2018.06.22 - Day 100

I signed up for the poetry course. Don’t where I will get the time from to do it, but it just looks so interesting!

Niebauer says that the left-brain interpreter creates categories and oppositions. It oversimplifies, it – ‘splits the world into opposites and then limits attention to one end of the spectrum as if it was an isolated piece of reality. The law of opposition can only work if attention is limited to one end of a category at a time and because we are unaware of what we fail to notice, we never notice the other end of the category.’ But we can’t stop it doing it. ‘To think is to think in categories and there is no way around this. The left-brain interpreter is categorical, it creates division outwardly and inwardly, so let it do its job, let it do its thing.’
It seems to me that about all we can do is become aware of this categorization process and not allow the categories to become so fixed.

Niebauer Ph.D., Chris. The Neurotic's Guide to Avoiding Enlightenment: How the Left-brain Plays Unending Games of Self-improvement (Kindle Locations 349-352). Outskirts Press, Inc.. Kindle Edition.

I'd love to take a poetry course like that one some day. It sounds incredibly challenging, though!

Have been in bed much of the day... had to cancel appointments this morning and plans with the kids to see a movie tonight. Just very weak, hopefully a 24 hr thing. No work, no books, no audios... instead a little light Korean TV, Earl Grey, grocery delivery. Sleep.

I'm glad we're continuing. Refreshing angle on ways to hold stories lightly, Zen. edited 20:34, 22 Jun 2018

So sorry to hear you've suffering ((((Eliza)))). :(( Hope you're feeling better by the time you read this.

Korean TV? Like KBS? I wonder what attracted you to that. Can you speak Korean? I know some programming has sub-titles and the K-pop can occasionally be good. (And some people are cute, he says shallowly.) On the other hand I watch Japanese TV online occasionally, so who am I to talk? :)

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Zen, found you and followed you. Cargoes. :)

I've realized it's quite handy not thinking verbally, or rationally, or linearly, like a lot of people say they do. (Though it can be a disadvantage if you're an engineer as people expect you to think that way!)

But there are many advantages to thinking irrationally, non-verbally, in flashes. One is that when you do get a left-brain mental commentary going on, or when verbalized thoughts arise in meditation, it's so obviously "not-you" that it's easy to not identify with it.

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Finished the first week of the short writing course. Wrote a "Found poem" (based on a jury service summons and some recipes and food labels I found in my kitchen!), reviewed someone else's and had my poem reviewed. On to week 2, where the focus is apparently going to be the tools we can use to shape the material of the words and language that were the focus of week 1.

But I reckon I must have spent 12 hours on it this week. It's advertised at 3 hours a week. There's NO WAY I could have done it in three hours. Not that I'm thick or anything!

I know I overdo things, over-research, over-prepare, over-perform, over-contribute ... over-enjoy! But what other way is there to do things, if you can? I may as well take advantage of my good fortune of available time and reasonable health.

It's also the passion of the Absurdist. "Ainsi je demande à la création absurde ce que j'exigeais de la pensée, la révolte, la liberté et la diversité." ("Thus I draw from the Absurd three consequences: my revolt, my liberty, my passion.")

Inch time foot gem.

Ichi-go ichi-e.

I never knew before you could have relaxed Taoist leanings and still be so intense. :)

Thank you, Storm. Doing 75% better today, and setting out to be productive. The warm napping dog next to me isn't helping much...

The only time estimations that can possibly be right for these courses, is learning something straight forward, like, ugh, the recent course I took was on SEO. They were exactly right about the time, because I had 0 desire to chat with others! Oh, and I took a "writing for the web" course, which taught how to be less substantive, expect less of your audience, and use lower vocabulary. :(

I love that you 'over', Storm! I tend to 'too', as in go just a bit too far. I've not been able to get the protections and energy levels thing right ... yet? So, I go too far then crash, or fray at the edges. Probably the best balances I've found are when I'm most disciplined about daily spiritual practice - then everything seems to fall into better priority. Would be good if I had a place to check in daily to get back on track with that...hahaha.

I found Korean dramas and films when looking for Japanese TV, thinking I would grasp that language better if I got used to it in the air of daily life. So many were only half subtitled though, and Korean TV has a huge following! In the time I've been watching these shows they've flooded the market and filled Netflix, which sounds like it would be a good thing except that the level (age level especially) of the shows Netflix chooses tends to be pretty bad so far. :) Excepting a show called "Misaeng" that is worth anyone's time. Rule of thumb = watch at least 2 episodes before deciding.

Why do I like them generally? I like the sound of the language, which I have indeed learned a lot of, and some of the very different-from-my-own ways of thinking (strong sense of justice or "han" [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Han_(cultural)], strong emotionality). Mostly, they remind me of a certain style of film that seems no longer to be made in the UK or US... Jane Austen type plot lines I find charming. :)

Unfortunately I'm not as interested in them as I was for a few years though. I miss that!

Oh - So glad to learn the "found poem" term! I once, in an SL event actually, heard someone recite a recipe for chocolate cake in such a magnificent way that it was the only poem I remembered from the entire event!


PS - One more link on 'han', although I don't think either reference really gets at it. http://articles.latimes.com/2011/jan/05/world/la-fg-south-korea-han-20110105 edited 14:27, 23 Jun 2018