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At best you can have a convincing illusion of control. But life is always entirely beyond your control. Ideally you learn to flow with it, including how it flows through you.

These are more accessible modern works that point you to more classical works if you’re interested:

Tantra Illuminated by Christopher Wallis

Roots of Yoga by Jim Mallinson

Three Pillars of Zen by Philip Kapleau

The World of Tibetan Buddhism by the Dalai Lama

People like to recommend the Heart Sutra and Pali Suttas, and Bhagavad Gita but I’d say it’s better to get some intro first so you can at least become aware of any prior assumptions you have about the world and realize those works come from a wildly different experience of being.

Bonus: Dark Emu by Bruce Pascoe The Hermetic Tradition in African Philosophy by Theophilus Okere Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram

Welcome! Hope you enjoy.

If you steer close to questions about metaphysics and spirituality, I highly recommend stepping outside the western paradigm. A lot of our philosophy is saturated with Christianity-influenced background assumptions, way, way more than people realize. Reaching all the way to modern psychology. It was very fascinating to recognize (and discard) them in my own thinking - and I was a basic intellectual atheist with what I incredibly naively thought was 0 Christian influence in the way I viewed the world.

Ah, I see. Unfortunately online one has come to expect people saying things like this seriously, especially when people discuss anti-authoritan ideas.

I read some Plato and philosophical works but my focus has been more on Indian and Buddhist philosophy.

Unless you are an avid reader, I don’t think it’s a good idea to try to read everything as listed. Figure out what your genuine questions about life are and read the works that attempt to provide answers. That’s why having HTRB on the background is highly useful. Don’t read just to say you did, seek to gain understanding, which is easier when you can make the books relevant to your life.

There’s something deeply ironic about saying people should be forced to read Orwell…

How to Read a Book https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Read_a_Book

Because people severely lack media literacy. People say read Orwell… and alt-right was saying it for years too.

There’s someone in this thread saying kids should be forced to read Orwell. Which I think illustrates the issue perfectly…

When I practiced Zen Buddhism formally, yes.

Though I still do open sitting for a few minutes to conclude whatever meditation I was doing. My nonduality teacher recommended it and I found it useful.

Edit: for those interested, The Way app from Henry Shukman is a decent intro to this. Though finding actual Zen Buddhist community is better.

I believed that I had to be certain way in society or I was fundamentally flawed and bad.

I dropped that belief, acknowledge that to some point it’s convenient for me to follow societal norms but trying to fit in makes me mostly miserable. I naturally don’t want to do things that bother other people but I also don’t really want to be around them so why should I try to be likeable to them any more than is normal to me. This way people who like me, are sure to like me as I am. If I like them enough, I’ll naturally also want to be considerate of them, even if I have to occasionally behave a little different.

I somehow made it very complicated with just beating myself up for being bad/stupid/ugly/broken because I kept believing people who I don’t even like.

You wait and digest. Don’t rush into the next thing just because you think you’re supposed to.

There’s just way more content today but probably the percentage of good vs. bad hasn’t changed much. Finding the good in the sea of bad might be harder though. Actively maintain and curate your feeds.

And keep around indie web and federation etc. Internet used to be a niche domain of the nerds. It is happening again where some find it’s just the time to depart from the mainstream web. Just don’t get too attached to visible engagement.

I literally cannot continue this conversation before we understand each other on the nature of wanting. Or like, I can… but we’d just keep going over the same things, reducing us both to just practicing intellectual wankery. And I have a feeling you have more self-respect than that, if you think that my argumentation is “unbecoming of an intellectual”.

And in any case we’ve been at this for 4 (very delighful) hours but this body really wants a different activity for now.

Pity, I had so much fun with this discussion. For that I thank you. Lemme know if you want to return to it later.

I’m not going to get into a discussion about justice with you before you explain what is an acceptable want and how it differs from a want in a controlled population.

“As to your second question, I’m afraid I’ll need for you to give me an example of something independent of biological, societal or cultural factors before I can answer that with any candor.”

The fact that you ask this from me specifically highlights the problem in your arguments. It is your view that necessitates the existence of something independent of biological, societal or cultural factors. I don’t think such a thing exists. I don’t think it’s possible to have a want independent of imposition. However when you say that “the notion of want is not applicable to a controlled population” as an argument against me positing that the guy in the comic is doing what he wants, implies that in your mind there is a “pure” want, independent of any imposition. You then refer to the rat as an example of consent, implying that a biological drive to survive is an example of a pure want. If you wish to make the case that a biological want is an example of a pure want, then I can say that the guy in the comic is following his biological drive to survive over any personal opinions on wearing pants - meaning a want is applicable to a controlled population.

How do you defend applying human idea of consent to a rat, but very conveniently for your own argument, refuse to apply oppressor to the hawk?

Simply restating a human-centric definition of consent doesn’t address the lack of consistency in your position.

The rat is neither consenting nor not consenting. It’s following a biological drive to survive. “Consent” remains a human construction. The rat isn’t arguing that it “should” not be consumed. And if we want the cycle of life to continue, some things must be consumed. Furthermore, if you want to say that the rat is displaying consent in nature, then you must also accept that it is being “oppressed” by the hawk. Meaning the rat is a “controlled population”, meaning as per you own words “The notion of want is not applicable to a controlled population.” And if you want to say that he hawk isn’t oppressing in the same way as a human oppresses another, then how is the notion of consent allowed for the rat? Consent requires agency.

Can you point out where in nature does consent exist independent of human minds? And can humans want anything independent of biological, societal or cultural factors?

Consent is also just a belief some people want to have. I’m not saying that it’s a bad belief to have, I’m in full support of it but that does NOT give me some divine right to impose the belief of it on others. We’re talking about wants, and that necessarily leads to a discussion on whose wants matter more. I am of the opinion that nobody’s wants are inherently (as in, outside human constructed narratives, cultures, norms) more valuable than those of others. I happen to value human well-being and respecting consent logically follows from that. However, because of exactly that I cannot impose consent on those who don’t believe in it. As such, I can only defend myself and others who agree with me against those who would try to impose their beliefs on me but I cannot go out and force them to obey me. This necessarily leads to the situation where I HAVE to accept certain results that may be undesirable in a realistic scenario. Including death in the hands of those that would oppress me. And that’s on me to do for myself - but that is also freedom for me to live according to my ideals without imposing them on others, Meaning, I accept that I can’t have the cake if I want to eat it. IT IS NOT EASY but it is what I have realistic power over.

I really don’t see how you draw that conclusion, except unless you consistently forget the wanting part where it suits you. A person really wants a pancake, they will support the system that gives them the pancake, even if the pancake is made from the flesh of newly born babies. They might be very unhappy about the babies but they want the pancake more than they don’t want the dead babies.

We can of course point out the boiling frogs thing. Oppressive systems gradually increase discomfort, but they stay within the realm of human capability of adaptation. The pancakes didn’t start off as babies, they started off as normal pancakes, then animals, then perhaps some human matter, then old people, then sick people, then just people, then babies. However here too you still operate within what people want. And most people don’t want to be shaken out of the trance where they’re constantly just comfortable enough to tolerate the (often abstract) negatives that enable their life. If they did, they would.