2011.10.21 06:00 - Regarding Reality: Strivings and Currents

This was the third session of Regarding Reality, a session based on the writings of Maxine Walden...

Eliza Madrigal: Good Morning Maxine:)
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Good morning, Maxine.
Samúð (oo0oo): Morning Maxine :)
Maxine Walden: hi, Eliza, Bruce, O, so nice to see you all!
Eliza Madrigal: I was wondering if we should send notices also to the main PaB group, and also, think to add a page to the Regarding Reality description, to post sessions on their own as we did for Magic of Time...
Maxine Walden: oh, good idea, Eliza
Eliza Madrigal: if okay with you Maxine, happy to make that page
Maxine Walden: oh, thank you so, Eliza, that would be great!
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): important that everyone gets the words that we're here.
Eliza Madrigal: wonderful, most welcome
Maxine Walden: Guess my head is elsewhere a bit!
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Pema :)
Maxine Walden: 'absent-minded'
Maxine Walden: hi Pema
Pema Pera: hi everybody!
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Good morning, Pema.
Samúð (oo0oo): Hi pema :)
Maxine Walden: Eliza is just bringing up the point to tell the PaB community of these discussions...have been only mentioning to the Time group
Pema Pera: ah, yes, good point
Pema Pera: regarding virtuality
Maxine Walden: :))
Eliza Madrigal: during the week had a few inquiries, making sure the logs were posted
Maxine Walden: nodding around...
Eliza Madrigal: :)

Maxine Walden: shall we sort of begin our discussion as others may join us?
Eliza Madrigal: sure :)
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): ok.
Samúð (oo0oo) nods

Maxine Walden: I find myself really interested in your thoughts here.
Maxine Walden: It seems to me that in our efforts to grow, to broaken our minds, even to gain repose ...
Maxine Walden: that we are rally swimming against a constant currnent of a force which would sweep us back toward the less complex, more sensory-defined aspect of reality...
Maxine Walden: and that just as a fish does not sense the water it swims in, that we may not sense this current much...
Maxine Walden: and even some of us, might even celebrate the more sensory defined 'realities' that we get swept back to (realize I might get in trouble with the phenomenologists here)
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): ;-)
Maxine Walden: But the main point here was to see what you all thought about the idea/concept of such a 'force' upon our psyches which in physics might be termed entropy
Pema Pera: (all phenomena are phenomena: swimming with or against, thoughts or sensory impression, anything we experience!)
Maxine Walden: that is going from the complex to the less complex...from order to disorder...
 

Pema Pera: I like your image of two currents, Maxine, two things that pull us . . . .
Pema Pera: what our environment pushes us to do, and what our body/unconscious naturally would like to do, perhaps?
Maxine Walden: {I am going to hold a thought unfinished, because it would distract right now...)
Eliza Madrigal: This morning walking, noticed a pull to keep a certain pace.. 'begin the day'... yet noticing, slowed down... then, space allows for hearing that birds weren't clumped in one tree but scattered about
Eliza Madrigal: my way of preparing for our session :)
Eliza Madrigal: Morning, Adams :)
Adams Dubrovna waves quietly
Maxine Walden: hmm, I would just like to listen for a bit, interested in what Pema and eliza are saying...associating to
Maxine Walden: hi, Adams

-bell

Maxine Walden: the perhaps irony that as we open to space we are going against one type of flow which would close that space...
Maxine Walden: Is that one way to hear these thoughts of Pema and Eliza?
Eliza Madrigal: there was definitely an inward rhythm that I had to see first
Eliza Madrigal: marching
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Maxine Walden: Adams, asking whether the sense of having to swim against a constant current that might pull our thoughtful endeavors toward the sensory, sweep our minds/thoughtful experience toward the sensory realm
Maxine Walden: If that makes sense in terms of each of our experience.

Bruce (bruce.mowbray): One factor in dealing with the "sensory realm," for me, is a sense of balance -- or perhaps IM-balance. . .
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): If the currents put me off-balance in some way. . .
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): then I sense that. . . and make appropriate (I hope) adjustments.

Maxine Walden: As in my ongoing experience it seems like an ever-present entropic force...which whenever I am distracted, fatigued, etc I can get swept away by at least to some extent

Samúð (oo0oo): I think the key is simply awareness
Pema Pera: yes
Maxine Walden: please say more...
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Who, Maxine?
Maxine Walden: any and all :)

Samúð (oo0oo): well the expressions of sages is all about simple sensory presences with things like making tea and sweeping and walking and such...
Maxine Walden: appreciating all your thoughts
Bruce (bruce.mowbray) listens.
Samúð (oo0oo): less abstraction maybe through contacting the details of phenomena
Samúð (oo0oo): directly
Pema Pera: and also listening to our bodies
Samúð (oo0oo): through awareness
Pema Pera: often our bodies are more honest than we are, when we swim against the stream of what is natural
Samúð (oo0oo): that feels correct :)
Adams Dubrovna: our aching bodies :)
Samúð (oo0oo): patiently waiting always to be heard

Maxine Walden: Yes, does this perspective then privilege the sensory as 'truer' or more valued than more complex thought-mediated experience? a truer reality, as it were?
Pema Pera: it includes the sensory, blending with feelings and thoughts, not more true than, I think
Eliza Madrigal: when caught up in marching, easy (for me) to forget body entirely ... part of what I'm almost 'surpised by' when slowing down, nods
Pema Pera: the problem is that we have learned to separate thoughts, rationality, which we now must learn to re-integrate, I think
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): again, to me, it feels like a "balance" between feelings, thoughts, - - maybe even insights and intuited "knowing"
Eliza Madrigal: 'the world' then feels to appear more and more
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): easy to get sensory overload (imbalance) as well as mental overload.
Eliza Madrigal: hmm

Samúð (oo0oo): I almost feel sometimes like there is a parallel thing happening between the evolution of the human brain in becoming more abstrct thinking oriented, with a part of us that has always been able to abide directly with things... almost think this nexus can account for religion in a sense
Pema Pera nodding to all that was said, yes . . . . whenever we try to exert control on the environment, in a not-fully-natural way, we tense up our body; by learning to listen to our body/mind together, we can use that as a gauge to get back more to wu-wei, not-forcing

Maxine Walden: Think I am sensing a recognition of a division perhaps a splitting of ourselves into 'thinking' and 'sensing' beings in these comments, and trying to heal that division by mutual recognition of each, perhaps leaning toward the sensory as integrative
Pema Pera: hi Tess!

-bell

Samúð (oo0oo): hi tess, I'll give you anotecard of what has transpired :)
Eliza Madrigal: Hi Tess :)
Adams Dubrovna: Our bodies certainly apprreciate looking at the sunrise or sunset or a flower
Tess Aristocrat: good morning from Texas ㋡
Eliza Madrigal: :))
Pema Pera: :-)
Maxine Walden: Yes, think I am trying to recognize the 'current' toward the sensory, which may well be a 'universal message' of a sort...'don't forget the basics...don't get lost in abstract thought...sort of a sheparding presence in this current we swim against...(just a newish thought here)
Pema Pera: don't split, yes, that's the main message I think
Pema Pera: "split happens"
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Walking through a natural environment has always been a "balance restorer" for me. . . no matter how emotionally or intellectually off-kilter I have let myself become.
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): sensory --
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): natural
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): physical
Pema Pera: yes, Bruce!

Maxine Walden: had an interesting experience last evening at a seminar...
Bruce (bruce.mowbray) listens.
Maxine Walden: a seminar on 'integrative thought' actually...
Maxine Walden: and as people strove to understand this provocative, brilliant man...
Maxine Walden: at least my experience was that each fell into a kind of 'cult' state of mind...
Maxine Walden: which seemed to be anything but 'integrative'
Pema Pera: !!!!
Maxine Walden: :))
Eliza Madrigal: mmm
Pema Pera: like pacifists fighting about how to produce peace
Maxine Walden: exactly, Pema, and each one fighting to be the more peaceful
Maxine Walden: rivalry re peacefulness
Eliza Madrigal: "I have more no self"
Maxine Walden: :))))
Pema Pera: hehehe
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): ;-)
Maxine Walden: 'I'm the more righteous pacifist'
Eliza Madrigal: easy to do

Pema Pera: so what's the remedy? stopping and dropping, something in that direction?
Maxine Walden: Witnessing this 'rivalry' made me deeply sad, actually...
Pema Pera: (yes, we can cry, and we can also laugh, or both)

Samúð (oo0oo): a sense of futility or?
Maxine Walden: For me, being able to witness this 'human' striving was an important thing...without feeling superior to the process
Tess Aristocrat: you know, you speak of walking and of gaining a rythym of thought in your walk..I do that too
Maxine Walden: because I could sense my own striving...my own wish to 'possess' the truth or 'get it' more then the next guy
Pema Pera: ah, maybe that's the take-off point to dropping our own sense of judging, Maxine?
Adams Dubrovna: wonderful to realize that
Maxine Walden: and how hampering that striving is to the wider experience of reality
Eliza Madrigal: mmm

Adams Dubrovna: we can do something about ourselves
Samúð (oo0oo): that's insight awareness
Pema Pera nods again all around :-)
Samúð (oo0oo): the is a sadness in abiding on that open ended place
Tess Aristocrat: I like this early energy..lots of thoughts
Maxine Walden: :)
Samúð (oo0oo): and the walks in the forest Bruce... something there... that healing

Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Does your awareness of your own striving bring about some "urge" to change the strife in your setting, Maxine?
Maxine Walden: maybe our being able to compassionately hold onto our human strivings...but not succomb to that current...
Maxine Walden: Bruce, I think my own self awareness (what I can attain that) does free me from the grip of the striving, from being defined by that 'need to possess, etc' and so allow a wider view of reality as many little realities all folded or entwined...
Maxine Walden: (multiple realities...parallel worlds?)
Eliza Madrigal: :)
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): multiple ways of "framing" experience . . . phenomena.
Maxine Walden: yes, think so, Bruce,
Samúð (oo0oo): together alone
Maxine Walden: :)
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): as a good poem or song can do.

-bell

Maxine Walden: our striving, in my experience, can become hard-edged, not allowing others in...as if 'only room for one'
Maxine Walden: and when I can see my striving, the seeing it may soften the edge...allowing more room for others, as it were
Maxine Walden: I think in our small infant selves we each have a sense of wishing to be 'the only one' (perhaps a memory from the womb)
Samúð (oo0oo): mmmm survival force
Maxine Walden: And at times, that striving, that current may feel very powerful, even take us over, sweep us away...
Eliza Madrigal: a tweet this morning from somewhere: "Happiness itself is generosity"
Tess Aristocrat: ㋡
Maxine Walden: :)
Adams Dubrovna: and our bodies hope our minds do not beat themselves up too much
Tess Aristocrat: haha
Maxine Walden: yes, adams, more ancient wisdom in the body about warfare?
Adams Dubrovna: thinking of a reminder to be gentle with ourselves too
Eliza Madrigal: :)

Samúð (oo0oo): ((((((self))))))
Eliza Madrigal: :)))
Tess Aristocrat: ㋡
Pema Pera: :-)

Maxine Walden: Interesting for me, I brought a wondering about the 'force' of concretization this morning, and find that as we talk, forces from various directions seem interesting to contemplate, currents from several directions
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): "pacificism" can be a physical realization - - and only later be "justified" through reason.
Tess Aristocrat: notice how we all start with many layers and slowly merge into one?
Maxine Walden: grounded in the body, Bruce?

Eliza Madrigal: Hi Lotus flower :)
Pema Pera: hi Serena
Eliza Madrigal: Welcome... will IM you with a note
Lotus Flower (pema.snowpaw): greetings
Tess Aristocrat: This is my friend Pema
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): oh yes. . . discovered in the body -- and then, perhaps, later gets "understood" in the mind.
Adams Dubrovna: A second Pema!!!
Maxine Walden: Pema, meet Pema
Pema Pera: nice to have so more Pemas!
Lotus Flower (pema.snowpaw): hehe :)
Lotus Flower (pema.snowpaw): just call me Lotus to avoid confusion
Lotus Flower (pema.snowpaw): nice to meet you
Maxine Walden: :)
Lotus Flower (pema.snowpaw): yes indeed
Tess Aristocrat: giggles..runs off for more tea
Adams Dubrovna: nice to meet you both, Lotus and Tess :)

Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Perhaps it was your physical senses that first noted the "strife" in that meeting last night, Maxine.
Maxine Walden: maybe so, Bruce, an interesting thought...maybe a kind of agitation
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): yes, and an imbalance.
Maxine Walden: it felt jarring...striving and then agitated, and then observing the striving...
Maxine Walden: and then the slight sadness, but also giving up the striving
Samúð (oo0oo): :)
Eliza Madrigal: surrender/generosity/trust
Maxine Walden: hmm
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): (the inward bodily sense of oneself . . . responding/reacting to the environment?)
Samúð (oo0oo): no shell, no cave.. naked
Tess Aristocrat: back
Samúð (oo0oo): wb Tess

Maxine Walden: and as I think about the experience it seemed to be located in my 'gut' or the center of bodily experience...maybe just a retrospective impression but interesting
Eliza Madrigal nods
Eliza Madrigal: Thank you Maxine... all very interesting, and deeply helpful
Samúð (oo0oo): ::breathes into my abdomen::
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): ?me ponders "trusting" those physical sensations - - and whether trusting is what we mean by "real" --
Maxine Walden: oh, very helpful to me as well, Eliza and all; these conversations often 'travel' and inform unexpectedly
Eliza Madrigal: intriguing question Bruce
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): "Reality" = what we trust????
Maxine Walden: yes, interesting pondering Bruce.
Maxine Walden: hmm
Tess Aristocrat: Maxine, was it debating type feeling?
Maxine Walden: what we trust at the moment, Bruce?
Maxine Walden: yes, Tess, the striving was a kind of debate of ideas,..if that is what you meant
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Well, I notice that different folks have different notions of what "reality" is. . . and I am wondering if that's a "trust issue." (Just rhetorically. . . )

Maxine Walden: Thinking of next week...I will be travelling on Friday...maybe best to skip next
week and come together the week after?
Adams Dubrovna: Sounds good maxine
Eliza Madrigal: Seems OK Maxine :) Thanks for letting us know
Maxine Walden: ah...maybe, Bruce we can take that up some more next time
Samúð (oo0oo): :)
Pema Pera: fine Maxine!
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): Fine with moi . . . and thank you Maxine and everyone for your input today.
Maxine Walden: yes, thanks to everyone for these discussions
Pema Pera: thank you for setting this up, Maxine!
Maxine Walden: see you in two weeks. Thanks so much!!
Samúð (oo0oo): :)))
Pema Pera: bye Maxine!
Maxine Walden: Bye for now
Adams Dubrovna: thank youThank you all. bye'
Bruce (bruce.mowbray): :))))
Samúð (oo0oo): Bye maxine... thank you
Eliza Madrigal waves warmly
Tess Aristocrat: bye ㋡
Maxine Walden is Offline
Adams Dubrovna: see you in two weeks :)