psychology

Across Time, Across Identities

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Most of us who pursue mystical endeavors read documents that are hundreds or thousands of years old. People pursue writings on meditations and mysticism, looking for strong threads and useful practices. Worshipers of various gods read through translations and historical documents, embracing divinity by trying to understand the past. Human history is the history of the mystical, the spiritual, as that’s part of what we do.

Plus some of us want to make sure we’re not just following something a hack wrote on a page for a quick buck a few decades ago.

As I’ve noted before that in my own Taoist-infused work, I’ve tried to cultivate a mental “ecosystem” of Taoist thought for my practice. I read some of the Tao Te Ching each night and study a hexagram of the I Ching each night. This helps me better understand Taoist practices and have a mindset that is more expansive, having a system of symbols to relate to reality.

However in my practices I also find moments wondering as to the mindset of whatever author of long ago I’m reading. It might be a bit of obscure symbolism, a disturbing bias, or an intimate detail I just don’t get. One moment you’re reading a thousand-year-old document and truly getting the author’s deep point, then you’re wondering what you’re reading.

(And, yes, there’s a specific set of indicdents in my own studies that spawned these speculations).

I think it’s easy for us to forget that those we read and study are people who lived in different times and places. We may relate to them due to shared experience, their exellent writing, and/or a good translator but there will be a gap. At some point, there will be an alienness between us and those of the past we want to learn from.

That’s fine. That’s to be expect.

Remembering these gaps exist helps me get better at learning in my mystical studies. Why is this symbol so important to this one person Where did these strangely-phrased biases come from? What was the political situation at this time? Why did some food get classified this way (a personal one for me, a cooking enthusiast)? This way I can bridge that gap.

In fact, as I noted, my attempts at a “Taoist Mental Ecosystem” are part of that. If I want to understand some of these amazing writings, I have to get into the mindset. Best of all I get to update that mindset for the present, which may mean I can one day help others or write something that helps people appreciate the things I do. Come to think of that, some of that is posts like this.

I also think remembering these gaps helps us appreciate when these gaps are bridged by the effort of authors, translators, and record-keepers. Some works are timeless because someone(s) tried to make a piece of work be accessible to others. Even the smallest spiritual book or meditation guide that has stood the test of time is a monument to the effort that made sure it has.

So let your past authors and translators and so on be a bit alien. It’s OK. They did their part, so let’s do our part to connect to them.

–Xenofact

The Spoons of Taoist Energy Work

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The Spoons of Taoist Energy Work

No, this isn’t about a highly obscure magic item (yet). It’s a bit more exposition on how my takes on “energy” work in mysticism has some benefits even if it’s not scientifically true. Energy as a metaphor is quite useful in my meditative practices, if only because it gives me better ways to understand myself.

In my meditations, I practice a kitbash version of “Internal Alchemy” from Taoist practices. Essentially I clear blockages of energies, generate energies, and circulate them. There’s 3 basic “treasures” (vitality, chi (sort of general energy), spirit), meridians, etc. But the key thing for this column is you conscience of your body’s forces as having certain functions and being able to be refined, expended, and conserved.

Taoist works often talk about conserving these treasures (usually all three, as they affect each other). One does not wish to waste one’s vitality in pointless sexual and physical indulgences as one cannot generate chi. One does not waste chi with poor habits and racing emotions as that is the powerhouse of the body and source of spirit. One preserves the spirit so it does not drain away, limiting your mental abilities and your ability to achieve higher states.

This may sound complicated, but it really comes down to “stop randomly expending your energies with worries, disconnected indulgences, etc.” One “guards” these treasures and refines them into mental and physical health and even enlightenment.

I found this simple idea of “guarding one’s energies” to be very useful for understanding how I waste the resources of mind and body. Pointlessly pushing oneself at work, obsessing over things you can’t change, etc. just burns you out. Having a more complex and poetic framework just makes it easier, no matter how “real” it is.

In fact, I realized how these ideas go to the idea of “Spoons,” the metaphor used for how much attention/mental energy one has in popular culture. Though a recent invention, it compares to multi-aeons old practices rather well. Another reminder of how metaphors for complex human behaviors are so useful, even if they are not technically or scientifically real.

Now admittedly Taoist practice isn’t just spoons – it’s sort of more forging spoons, using spoons wisely, and making better spoons. But in many ways, the preservation of one’s powers (especially spirit, which is closer to “spoons”) is part of both metaphors.

Ancient practices and modern metaphor. A reminder that a little poetry goes a long way towards our spiritual health.

Plus I get to make jokes about the title of my essay.

-Xenofact

The Monsters They Brought With Them

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There’s something wrong with so many famous people, rich people, and famous rich people. They’re ranting about conspiracy theories and weird reproductive obsessions. There’s talk of aliens and hallucinatory trips, drug usage, and secret history from people supposedly directing our future.. Something is off with these folks.

It’s not just things they say or believe for a profit or fame – I mean they do say these things for profit and fame. But it seems they really believe some of this crap, at least before they find something else to freak out about. There is some real fear there under the usual isolated-rich-famous-weirdo delusions.

It seems weird to be so afraid of everything. I mean you got money and fame and everything, why be so terrified? Why be so terrified of things that are clearly bullshit?

Well beyond daddy issues and the usual problems that make people fall into conspiracy thinking, I think one issue is these people are so isolated.

You’re rich, you can do anything you want. But also you depend on other people, people who say what you want to here so they stay on the gravy train. You are flattered and complimented. You are isolated and detached from reality.

You’re famous. People love you, talk about you, follow you (often for almost no good reason). Of course that means once again you exist in an isolated world. You are of course flattered and complimented, probably even moreso if you were just rich.

If you’re rich, famous, or both you exist in a kind of bubble, separate from reality. You’re in a kind of virtual reality crossed with an isolation tank. There’s no reality, there’s just what you brought with you.

And many people bring monsters with them.

Fears and delusions rampage through their minds, echoing off of the walls of their strange isolation. No one is going to correct them or even help them. That might make them angry and cut off the money train.

Told what they want to hear, they operate in unreality. Reality will shift to what they want to hear, delivered by hangers-on, investors, and an adoring public. But that also means their own terrors and insecurities can find root in their fallow minds. People who want to get ahead may also play off of their concerns.

Most of all, I suspect many of them know this isn’t real. You know people are lying, are flattering you. The news cycle constantly reminds you of your mistakes and fallabilities. You’re out there, famous, rich, exposed to the eye of reality and the eye of yourself. Every day, maybe every minute on social media, someone is reminding you you’re not right, you’re not perfect, you’re just a bank account and a PR department wrapped in flesh.

The rich, the famous in our world are so disconnected I wonder how much of their strange paranoia is just their own bouncing off the walls of their own unreal prison.

Unfortunately they make decisions about our lives.

–Xenofact