One of the great things about a blog is that you can talk about an idea in different ways through posts until you find a better way to phrase what you’re trying to say. I’ve talked a lot about internal training and culture lately because I’m trying to express an idea but unfortunately I haven’t apparently found a good way of saying it yet. Well now I think I have. Here it is:
You can’t practice a system based on unity and expansion of consciousness with a mindset based on duality and reductionism.
This is the biggest problem I see and the one I’m arguing that people need to get over the most. But penetrating the mist of people’s mind and even trying to get them to see that there are other ways of thinking is very difficult. For some people it’s simply impossible. As some people suggest, perhaps it’s time to just talk to the choir but as a former pew-warmer myself, I can’t help but trying to convert a few more. (BTW that’s called getting the most out of your metaphors. 
)
Go zen on this one for a while if you can. Try to grasp this intuitively.
Is that clearer?
(BTW who is the artist that did this work above? It used to be my favorite print and I want to buy it again. Thanks.)
11 responses so far ↓
1 Flagon // Apr 4, 2008 at 10:54 am
I don’t know if this is on topic but last night on tv here (Sydney/Aust) I watched a science show where they looked at research (randomised control trial) that showed acupuncture significantly increased ivf success. A professor commenting on the research said that “we don’t know how it works”. I guess what he was really saying was I don’t have the theories or models to explain whats happening.
Chinese medicine however is able to explain whats happening and its theories and models were used to design the treatment. So we have two sets of theories and models which can’t (yet?) be related to each other, ie different ways of thinking.
2 taijiquestion // Apr 4, 2008 at 12:04 pm
Hi Dave, I think your better way of saying it says it pretty good. By the way, in the past I posted about the artist you mention: Alex Grey. At the risk of self-promotion, can I mention my post here… at the bottom of it there’s an Alex Grey hyperlink. Or folks can use Google.
http://taijiquestion.wordpress.com/2007/02/05/energy-enclosed/
3 Yuri Snisarenko // Apr 4, 2008 at 12:43 pm
“You can’t practice a system based on unity and expansion of consciousness with a mindset based on duality and reductionism.
This is the biggest problem I see and the one I’m arguing that people need to get over the most. But penetrating the mist of people’s mind and even trying to get them to see that there are other ways of thinking is very difficult. For some people it’s simply impossible. As some people suggest, perhaps it’s time to just talk to the choir but as a former pew-warmer myself, I can’t help but trying to convert a few more. ”
Ha-ha, simply great! Dave, you are my hero for this day
:)
4 YMAA.com // Apr 4, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Alex Grey’s COSM in NYC is a must-visit: http://www.alexgrey.com/
Yes, Dave nicely put. Working toward unity is laid out clearly in traditional Qigong and really in all Chinese martial arts, as students are taught the 5 regulatings:
Regulate the body, breath, mind, Qi, and Spirit (shen), in that order. When you reach the stage of regulating, you have fine-tuned the other aspects and you have developed the skill of attaining unity. You become unity. Each stage is essential for complete and efficient progress.
Or you can sit in Zen and wait for it to happen naturally.
5 Joseph T. Oliva Arriola // Apr 4, 2008 at 10:20 pm
And then you die…
6 Rick Matz // Apr 5, 2008 at 10:56 am
In other words, you have to let your practice shape you, including your mind.
7 ella // Apr 15, 2008 at 1:58 am
its dead mad to kill horses!! all u fat losers!!
if i see anyone who goes against this…. YOURE DEAD!
8 wayne hansen // Apr 15, 2008 at 12:36 pm
flagon.
the same night the accupuncture artical was on
aca had an artical on how the csiro was using bitter gourd to cure type 2 diabetes.
9 Flagon // Apr 15, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Thanks Wayne I’ll have a look on their website.
10 meow // Apr 15, 2008 at 5:29 pm
why does no one discuss fighting?
11 meow // Apr 15, 2008 at 5:29 pm
i kno the mind is important, but actual strategy, or different ways of beating an opponent?
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