen Arado: I think there are
Zen Arado: or languages whose structure doesn't separate a subect and an object
Zen Arado: like English does
Zen Arado: yeh we develop an ego for self protection
Zen Arado: but it then goes too far I think
milakel Resident: *pokes zal* :)
Zen Arado: :)
milakel Resident: he's in meditation, i think
Zen Arado: or fell asleep again :)
Zaldaan Sirnah: I did a search for "language without first person"
Zen Arado: you wouldn't get me up at his time :)
milakel Resident: :)
Zaldaan Sirnah: I think it's one of the more fundamental qualities of a language, originating very closely with grammar
Zen Arado: Chinese I think Zal?
Zaldaan Sirnah: no Chinese has I.
Zaldaan Sirnah: "wo"
Zen Arado: ah ok
Zen Arado: but I read somewhere that some languages don't have the subject/object distinction that English or Indo European languages have
Zen Arado: it make us think like that
Zen Arado: you there and me here
Zen Arado: a kind of separating effect
Zen Arado: anyway I'll have to go
Zen Arado: I have to try to join two logs together now :(
milakel Resident: :P
Zen Arado: I crashed during a play rehearsal too last night
Zen Arado: have to get rid of this anti virus
Zen Arado: brb
milakel Resident: what it's doing?
milakel Resident: there's probably an option to not restart or not to check a pc automatically
Zaldaan Sirnah: oh, so you mean, without even the 1st person pronoun?
Zaldaan Sirnah: ie. it could be included in the conjugations or declensions?
Zaldaan Sirnah: (declension is the "conjugation" of a noun)
Calvino Rabeni nods
Zaldaan Sirnah gives a non-smiling nod of recognition to Calvino.
Zen Arado: back
Zen Arado: Hi Cal :)
Calvino Rabeni smiles at the nonsmiling in a nonsmiling way
Zen Arado: yes Mila but it seems to freeze SL
Zen Arado: and the message gts hidden behind the browser on one of my two screens
Zen Arado: that's how I got caught out maybe
Zen Arado: not helpful when in the middle of a play
Zen Arado: and don't have time to read messages
Zen Arado: anyway I hav e to go
Zen Arado: bye all
Zen Arado: thanks for the discussion
Calvino Rabeni: Goodbye ...
Zen Arado: (smiles )
Calvino Rabeni: I take it the theme involved smiles in some way
Zaldaan Sirnah: True or natural smiles vs. habitual or self-imposed

Calvino arrives and outlines a psychological basis for the role of faces:

Calvino Rabeni: ah yes I think fully embodying one's face is a deeply cultural and long lasting state of affairs
Zaldaan Sirnah: fully embodying one's face?
Calvino Rabeni: yes being in it not behind it like a mask
Calvino Rabeni: filling it out in the social space
Calvino Rabeni: not being at the back of it somewhere
Calvino Rabeni: I read an interesting formulation about science and human nature studies
Calvino Rabeni: about the frontiers
Calvino Rabeni: the 90's were the decade of the brain
Calvino Rabeni: the '00s the decade of behavior (seen with its neural correlates)
Calvino Rabeni: and the next decade, social cognitive neuroscience
Calvino Rabeni: as the neurological correlates of social behavior are investigatede
Calvino Rabeni: showing for instance interesting things about the role of faces
Calvino Rabeni: and that they connect to parts of the brain that mediate functions that aren't conscious or cognitive at all
Calvino Rabeni: direct communication
Calvino Rabeni: An infant can't consciously control anything of its body; may not have much of a self-model
Calvino Rabeni: but emotionally responds to its parents faces and can imitate them and make the same expressions
Calvino Rabeni: not learned or studied
Calvino Rabeni: social intelligence from day 1
Calvino Rabeni: would that be the authentic smile?
Calvino Rabeni: later it gets modulated by more complex social requirements
Calvino Rabeni: delicate balances of necessity in communication
Calvino Rabeni: and the regulation of emotions in the social field
Zaldaan Sirnah: there are two sides -- the baby smiling because of its internal state of happiness, for example
Zaldaan Sirnah: and..
Zaldaan Sirnah: and the baby smiling because this system has learned that the baby is more successful when it smiles
Zaldaan Sirnah: survival
Zaldaan Sirnah: like the, "babies are cute so we don't kill them."
Calvino Rabeni: perhaps, though that's old-school darwinism
Zaldaan Sirnah: it definitely is.. but not wrong
Calvino Rabeni: pretty partial though
Zaldaan Sirnah: however, the absolute level of it, I don't know
Calvino Rabeni: not a comprehensive explanatory framework
Zaldaan Sirnah: and what other angle is there on the baby smiling?
Calvino Rabeni: The baby doesn't so much have an "internal state" ... perhaps that's a concept even for adults that pretends people are separate from their social field, which they never are
Calvino Rabeni: and the behavior is present before opportunities for learning have happened
Calvino Rabeni: there's a conceptual paradigm at work
Zaldaan Sirnah: the baby doesn't have an "internal state"?
Calvino Rabeni: which is coming under challenge
Calvino Rabeni: oh, here's a ref. for the first idea
Calvino Rabeni: http://www.apa.org/monitor/jan02/frontier.aspx
Zaldaan Sirnah: or, smiling is more on the interactive side of expression, vs. innately tied to state?
Calvino Rabeni: well those are intricately linked, in no sense does one dominate the other or come first in any process
Calvino Rabeni: so they are intrinsically a single process
Calvino Rabeni: "inside" and "outside" are conventions of thought, not descriptions of how things "work"
Zaldaan Sirnah: what do you mean by "social field"?
Calvino Rabeni: The present network of relationships every human is in, and their extent in all the different structures of memory, cognition, etc.

Structuring awareness:

Calvino Rabeni: Here's a ref to the second idea
Calvino Rabeni: http://www.lindaheuman.com/christine...karda-book.htm
Calvino Rabeni: (with credit to Santoshima for pointing it out)
Calvino Rabeni: It describes a paradigm of epistemology we often operate under as an assumption
Calvino Rabeni: that the world is a fragmentary mess that needs to be assembled through perception and cognition by each individual
Calvino Rabeni: but it takes a contrasting perspective
Calvino Rabeni: that things are "already whole" ... that's what we're coming from
Calvino Rabeni: and cognition has more role to take it apart than put it together
Calvino Rabeni: in other words, we already "know" by virtue of our nature and embeddedness with self and world and social field
Calvino Rabeni: not that we have to figure it out
Calvino Rabeni: the newborn is highly functional, socially, in fundamental ways
Calvino Rabeni: even before getting experience
Calvino Rabeni: or learning much of anything
Calvino Rabeni: representations come later
Calvino Rabeni: and add complexity of behavior
Calvino Rabeni: competence at responding to more complex layers of reality, perhaps, or counterfactual situations
Calvino Rabeni: A human brain is doing millions of things all at once
Calvino Rabeni: and mostly noncognitive, and highly social
Calvino Rabeni: and what emerges to consciousness often does so only because there is a breakdown in more highly functional modes of intelligence
Calvino Rabeni: like something goes wrong, there is a mismatch, some dissonance
Calvino Rabeni: then consciousness is presented with it as it emergies
Calvino Rabeni: emerges
Calvino Rabeni: perhaps many forms of meditation can be defined as the practice of being aware when it is not necessary to do so
Zaldaan Sirnah: isn't the development of awareness not a breakdown, but the development of capacity of conscious awareness and its presence in a single individual?
Calvino Rabeni: that is, being aware without the "emergency" requiring it
Zaldaan Sirnah: whereas knowledge exists without dimensions and is manifest at all levels, microscopic and macroscoic, and thus perhaps we can consider that "awareness" and intelligence also exist at all these levels as well -- but for a being at the scale and relation like ourselves (plants, animals, ...) -- for a being to then develop awareness
Zaldaan Sirnah: so, if I focus on something, to bring that information to my consciousness. If I study or meditate or contemplate -- am I then breaking down or causing some dissonance?
Zaldaan Sirnah: Perhaps I am bringing more harmony here -- harmonizing this level even moreso with some other level of reality.. or "mode" might be a good word, since I've had problems with my usage of "levels" sometimes.
Calvino Rabeni: surely there are structures that are manifest at all levels. However terms like knowledge are used inconsistently. One view is knowledge is an action mode of consciousness when it is correlated with those world-structures
Zaldaan Sirnah: what's an "action mode"?
Calvino Rabeni: Combination of awareness and structure. Like saying, by analogy, objects aren't visible unless there si a light source
Calvino Rabeni: or like saying, the knowledge isn't happening in a static way, it's only happening when someone is paying attention, that's knowledge, the rest is just form
Calvino Rabeni: Like books aren't knowledge, don't "contain" knowledge
Calvino Rabeni: There's no such thing as a "knowledge management system" if the notion is that the system "contains" knowledge ... it's nothing but data
Calvino Rabeni: earlier you said " If I study or meditate or contemplate -- am I then breaking down or causing some dissonance?"
Calvino Rabeni: I agree with you that - " If I study or meditate or contemplate -- am I then breaking down or causing some dissonance"
Calvino Rabeni: sorry strike that
Calvino Rabeni: your second statement
Calvino Rabeni: DIdn't get the copy correct
Calvino Rabeni: Agreeing with that - "Perhaps I am bringing more harmony here -- harmonizing this level even moreso with some other level of reality.. or "mode" might be a good word, since I've had problems with my usage of "levels" sometimes"
Calvino Rabeni: Well, there's analytic effects of study that break things down and look for dissonance, and synthetic effects too
Calvino Rabeni: but about the meditation and contemplation, I think they're usually intended to allow consciousness to operate in a more unifying way
Calvino Rabeni: less driven by emergency and breakdown
Zaldaan Sirnah: I think the idea is a very interesting source for some other contemplation and discovery though
Zaldaan Sirnah: (...comes to awareness when...)
Calvino Rabeni: (I would change the word "consciousness" to "awareness" in that last thing)
Calvino Rabeni: yeah
Zaldaan Sirnah: I'm afk off and on.. my wife needs me..
Calvino Rabeni: Good talking with you, Zal, thanks
Calvino Rabeni: Later