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42 Responses

sidewalkbends, on May 27, 2009 at 11:13 pm said:

Odd question I know, but did you just recently injure your right knee and half way up your thigh on the front side?

Take it easy. I enjoy your commentaries.

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- Benjamin Steele, on May 28, 2009 at 5:22 am said:
  
  Nope. I haven’t had any injuries of late. The only thing a bit out of order is my spine, but no more than usual. I sure hope I don’t hurt my knee because a knee is a nice thing to keep in working order.
  
  Ya know, I’ve been meaning to do something with this ‘About’ page. Thanks for reminding me.
  
  Reply
  - sidewalkbends, on May 28, 2009 at 7:59 pm said:
    
    Good to hear it. Sometimes I feel these twinges. Sometimes they’re people’s pain and other times just a way to get me to talk to people. Guess I’ll see where it goes.
    
    Reply
    - Benjamin Steele, on May 29, 2009 at 8:52 pm said:
      
      Nothing wrong with following and speaking one’s hunches. It does no harm, and it can even be helpful sometimes. It’s all good.
      
      Reply
monarc7, on October 12, 2009 at 10:23 am said:

I just have to talk. Big-up to you, keeping the society of the inquisitive fire burning so long. You been into this a long time and I admire that.
I am just 20 and considering your dedication, I may safely say you ahead man. I just wish I continued my childhood passion till now without that hiatus but well that’s how it is, no use wailing over spilt milk.
I wonder though if you are not a loner. It just is mostly what happens to guys in the society

Reply
- Benjamin Steele, on October 12, 2009 at 11:12 am said:
  
  Hello
  
  What hiatus did you have? Have you been having too much fun? Socializing too much? Or just keeping busy with school and/or work?
  
  If you promise not to tell anyone, I’ll share my secret.
  
  Be born to a father who is very intellectual and to a mother who passed on her trait of obsessive thinking. Try to inherit an introverted and depressive personality from one or both sides of the family.
  
  Become severely depressed and begin thinking too much around highschool. Foster a sense of being different and detached from other people. Then, hit rockbottom sometime after highschool and drop out of college. Spend the next decade or so compulsively looking for the meaning of life. Live in constant despair and doubt. Feel your life slipping away and endlessly dwell on your fear of failure.
  
  Spend all of your time and money in your studies in a pathetically desparate hope for some kind of answer, any kind of answer. Rant at God and then realize God isn’t there or doesn’t care. Give up a thousand times, but realize your idealism always somehow manages to keep you from entirely sinking into nihilism.
  
  Hit rockbottom again in your late 20s. Fall in love and have your heart tragically broken. Meditate deeply for a time and get completely lost in yourself. Come to a deep sense of truth that leaves you more bewildered than you were before.
  
  Last but not least, have as little social life as possible. But maintain at least one friendship with another person who shares both depression and intellectual curiosity.
  
  It’s pretty simple.
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 12, 2009 at 2:47 pm said:

Yea, I have a blog; monarc7. Maybe u were lucky to have parents to give you this.

My story: Love of knowledge led me from conception to teach myself how to survive a traumatic birth day, 12th July 1989.

Thinking back to childhood is a Gideonite trial for me cos the wall of late childhood is a ballerblocker. Though some holes are punctured from the inside by the sheer ardor of what lies beyond it coupled with my present desire for them, those happy moments. So a few peeks is mostly what I get. Its mostly an experiment to find myself at my happiest and find who I am. If it works, fair.

What is that wall? Papa left the family and the psych was too much. I always was an ugly duckling but this renderred me bestial, maybe morlock-like. Searched for consolation, something to hold and what I got was hip hop; dunked myself and acquired gills to live in that new environment. I loved the thought-provoking types and with my desire for more it was perfect bonding.

I always found a home in God’s kingdom so I prayed a lot. My pops pushed me to learn but I thought different. Books ain’t Athena’s only tool, every medium was and still my mind. I argued a lot, they said I was a know-it-all and disrespectful so trying to fit in was the cause of my hiatus, I tried so hard to be like them but I uncannily stayed out and I believed when it was said that I am bad.

In Ghana, we say Senior secondary school not high school. There, depression, as everyone just loved to hate cos of my complex, contrary nature. Only two understanding boys were my saviors. They kept me company all the time and being dreamers alike we got on well. We called ourselves the barbarians and thinkin back, I see it was apt as we never fit in not that we were destructive.

This is starting to look like an almanac so let me just say I found myself in my most depressed state around say 17 and here I am. Tryin to be what others wanted was my problem. Meanwhile I harboured my dreams and wanted to be a rich man so I could save the world. With enlightenment though, I found that saving the world would mean bringing it to its ideal state and finding that is daunting so that dream was just a fantasy because finding the ideal is top priority and playing this game we got going here is worthless and hypocritical.

Reply
- Benjamin Steele, on October 12, 2009 at 10:14 pm said:
  
  So, what is traumatic about the birth day 12th July 1989? That does make you still fairly young.
  
  I was completely lost at that age. It was one of the darkest times of my life and I barely got out alive. I had no idea where life would lead me. I was studying and searching for answers, but I was far from hopeful of finding an answer. I had no idea that more than a decade later I’d still be looking. If I knew then what I know now, I don’t know if I’d follow the same path.
  
  I say good luck with your life. Some people claim it’s the only one we get. Do what you can. Do what you feel you must do. Life is tough. You muddle your way through. Then one day you die. You can’t know where any of it will lead and you’ll never see any of it coming.
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 13, 2009 at 6:28 am said:

I get that a lot. I say I’m 20 and people are amazed. They say I’m older than my age, I think its as a result of -like you- a recreation of contemplation. Everything stimulates thought. I can’t remember when my mind was ever idle. Einstein too made sure of that; ‘I am merely inquisitive’.

Well medical personnel told my mom we wouldn’t make it. The doc too was shocked to find me still alive after caesarean. Why? I don’t know and the doc is dead now so…

I say if it weren’t for this pursuit of wisdom, my discovery of vanity woulda been my insanity with suicide the finality. I dream of something more. Jesus is an object of my admiration but I just can’t get to holding the present God. I doubt men have what is the correct account and that men haven’t distorted it. Still I keep on this sojourn to that Solomon’s temple from where I hear wisdom calling.

I know its a long road but honestly I never liked anything less than challenging to my mind. It is going to be hard but my desire is all that matters

Reply
- Benjamin Steele, on October 13, 2009 at 7:04 am said:
  
  I’d be interested to hear about your views on Christianity or on Jesus.
  
  I’m more an agnostic than anything, but still very spiritual. I write about Christianity quite a bit. I must admit I’m highly critical of mainstream Christianity which probably is because I was raised in alternative Christianity. I do sense some kind of truth in Christianity, but I’m more drawn to a Gnostic vision.
  
  Have you studied Gnosticism and early Christianity much?
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 13, 2009 at 9:38 am said:

I’m pretty blank on that. I’m behind in the movement so I scour everywhere almost concurrently to upgrade myself. I will come around to it.

Actually, based on what I’m seeing now, Christianity has had too much syncretism. I find Christianity to be all or nothing. People mix n match and try to use the Christian principles to justify their own very
disparate cultures.

Courtesy of documentaries, I know a lot of fusion has occurred through time. I have to get down on this and find some more info.

Reply
- Benjamin Steele, on October 13, 2009 at 10:04 pm said:
  
  We might disagree about Christianity.
  
  From my studies, a few things have become clear to me. Christianity was extremely syncretistic right from the start mainly because the Hellenistic culture and the Roman Empire were syncretistic. The reason for this syncretism is because early Christians were a diverse group.
  
  The Roman Empire was filled with people from the entire known world and from a diversity of religions. There were even Buddhists and and Hindu in Rome. There may even have been a Buddhist monastery near where Jesus preached. Modern Christianity resembles early Christianity in one single fact and that is cultural diversity.
  
  Gnostics were the first commentators on the New Testament scriptures and they were among the most influential members of the early Catholic church, and eventually started churches of their own that competed with Catholicism. The most widespread Christian tradition was Manichaeism which was extremely syncretistic. Augustine, for example, spent about 10 yrs as a Manichaean before converting to Christianity and much of his theology is flavored with Manichaean thought.. Many Christians also came from various Greco-Roman religions and introduced Hellenistic ideas into Christianity. In particular Stoicism was influential and Romans couldn’t even tell the Stoics and Christians apart.
  
  Some were originally Jews or still considered themselves Jews. The Alexandrian Jews were trained in Hellenistic thought and were the biggest influence on early Christians. Many of the Church Fathers were classically educated. Early Christians were converted from many other religions.
  
  Emperor Constantine used his power to limit the inherent diversity of the first few centuries of Christian tradition. However, he also further syncretised Roman state religion into Christianity thus forming Roman Catholicism. Even after converting to Christianity, Constantine kept sun worship as the state religion and continued worshipping the sun himself.
  
  He apparently didn’t see much difference between the two. He may not have been entirely wrong considering that the Roman Empire and Christianity began practically at the same time and developed together. Also, it was common practice for early Christians to pray facing East, the direction of the rising sun.
  
  To me, there is no all or nothing Christianity. Original Christianity was destroyed long ago (mostly by other Christians). We can only guess how the first Christains practiced. What is absolutely clear is that Christianity of today has little resemblance to Christianity of the first century.
  
  Just my opinion based on my studies.
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 14, 2009 at 10:09 am said:

Actually, we don’t disagree. The syncretism has been and become even more profound with time. I learned about some modification that was done when the missionaries came to Africa.

I, though born catholic -wouldn’t say still am- was always skeptical of the denomination and the religion in general. Mainly, this is due to many cartoons I watched in my youth concerning the medieval days, the enlightenment with esp the inquisition.

I saw the Christians doing a lot contrary to the teachings of their leader and attempting to justify them with the teachings again but bent in their favor.

All or nothing has to do with following the original without addition or subtraction. Like Buddhism, Taoism, a lot of this has occurred and the teachers in the end are lost as their words suffer so much warp. Different opinions plus arrogance, ‘I know it all’ make for this.

I read your post showing ideas and their sources, the interconnections and I must say some I haven’t even heard of. But the christian development is a pretty curious one. Knowing that syncretism has been and still is, I did not imagine the initial scale at all, it was large.

Anyway, these religions are similar in their syncretic development. It is across the board which is evident in the multiple branches in each.

Reply
- Benjamin Steele, on October 14, 2009 at 12:39 pm said:
  
  I think understand your position.
  
  I’m very interested in early Christianity and the scholarship about what was original to Christianity. The problem with the all or nothing attitude is that it might leave you wiith nothing, but maybe nothing is better than accepting a watered down version. There is no way to be absolutely clear about what was original (the hypothetical ‘all’).
  
  But if you read my post about interconnections of ideas, then you know my general viewpoint. I see a tradition of Gnostic/Christian ideas running through Western history. I do sense there is something true to Christianity, but I feel reservations about it in that beyond basic religious platitudes I don’t precisely know what that truth is. I study it enough that Christian ideals and ideas are apart of my sense of identity.
  
  In case you’re interested, I just wrote a new blog post about Christianity:
  
  http://benjamindavidsteele.wordpress.com/2009/10/14/re-top-ten-problems-with-the-jesus-myth-theory/
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 14, 2009 at 2:09 pm said:

The all or nothing is such that you eliminate the intermediaries ie. the preachers and their likely syncretism. You take the potent product and you find the truth yourself. It’s ok though to be under their wing for sometime but it means you have to be a skeptic so you don’t take it as certainty. Truth be told, that ‘all’ is utterly hypothetical or fantastic cos finding it is almost impossible.

This position resonates with Eastern philosophy’s ‘find your own truth’. My problem with Christians is they claim to be following Christ but they rather follow middlemen. But wait, that will be an unfair indictment so I will group them based on ignorance of likely impurity and potential for truth-seeking; the permutations bring out the group characteristics.

The most irritating group is the knowing and no potential because they are most likely the bigots.

What do you think?

Reply
Benjamin Steele, on October 14, 2009 at 10:02 pm said:

Ah, yes, those darn intermediaries. Christianity would be a much more interesting religion if most Christians studied the Bible and Biblical scholarship for themselves.

What do I think?

I trust my own sense of truth. If you can’t trust your own sense of truth, then how else can you determine whether any particular belief or scripture is true? You can’t, but that never stopped anyone.

In terms of Christianity, I’m drawn to Gnosticism. I’m attracted to Valentinian Gnosticism and Marcion’s New Testament (the first New Testament in fact) interests me greatly. I like the Gnostics because they were truth-seekers. I can’t say I agree with all of their beliefs, but as a truth-seeker myself I support their vision of religion as based on truth rather than submission to dogmatic human authority.

So, in general, I’m of a mystic persuasion. I’ve had spiritual experiences that felt real to me. I don’t know what to make of these experiences, but they’re at least a starting point.

Besides studying Gnostic scriptures and the scholarship about them, there are four things that influenced my sense of Christianity. I was raised in New Thought Christianity (Unity church). I read A Course In Miracles in highschool. I’ve read quite a bit of Jung’s writings on Gnosticism. Last but not least, Philip K. Dick gave me the best understanding of Gnosticism I’ve ever come across.

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monarc7, on October 15, 2009 at 6:30 am said:

To me, your upbringing was pretty beneficial. Those authors you often refer to eg. Ligotti, PKD were serious about the search for truth too.

Eastern philosophy has always been my interest maybe cos I found Siddartha at an early age. Finding his material is just the problem now. I am currently into the Tao te Ching while studying various other works mostly non-spiritual like Homer, Sappho. I’m doing some western too eg. Russell, Thoreau.

Concurrent acquisition of knowledge has its drawbacks like the slow pace on each but on the whole, I think I’m ok with the progress. Maybe I’m obsessed but its cool.

Walden is cool and everything but I struggle with the sociocultural aspects esp when they are used as metaphors. The work too is extremely poetic so care is warranted.

Right now I have to get Buddha’s work but I learned that too has watered down versions so I’m pretty careful.

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- Benjamin Steele, on October 15, 2009 at 7:17 am said:
  
  I assume you’re referring to Hesse’s Siddhartha, correct? I came across Siddhartha in highschool and it was the first Hesse book I read. I loved it. I read some other Hesse, but that one sticks with me the most. Around that same time, I also read Thoreau’s Walden. The combination of those two books can have quite the impact on a young mind.
  
  I hadn’t read Walden in a long time. I don’t remember having any trouble with any sociocultural aspects. I should read it again sometime. Quite possibly my most favorite quote comes from Walden:
  
  “I learned this, at least, by my experiment: that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. He will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin to establish themselves around and within him; or the old laws be expanded, and interpreted in his favor in a more liberal sense, and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings. In proportion as he simplifies his life, the laws of the universe will appear less complex, and solitude will not be solitude, nor poverty poverty, nor weakness weakness. If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”
  
  Now, there is idealism for you. I’ve had the last half of that quote memorized for more than a decade.
  
  I’ve read at least some of the Tao te Ching, but it’s been a while. Both Jung and PKD were into Taoism. I just finished PKD’s The Man in the High Castle which has a fair amount of Asian philosophy in it. It was rather interesting as he was connecting Eastern ideas with Gnostic/Christian ideas.
  
  Concurrent acquisition? I highly recommend it. It may not be quick, but the results are highly satisfying. I like reading fiction and non-fiction concurrently. This method works particularly well for writers such as PKD, Ligotti, and Burroughs who have written both fiction and non-fiction.
  
  And obsession? You are a man after my own tastes. Obsession makes the world go round… or at least makes my world go round.
  
  Buddhism… I have some interest in it. I’ve never studied Buddhism to any great degree. Just read some books here and there. Mostly my interest in Buddhism was because I had a friend interested in it and also I used to have a regular meditation practice.
  
  I always think of Buddhism in terms of two things. It reminds me of Siddhartha. I’m more like him in wanting to find my own path. The second thing it reminds me of is Ken Wilber’s integral theory. My friend who was really into Buddhism was also really into Ken Wilber’s writings.
  
  As for watered down religion, one of my favorite tools for panning for gold is comparative mythology and it’s kissing cousin depth psychology. Writers like Jung and Joseph Campbell help me to grasp the more fundamental aspects of religion. Astrotheology and mythicism are also a fun avenues of study.
  
  It’s all good.
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 19, 2009 at 9:35 pm said:

Sorry for the wait, I went on a little expedition to find a few things out.

Got to know of that Siddhartha book from your blog and I got it but it’s in waiting for now. I got acquainted with sort of a summary of his story -which I hear is not pure- in my youth. I got more when I refound myself and I have been building since and this one too, I think, will be quite helpful.

I went on wikipedia for an overview of the integral theory and it is interesting. Walden; thing is some practices are foreign and I have to pause and think to connect dots. He uses certain metaphors which are supposed to convey a certain meaning but it gets lost on someone foreign to it; climate-related, culture, things peculiar to say temperate climes. But it’s good, it widens the mind by furnishing extra knowledge outside of the primary aim.

Anyway, I just got Huckleberry Finn. It’s not in your list but you read it?

Reply
- Benjamin Steele, on October 19, 2009 at 10:17 pm said:
  
  No worries about the wait. I just figured the conversation was over, but I guess I was wrong.
  
  What kind of summary of Sidddhartha did you acquaint yourself with when younger? Was it a written summary or did someone describe the story to you?
  
  There actually have been two movies based on the book. There was one made in India, but because of India’s conservative mindset they lessened the rebellious side of Siddhartha’s character. The other version is Zachariah. It was made in the US and is a loose adapatation. It’s made into a Western gunslinger movie. I enjoyed it more than the other adaptation.
  
  By the way, if you’re interested in the ideas in Hesse’s work, then you should study Carl Jung’s work. During a difficult period of his life, Hesse became involved with psychoanalysis and developed a personal relationship with Jung. This led to his writing certain books such as Demian.
  
  I guess I understand the difficulty you had with Walden. It’s interesting how you don’t realize how much implicit knowledge you’re raised with. Everything in Walden was already a part of my cultural upbringing as Walden is one of the most influential texts on American culture. Even some of the phrasings from Walden have become common parlance in the US.
  
  It’s likely I read Huckleberry Finn sometime when younger, but I’m not certain. It’s a story that is also a part of my cultural upbringing and so I’m very familiar with it. Mark Twain was a midwesterner as I am. He was a very interesting thinker. I’d recommend you check out his unfinished work The Mysterious Stranger. It was made into a film which I haven’t seen, but there is a scene from the story that is in a very weird claymation adaptation titled The Adventures of Mark Twain.
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 21, 2009 at 2:59 pm said:

From folks, history books, toons but never a story with appreciable integrity; gaps all over the place and critical statements belittling the info. You right man if one opens the eyes there really is a lot of understated stuff around. Reading about Mark Twain, I find he will have liked Thoreau’s company. They were both free spirits. A day or two ago, I found myself bashing society for how it limits human potential. Crucial was that I found very good examples countersigning my point. All the great men I know of were either recluses or major rebels. Of course it will if society is founded on the past and these guys are mainly innovators. Also society is inherently discriminatory and it should not have as much power as it does. I realise my thoughts have had an anarchist tinge to it since my youth and I am getting to believing in astrology but it has its shortfalls and being a grand skeptic I just can’t say I am pro-astro. Also I see that those a belief in or just fascination with transcendence is important if we want to quell that depression rogue.

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- Benjamin Steele, on October 21, 2009 at 8:17 pm said:
  
  It’s easy to feel critical about society. I get in critical moods all of the time. Life is tough, and the most worthy people often aren’t rewarded. It seems to be just the way the world is and it doesn’t seem that it’s going to change anytime soon. Oh well…
  
  I have some interest in astrology. I’m skeptical of it, but I suspect there is some truth to it. I wrote about the scientific research in my old blog.
  
  http://benjamindavidsteele.gaia.com/blog/2008/8/astrological_evidence
  
  Whether or not it’s objectively true, it definitely is a complex symbolic system with a depth of meaning. As many humans helped create it over a long period of time, it expresses something true in the human mind
  
  A couple of years ago, I came across Gerry Goddard’s writings. He combines astrology with other theories and it’s very interesting. If you go to his site, you can find articles and a book he finished before he died.
  
  http://www.islandastrology.net/
  
  Reply
monarc7, on October 22, 2009 at 4:47 pm said:

Right now I am hunting Jung work like a T-rex, no relent man. Luck though isn’t on my side cos all I get is overviews. That’s one of my traits, meticulous, I want the original not some paraphrasal. I concede that the overviews are good works but I am never satisfied till I have an impression of the original.

I’ve been drawn to his work more cos he was into the transcendent differing from Freud as I have learned. Getting it, as I said, is like it belongs in a Homeric tale.

Dan Brown released recently, any interest?

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- Benjamin Steele, on October 22, 2009 at 9:07 pm said:
  
  Why you having no luck finding Jung’s work? Are you looking in used bookstores? I’m somewhat surprised because Jung’s books are always being reprinted. My friend’s grandfather was a professor who studied Jung and he has the whole collection of Jung’s writings. That would be nice.
  
  I admire your desire to find Jung’s original work to study for yourself. But I wouldn’t dismiss the books that paraphrase and analyze Jung’s ideas. Jung was a very complex thinker and he references so widely. Having some background on Jung’s life and studies is immensely helpful.
  
  Jung sure did wrote a lot. You could spend your whole life just studying Jung’s writing. Did you hear about the new release of Jung’s journal? It was written during the time Jung was having some major mental issues and which led to a shift in his thinking. I’ll have to get a copy of it one of these days. There is a New York Times article about it which I mentioned in a recent post.
  
  http://benjamindavidsteele.wordpress.com/2009/09/19/carl-jung-20th-century-visionary/
  
  Do you prefer the religious side of Jung more than his psychological ideas? You can’t exactly separate them of course, but I was just wondering what is your focus. A good book that Jung wrote about religion is Answer to Job. Jung considered it his most personal work that was published and he got a lot of criticism for it. That book seems to be as close as Jung got to theology.
  
  Dan Brown? Have you read him?
  
  I have a mild curiosity about such things. Conspiracies, politics, secret societies, religion, symbols… what is there not to like. I haven’t read his books, but I’ve seen the movies. However, I’ve read about these subjects in other books which Dan Brown probably used for research. An even more fun and intellectually interesting writer about conspiracies and secret societies is Robert Anton Wilson.
  
  Reply
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Reply
Monarc, on May 10, 2011 at 11:14 am said:

“Become severely depressed and begin thinking too much around highschool. Foster a sense of being different and detached from other people. Then, hit rockbottom sometime after highschool and drop out of college. Spend the next decade or so compulsively looking for the meaning of life. Live in constant despair and doubt. Feel your life slipping away and endlessly dwell on your fear of failure.

Spend all of your time and money in your studies in a pathetically desparate hope for some kind of answer, any kind of answer. Rant at God and then realize God isn’t there or doesn’t care. Give up a thousand times, but realize your idealism always somehow manages to keep you from entirely sinking into nihilism”

I haven’t yet read through the rest of the commentary to know if this I’m about to say is in there but man, we seem to be living the same life. Thanks to my mom, however, I didn’t drop outta college. I am also doing a research, when you were young, did you ever dream or wish that you one of God’s angels or that you’d see God?

My boy is getting famous, getting questionnaires n shit, damn! Haha, don’t mind me. That’s why you’re my Steely friend

“Come to a deep sense of truth that leaves you more bewildered than you were before.

Last but not least, have as little social life as possible. But maintain at least one friendship with another person who shares both depression and intellectual curiosity”

Surprisingly, I’ve done all of that since this very day you said it without thinking it. Man, I’ve unwittingly played into your trap. Argh, you’re a wizard, get away from me, argh . I have found someone similar to that friend you mentioned, you

“Sorry for the wait, I went on a little expedition to find a few things out”

That was when I left home with my heart on a pike thrusted into the ground in my room with a message pinned to it saying a lot of things but crucially “maybe I’ll be back, maybe I won’t” in a letter named ‘Farewell’. And that is when I found my own truth and I got lost in myself for the very first time. That is when ‘I AM’ presented Himself to me vividly and unquestionably. Funnily, I was sitting in front of the town (Keta) god on the beach in the lotus position. And out of the supreme Black, he came. My favorite colors always were black and white – the reason I got even more endeared to Mike Jackson – but now it’s even more profound, it’s part of me. That was the beginning of the Revolution

Reply
- Benjamin David Steele, on May 10, 2011 at 11:54 pm said:
  
  “when you were young, did you ever dream or wish that you one of God’s angels or that you’d see God?”
  
  I’m not sure. There are a few things that might be relevant to your inquiry.
  
  First, I thought a fair amount about and questioned ‘God’. But did I ever experience God? I don’t know.
  
  Second, I did have supernatural experiences. The one incident I clearly remember is having seen something that looked like a shadow moving across my bedroom wall and then after hiding under my sheets feeling something sit on my bed. The next day I found out my grandmother had died the night before.
  
  Third, I guess it depends what you mean by ‘younger’. When I was your age, I was indeed younger than I am now. In my late teens, I began to have a growing sense of the divine or something akin to it. In my 20s, I had some more full-blown experiences that I at times refer to as ‘God’.
  
  Does that answer your question?
  
  “Man, I’ve unwittingly played into your trap. Argh, you’re a wizard, get away from me, argh . I have found someone similar to that friend you mentioned, you”
  
  I think we’ve both unwittingly played into someone’s trap, but I refuse to take the blame. I’m innocent, I tell ya. The demiurge did it, the evil bastard!
  
  Ah, a friend and his name is ‘you’. Do I know him?
  
  “That is when ‘I AM’ presented Himself to me vividly and unquestionably.”
  
  You’ve never spoken about that to me… or, at least, not in any great detail. I would ask you to share more about the experience/vision itself, but I realize such things aren’t prone to be easily put into words.
  
  Reply
Monarc, on May 11, 2011 at 9:06 am said:

“Does that answer your question?”

Naa, but in some way, they do. I meant when you were about pre-teen. I, for instance, used to fantasize about being assumed into heaven and becoming part of the heavenly army, along the side of Michael. Or just being a vessel of God. I’ll be totally honest with you, it wasn’t for any especial love of God but rather because it was an interesting life to live. Full of wonderful things. Then, I really had a wish to see God. First, God was the most wonderful, most extraordinary, only great things were possible in his company. Second, which I think came along the way, was this mind that I wanted to go back where I came from, that God was where I was to be.

“You’ve never spoken about that to me”

The context hasn’t presented itself. Aside that, I didn’t know to trust you with this kind of stuff. The only part amenable to objective relation is the ‘I Am’ image and the background on my blog. The background is more representative of the process that led to the full ‘I Am’ from the beautiful Blackness. You’re right, words or even images don’t get it well

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- Benjamin David Steele, on May 11, 2011 at 9:23 pm said:
  
  “I meant when you were about pre-teen. I, for instance, used to fantasize about being assumed into heaven and becoming part of the heavenly army, along the side of Michael. Or just being a vessel of God.”
  
  Okay, I’ll answer your question in terms of my pre-teen years.
  
  I don’t know what (if any) religious tradition you were raised in, but I’d guess it was much different than what I was raised in. My childhood churches were Unity and Science of Mind, both very liberal new agey religions. I was raised in a worldview that was ‘spiritual’ but not ‘religious’. Most religious concepts such as an anthropomorphic God (or the whole issue of good/evil, original sin/blood sacrifice, heaven/hell) don’t fundamentally make sense to me because they are alien to how I was raised.
  
  So, in my pre-teen years, I had a strong sense of the spiritual. I would imagine many things that were of a supernatural/metaphysical bent, but I lacked a religious fantasy life because there were no religious concepts deeply embedded in my psyche. I was raised with more concepts such as ‘possibility-mindedness’, ‘abundance thinking’ and ‘power of mind’… and so that was the framework of my imagination. Spirituality was in the here and now of my experience rather than in a religious vision of heaven.
  
  However, I suppose I thought of ideas along the lines of being a vessel of God. It’s just in New Thought Christianity it’s assumed we all are vessels of God. I was raised as a heretic.
  
  By the way, this might help you understand some of the weirdness of American conservatism. My parents are very socially and fiscally conservative on most issues, and yet my parents raised me in the most liberal form of Christianity that exists in the US.
  
  Liberalism and conservatism have a weird history together in American culture. Many conservatives (including fundamentalists) have been influenced by the New Thought tradition which has its origins back around the Populist Era of the late 19th cent.
  
  The New Thought worldview fits in nicely with the whole Protestant work ethic, the Calvinist theology of divine reward, the fiscal ‘conservatism’ of classical liberalism, and the radical individualism of right-libertarianism. They seem like strange bedfellows, but it makes sense in terms of US history. So, my parents actually aren’t unusual in being drawn to radically liberal Christianity even as they are attracted to the far right.
  
  Reply
- Benjamin David Steele, on May 11, 2011 at 10:28 pm said:
  
  I had another thought about religious imagination.
  
  There are certain religious traditions in America that lack religious imagination, lack the respect/wonder toward myth and lack the worship/idolization toward symbols. New Thought is one and then there are the even older Anabaptist traditions such as Amish, Quakers and Shakers. Anabaptists are quite distinct from the Calvinist Baptists who do have quite the religious imagination.
  
  Combined with American Pragmatism, this Anabaptist tradition might’ve been an influence on New Thought. New Thought is essentially a modernized theologically bare bones version of Valentinian Gnosticism. Religious imagination never meant much to me until I started to explore other religions (especially those like Hinduism which are mythically colorful) and started studying the origins of Christianity. When I discovered Gnosticism, I had found the religious imagination that was the theological foundation of my own New Thought upbringing.
  
  Jung, PKD and (W.S.) Burroughs helped me to bring Gnosticism into the modern context. Jung’s archetypes gave me a framework to understand and PKD more than anyone gave me a living vision. I finally could make sense of my own experiences which were a bit disconnected from the American mainstream of Protestantism and Fundamentalism.
  
  So, I grew up without the religious imaginings that you had. But maybe there were some advantages to the blank slate that life offered me. My religious imagination can be wide-ranging for the reason it has no grounding in childhood religious indoctrination/enculturation.
  
  The basic lesson my religious upbringing taught me was to trust my own experience, that no one’s ideas or beliefs can trump my experience. Part of me struggled a lot with this growing up. How does one in the confusion of growing up understand their own experience? Many times I wouldn’t have minded someone telling me something with certainty instead of leaving it to me find for myself. It might be easier to not be given such an open-ended lesson, but it does open up the vista of imagination.
  
  I’d be curious to know how this compares to how you were raised.
  
  Reply
Monarc, on May 12, 2011 at 1:40 pm said:

“I don’t know what (if any) religious tradition you were raised in”

It’s fairly recently that my family could speak of a religious tradition. As for myself, I grew on myth ie diverse religions, mythology, fantasy. Initially, we were presby, we thought they were a sham (due to practices in the church – a hypocrisy n exploitation and long hours in there) so we left for the Catholic, all decided by mom. If anything, it was the particular catholic church and not the Catholicism in general that pleased us to stay. There was a particular priest there that really made me enthused, though he left later. Plus, I never paid attention in Sunday School, I was always only interested in the bible stories, the figures and perhaps, some ideas, I possibly challenged the rest. I preferred to philosophize myself. And that was very young, not more than 7y, I was already choosing my own education.

“Most religious concepts such as an anthropomorphic God (or the whole issue of good/evil, original sin/blood sacrifice, heaven/hell) don ’t fundamentally make sense to me because they are alien to how I was raised”

I practically made my own morality based on Jesus and what I could get of Buddha, both of which were similar to me. As well, I philosophized myself on morality. Morality is a very tough subject especially in the face of the devastating Ti (that’s a general point). I never allowed enculturation or education on terms other than mine. That explains my distance from my culture and others as well except perhaps Bushido.

I always believed in the Taoist God for some reason. When God was said to me, the only conception was one of the indescribable Tao though in my mind, it was a pretty vivid Black. Actually, the first time, I imagined this vivid Black was when I asked at about 8y, ‘so after heaven, what next?’ plus a question Russell also asked, I forget the question. I don’t know where I got that conception of the fathomless Tao from but I always had it.

Besides, I was always more interested in the mythological way of seeing gods, ‘god of this’, ‘god of that’ and those also influenced my mind. I was only scared of heresy and hell that I remained loyal to any thoughts about their being heretic thoughts. The Catholic ‘angels n demons’ that were categorized served to replace them for me. From Zeus to Raphael and Molech, I was interested in these things. Based on that, I always had an idea about archetypes. Fear, mostly, made me unsure of them plus an inferiority complex to some appreciable extent. Let’s not forget the imagery and mythology of Africa which is so diverse.

Plus, I had visions of my own early like a hideous monster that haunted me at my bed side. And, countless shadows which I still see. Indoctrination wouldn’t describe me at all, as I said before, I mostly grew myself. Plus, these images mostly were the uncanny type though the idea expressed would usually crystallise in my mind. They were really weird and half of the time, indistinct

Reply
- Benjamin David Steele, on May 12, 2011 at 11:19 pm said:
  
  You had a religious upbringing that was fairly diverse.
  
  I didn’t mean to imply that you were indoctrinated. I more meant the process of enculturation… which means the culture we’re surrounded by and which we internalize.
  
  I realize that you are very independent-minded and your religious imagination is a very personal experience. We share those things… in different ways and with different early influences.
  
  Here is what I was trying to get at.
  
  In the US, Catholicism strongly defines the religious imagination. If you look at the horror/fantasy movies made about religion or religious themes, they usually involve Catholic churches and priests. But I’ve never been to a Catholic service in my life. My only experience of Catholicism was attending Boy Scouts in the basement of a Catholic church.
  
  The churches I was raised in rarely taught Bible stories. I actually can’t remember any Bible stories told to me as a child, not in any Sunday school nor by my parents. The churches I grew up with tended to be more focused on improving one’s life and one’s relationship to God. New Thought Christianity is also known as Practical Christianity. It’s almost entirely devoid of complex theology, mythology, and symbolism.
  
  On top of this, I just wasn’t surrounded by much that would inspire my religious imagination. I didn’t have in my house growing up many books on religion, myths, and folklore. And American society is different than African society in that there isn’t the same diverse imagery and mythology. I wasn’t even aware of Native American religion/mythology to any great degree until I was older.
  
  I suppose what inspired my childhood imagination was reading fiction and watching tv. My discovery of the SF genre was very important at one point in my life. At an even younger point in my life (when I first learned to read), I did come across ghost stories and that was my introduction to religious imagination, but it wasn’t in the context of religion.
  
  I was trying to remember what my point was. I had to look back to see what began this discussion of religious imagination. You were asking me about experiences of God and such as a child. It’s an interesting question.
  
  How much is personality and how much upbringing? If I had grown up with lots of mythological imagery and storytelling, would it have influenced the experiences I had as a child? Or even would it given me a context to understand and remember those experiences? I recollect being very spiritual and yet my sense is that my religious imagination was lacking at that time.
  
  Here, let me think of this in another way. If a child was never taught anything about religion or mythology, how would their imagination manifest and how would they understand their experiences? If you weren’t brought up with the concept of and stories about God and god-men, would you even be able to discern the divine with no language to describe it and no cultural context in which to understand it?
  
  To be honest, I can’t say what experiences I had as a child. I had experiences or at least I remember having had experiences that fit my religious upbringing, but I either didn’t have or can’t recall having had experiences that didn’t fit my religious upbringing. Most of my childhood is vague at this point, mostly forgotten with only a few events remaining as shadows in my mind.
  
  Reply
- Monarc, on May 13, 2011 at 8:46 am said:
  
  “both of which were similar to me”
  
  Should read “both of whom were similar, to me” in the fourth paragraph.
  
  “the face of the devastating Ti (that’s a general point)”
  
  ‘general point’ in the sense of Ti as a function-attitude.
  
  Besides, music and art influenced my imagination (or religious imagination, if you want to call it that)
  
  By the way, some of my sentences are like flags or stepping stones with which I access the actual thing I wish to say so try to pardon some incomprehesible sentences. I’m mostly very deep in the ocean of thoughts when such things happen and the idea is even much deeper. My mantra when I was younger was “I know it but I don’t know how to express it”. When you made those metaphors of Ni and Ti (which I think all the introverted functions can have applied to them in terms of reference to their depth and inaccessibility but possibly less so for Si; Fi and Ni being the more remote) where Ni was a hole in the bed of a river causing a whirlpool that produced eddies at the shore and Ti being the rock just below the surface causing ripples causing ripples, they really hit home. And, they correspond to Jung’s description perfectly. What really affected me was your description of Ni but I think my ideational processes and expression have become clearer nowadays? (rhetorical question) Still, however, some are very remote. maltreating conventional signs ruthlessly, me. One thing very fascinating about myself to myself is I can have a very quick understanding but would be incapable of intelligible expression even to myself, sometimes, I just know I know it. These our conversations are very helpful, my memory really benefits.
  
  Reply
  - Benjamin David Steele, on May 13, 2011 at 7:48 pm said:
    
    “Besides, music and art influenced my imagination (or religious imagination, if you want to call it that)”
    
    That might one point of confusion. I was intentionally separating the issue of religious imagination from the issue of imagination in general. As a kid, I had plenty of imagination. It’s just it didn’t have a religious/mythical/symbolical framework. My childhood imagination, for good or ill, was more formed by pop culture.
    
    “When you made those metaphors… where Ni was a hole in the bed of a river causing a whirlpool that produced eddies at the shore and Ti being the rock just below the surface causing ripples causing ripples, they really hit home. And, they correspond to Jung’s description perfectly.”
    
    I can take credit for the description and the imagery which I think is original to me, as far as I can recall. But the understanding comes from my having had some very long and deep discussions with several INFJs over a period of about a year. Ni fascinates me more than any other function-attitude. I remember how INFPs tended to see Ni as being mysterious and even mystical, but for INFJs it felt more mundane as it was just their experience.
    
    “One thing very fascinating about myself to myself is I can have a very quick understanding but would be incapable of intelligible expression even to myself, sometimes, I just know I know it.”
    
    That would seem to demonstrate a distinct characteristic of Ni. I can sometimes feel that way about understanding without being able to express it, but I suspect not the extent you feel it.
    
    Expression probably involves the Perceiving functions (especially Intuition in terms of verbal expression) more than the Judging functions. When the Perceiving function is introverted (as with Ni) expressing to another person (especially of another type) becomes more difficult. As my Intuition is extraverted, verbal expression isn’t as challenging. In fact, I use my expression as a favored method of understanding. I express different ideas and interpretations, throwing it all against the wall in order to see what sticks.
    
    “These our conversations are very helpful, my memory really benefits.”
    
    I too find them helpful and enjoyable. It’s interesting that I don’t write more posts about Jungian typology. I do have a fair amount of posts about the topic, but not as many as some other topics. The reason for this is that typological distinctions are easier to suss out in interacting with another person who is also interested, informed, and introspective. Maybe it’s my Ne that wants more immediate feedback.
    
    Reply
Monarc, on May 13, 2011 at 12:00 am said:

“The churches I was raised in rarely taught Bible stories. I actually can ’t remember any Bible stories told to me as a child, not in any Sunday school nor by my parents. The churches I grew up with tended to be more focused on improving one’s life and one’s relationship to God. New Thought Christianity is also known as Practical Christianity. It ’s almost entirely devoid of complex theology, mythology, and symbolism”

I wouldn’t have remained loyal to such a church especially when I saw images myself and on TV in cartoons, movies, books. Man, I would take what I liked and would leave and no amount of deprecation of the other side of matters (mythology) would completely stop me. I might feel inferior and heretical about it but my compulsion is to investigate them.

An independent mind runs through my family from as much is known my great-grandfather. He was stubborn is what he was. His name was Avuchu which means ‘male dog’ in Ewe but a fearful name in the Ewe context. And, he was counted the wisest man in his village which he fled. He was actually to be a royal but he ran. My mom knows the story better but she’s asleep right now

I perfectly understand your questions about context cos for me even when I had context, I still doubted and had my own ideas. I to some extent explained my experiences using a singular tradition. But, the traditions were so many, including my own, it was chaos all over. I depended on my reactions to these things and still do. It’s nice to have a personal mythology of sorts. If anything, I got more religious in my teens but it didn’t last. It very much is going to be difficult to interpret them, I understand, my man

Reply
- Benjamin David Steele, on May 13, 2011 at 7:22 pm said:
  
  “I wouldn’t have remained loyal to such a church especially when I saw images myself and on TV in cartoons, movies, books. Man, I would take what I liked and would leave and no amount of deprecation of the other side of matters (mythology) would completely stop me. I might feel inferior and heretical about it but my compulsion is to investigate them.”
  
  Well, loyalty wasn’t the issue as I wasn’t raised with the idea of being loyal to one’s religion. The Unity Church falls on the opposite end of the spectrum, Rather than what can you do for your church, it’s more about what your church can do for you.
  
  Also, it was simply the church I went to my entire life up to the point of my moving out on my own. For the most part, I didn’t know of any other church or any other religious mentality. It was simply what I knew and I didn’t know what I didn’t know.
  
  In Unity, there is no fear of deprecation. It’s impossible to be a heretic in Unity. How can you rebel against that which is open to and accepting of rebellion? If you don’t like it, you leave. No one would probably care. No one will tell you you’re damned. If I wanted to explore a different path, people in Unity (my parents included) would have been the first to encourage me and wish me luck.
  
  That is the beauty of it and why it’s such a pleasant spiritual trap. When you are given complete freedom to explore, you can actually feel less compulsion to explore. In terms of religious imagination, I had no inkling that I was even lacking anything. No one was overtly denying it from my experience. It simply wasn’t there, simply outside of my social context at that time.
  
  However, it was Unity (and my parents who raised me in Unity) that taught me to and encouraged me to explore. I might not have explored so widely and discovered what I was lacking if I hadn’t been raised in that worldview of intellectual curiosity and spiritual seeking.
  
  Even now, I value spiritual seeking over religious imagination. For me, spiritual seeking led to religious imagination. But, from what I can tell, for many people being raised in a tradition of religious imagination doesn’t necessarily (and usually doesn’t) lead to spiritual seeking. I’m a seeker, whether spiritual or intellectual or anything else for that matter. Seek and ye shall not find, that is my motto. I’ll never stop being a seeker because seeking has no end.
  
  Reply
Monarc, on May 15, 2011 at 2:17 pm said:

“Most religious concepts such as an anthropomorphic God (or the whole issue of good/evil,…) don’t fundamentally make sense to me”

Then you did very well or it shows how ethics is inherent. I say this in relation to what you said about ‘Evil’ expressing something indescribable. You did very well or it points to your bringing forth of what was in, in developing an ethical side to yourself. I was wandering pondering today and I met a girl urinating in the open, I averted my eyes. I realised that this was due to some voice inside telling me to turn away and I recognised this voice as very familiar and recalled it from my own past. I realised that though I may rationalise it and say “oh, it’s a natural thing”, I still can’t bring myself to do it. At that time, the inherence of ethics became starkly clear. To you, it might not be a voice but it is undeniably a formidable energy that influences the individual. By the way, have you noticed that this thing we do, discussing topics on the blog is similar to what the intellectuals used to do in letters? These are our letters, will a Steele the Monarc one day quote our exchange as you did with PKD to Warrick?

I was wandering pondering for a long time today and all it appeared to me was “spots and jumps” of thought (appropriated from Bertrand Russell) but I just came back home (at the time of writing this was about 17:10 hrs) and realised that they were all linked in fact. It’s something I’ve observed of myself, it’s like I can facilitate a certain part of my mind and then the thoughts linked to it start to flow out, consciously or not, till some appreciable checkpoint is reached which is only intuitively known to be appreciable. It can seem as if that thought has been elected to be conscious for that duration until the checkpoint is reached then another one jumps in or I go looking for something to think about, maybe a book, life observation or self-analysis. Same thing happened today, though I was just thinking in ‘spots and jumps’ not particularly flowing from one thought to the next consciously, it seemed the thoughts that followed were conceptually linked to that first thought about Ethics including recalling this you said about ‘Evil’.

I also pondered on the concept that an advancement one end of a spectrum necessitates and generates an advancement on the opposite end of the spectrum. This I arranged into the maxim:

Inordinate pleasure leads to inordinate pain,

It was a lot of thought that led to that maxim which is like a natural law of sorts and I think it will get posted up one day but it’s going to be a mighty long one, even longer than that my mega-post ‘Will to Power’.

Then, I remembered Mr. Hegdes declaration of perpetual rebellion; it seems it’s the natural way of things to find opposition in everything. Which when we go deeper, it is we ourselves who are always opposing but that’s just an addendum for this point. So, Mr. Hedges is just being natural. It’s like a natural law of some sort, I said this already (I wrote this already and some damned stupid error of wordpress caused me to lose what I wrote, so it’s more like retracing my steps and making some critical statements I made in the erased one, goddamn wordpress black death-infected goblins). By the way, when I experienced this ‘I Am’, there was also this thought of the clash of the opposites alongside, and this thought was that it was what had just happened within me. A lot of things ran through my mind at that time, some I couldn’t even get a hold of man. It was an immense experience and during that time, I got a glimpse of what was happening at home especially to my mom, she always was the one most closely bonded to me. I hadn’t seen Avatar (The Last Airbender) at the time but when I saw the final stage of leaving the one person he loved the most, it was all too familiar, I don’t know where they got the concept from but I knew that concept. According to wikipedia, the director used Eastern philosophy esp Hindi in depth which I was aware of but I didn’t think such an experience would be documented or was it the director’s own experience. Do you like ‘The Last Airbender’? I see a lot of shared interests in movies and TV shows in your ‘About’.

So let’s say I’m INFJ, why are you always coming into close contact with INFJs, are we sure we aren’t looking at fate of some sort? You, being depressed, might need some of the INFJ pep. As for me, I’m no good for that, honestly (and especially with you), unless the person is getting neurotic or out-of-reach, perhaps, suicidal, cos I’m similar to you in respect of depression with my doubt always waylaying me in addition, I’ve even written a ‘Manifesto of Melancholy’ recently on my blog. My motto “Expect anything; Doubt everything”. Both you and I will have to be of the melancholic temperament, always thinking, the same thinking that kills us, the same thinking that we love so much.

Jung said: ‘the psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made conscious, it happens outside as fate. That is to say, when the individual remains undivided and does not become conscious of his inner opposite, the world must perforce act out the conflict and be torn into opposing halves’. The part I’m focusing more on is the first part but I just put it all in here so that if you haven’t seen this before, you see it now cos it has a lot of substance. It’s linked to Jung saying that ‘Self and world are commensurable factors’

Jung on the introverted rational type: “He himself sets the subjective factor at too low a value, and his feelings of inferiority are his chastisement for this sin”.

Reply
- Benjamin David Steele, on May 15, 2011 at 9:51 pm said:
  
  “By the way, have you noticed that this thing we do, discussing topics on the blog is similar to what the intellectuals used to do in letters?”
  
  Yes. Our little (or not so little) discussions are essentially a form of correspondence. The difference is that the process is more instantaneous rather than waiting weeks for a reply. I do enjoy having long discussions in the comments section.
  
  ‘Evil’ is a helpful example of my evolving attitude. Unity church didn’t even use the word. Growing up, I never even thought about evil or what it meant. As I got older, I began to understand how others theologically interpreted it, but it still just seemed like a silly and childish concept.
  
  My understanding has changed some since that time. I still see the theological concept as just another one of the tools in religions toolbox of fear-mongering. But I’ve come to realize that certain people have used the word to imply something more profound.
  
  My depression brought me to a worldview that conflicted with my new-thought/positive-thinking upbringing.. Two things, besides my own depression, made the dark-side of God more real to me: Jung’s book about Job and the movie/novel The Last Temptation of Christ. So, for me, religious imagination has always been found in the dark shadows and the lonely hidden places outside of the bright lights of religiosity and dogma. I’m not sure how many people would share this sense of religious imagination. I don’t doubt some people learn to find it within the environment of a specific church or tradition.
  
  “I also pondered on the concept that an advancement one end of a spectrum necessitates and generates an advancement on the opposite end of the spectrum.”
  
  The relationship of opposites or perceived opposites is always fun to think about. I’m sure your referring to Jung’s enantiodrama as you quote Jung discussing it further down in your comment. Here is a Jung quote I like that is about this notion:
  
  “The grand plan on which the unconscious life of the psyche is constructed is so inaccessible to our understanding that we can never know what evil may not be necessary in order to produce good by enantiodromia, and what good may very possibly lead to evil.”
  
  “Do you like ‘The Last Airbender’?”
  
  I know I’ve seen it, but I don’t remember it clear enough to give you a good answer. I think I enjoyed it. Maybe I’ll watch it again if I get the time and I’ll get back to you about it.
  
  “So let’s say I’m INFJ, why are you always coming into close contact with INFJs, are we sure we aren’t looking at fate of some sort? You, being depressed, might need some of the INFJ pep.”
  
  It’s not pep. I don’t really think of INFJs as peppy. Maybe INFJs aren’t as melodramatically downbeat as a disgruntled INFP, but they aren’t exactly the opposite either. INFJs seem a bit more balanced and grounded, centered and focused. Compared to INFPs, INFJs are fairly practical. My sense is that INFJs have more of a sustained momentum to their lives… whereas INFPs suffer from a mental form of premature ejaculation followed by emotional flaccidity.
  
  “He himself sets the subjective factor at too low a value, and his feelings of inferiority are his chastisement for this sin”
  
  Interesting. It’s clear how that applies to dominant Ti types, but it’s less clear to me about how it applies to dominant Fi types. I know INFPs often have feelings of inferiority. On the other hand, INFPs are often obsessed by the subjective. Maybe there is something about the INFP’s experience of the subjective that is distorted, too self-enclosed or somehow prone to dysfunction. It also makes me wonder how differently the subjective might be experienced by those with dominant intuition or sensing.
  
  Reply
- Benjamin David Steele, on May 15, 2011 at 10:05 pm said:
  
  “Then, I remembered Mr. Hegdes declaration of perpetual rebellion; it seems it’s the natural way of things to find opposition in everything. Which when we go deeper, it is we ourselves who are always opposing but that’s just an addendum for this point. So, Mr. Hedges is just being natural.”
  
  By the way, Hedges is a Christian, although a very liberal/socialist alternative Christian who seems to follow Jesus’ example more than following religious rules. His view of losing is winning is in the context of Jesus’ teachings. The whole idea of being poor in flesh while rich in spirit. This style of thinking goes back to Greek thought, the Christians supposedly having inherited it (along with natural law) from the Stoics.
  
  Here is another quote by Hedges from the same book (The World As It Is, p. 83):
  
  How do we resist? How, if this descent is inevitable, as I believe it is, do we fight back? Why should we resist at all? Why not give in to cynicism and despair? Why not carve out as comfortable a niche as possible within the embrace of the corporate state and spend our lives attempting to satiate our private needs? The power elite, including most of those who graduate from our top universities and our liberal and intellectual classes, have sold out for personal comfort. Why not us?
  
  The French moral philosopher Albert Camus argued that we are separated from one another. Our lives are meaningless. We cannot influence fate. We will all die and our individual beings will be obliterated. And yet Camus wrote that “one of the only coherent philosophical positions is revolt. It is a constant confrontation between man and his obscurity. It is not aspiration, for it is devoid of hope. That revolt is the certainty of a crushing fate, without the resignation that ought to accompany it.”
  
  “A living man can be enslaved and reduced to the historic condition of an object,” Camus warned. “But if he dies in refusing to be enslaved, he reaffirms the existence of another kind of human nature which refuses to be classified as an object.”
  
  The rebel, for Camus, stands with the oppressed—the unemployed workers thrust into impoverishment and misery by the corporate state, the Palestinians in Gaza, the civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan, the disappeared held in our global black sites, the poor in our inner cities and depressed rural communities, immigrants, and those locked away in our prison system. To stand with them does not mean to collaborate with parties, such as the Democrats, who can mouth the words of justice while carrying out acts of oppression. It means open and direct defiance.
  
  The power structure and its liberal apologists dismiss the rebel as impractical and see the rebel’s outsider stance as counterproductive. They condemn the rebel for expressing anger at injustice. The elites and their apologists call for calm and patience. They use the hypocritical language of spirituality, compromise, generosity, and compassion to argue that the only alternative is to accept and work with the systems of power. The rebel, however, is beholden to a moral commitment that makes it impossible to stand with the power elite. The rebel refuses to be bought off with foundation grants, invitations to the White House, television appearances, book contracts, academic appointments or empty rhetoric. The rebel is not concerned with self-promotion or public opinion. The rebel knows that, as Augustine wrote, hope has two beautiful daughters, anger and courage—anger at the way things are and the courage to see that they do not remain the way they are. The rebel is aware that virtue is not rewarded. The act of rebellion defines itself.
  
  Reply
  - Monarc, on May 15, 2011 at 11:30 pm said:
    
    Yeah, I noticed it while reading Greek thought recently, well not so recent.
    
    There’s something I don’t quite understand, the word ‘creative’. Maybe, it’s cos the things I do are natural to me but when I see something that others are so marveled by and is objectively determined as ‘innovative’, I’m skeptical of the use of ‘innovation’ to describe the thing cos I ask “what’s so special about this that others can’t do”. For me, it’s mostly my thoughts and I still ask the question. I don’t get it. What they call innovative is normal to me. Heck, if I had more extraverted energy, I might be implementing some of my plans ‘innovatively’ rather than sitting by the TV watching others enact my plans and saying “that guy stole my mind” or “that coulda been me”
    
    “The power elite, including most of those who graduate from our top universities and our liberal and intellectual classes, have sold out for personal comfort. Why not us?”
    
    Well, that’s me, that intellectual part is for me, the damn cowards. To the dungeons with all of them, we’ll torture their books while they watch!!
    
    “A living man can be enslaved and reduced to the historic condition of an object,” Camus warned. “But if he dies in refusing to be enslaved, he reaffirms the existence of another kind of human nature which refuses to be classified as an object.”
    
    For the archives. Igor, bring your head, let me place this one there. Remember, don’t let it fall, this one is French, you know how vengeful they are
    
    Reply
    - Benjamin David Steele, on May 16, 2011 at 8:56 am said:
      
      “There’s something I don’t quite understand, the word ‘creative’.”
      
      I could answer that a couple of ways.
      
      First, ‘creative’ and ‘innovative’ can be looked upon as ideas that are subjective and relative. I’m sure they mean many things to many people. Even if one doesn’t perceive oneself as creative, others might perceive one that way. A person may be comparatively more creative than some other person while simultaneously being less creative than another. Or one might consider oneself to be creative, yet society might not appreciate and acknowledge one’s self-perceived creativity. Also, in different cultures, ‘creative’ will be defined and perceived differently. In this sense, it becomes an issue of who gets to decide who is and who isn’t creative.
      
      Second, such terms can be used in a more objective and narrow sense. In terms of science, ‘creative’ and ‘innovative’ would be defined very precisely with typical characteristics. Psychological research has studied and measured innovative thinking. As I’m sure you understand, there are certain styles and modes of thinking that lead to original/idiosyncratic results. And there are certain traits and functions that predispose someone to that way of thinking. It’s just a fact of life that not all people have equal capacity for all abilities. To you, what gets called ‘creative’ or ‘innovative’ may seem normal, but it probably doesn’t seem normal to many people.
      
      I would guess that most people most of the time think the same type of thoughts in the same type of way from day to day, never changing their routine, never shifting their perspective, never coloring outside the lines, never thinking outside the box. They do what they do because they’ve always done it that way, and they’ve always done it that way because that was how they were taught to do it or how they first figured out how to do it. Why change? Why do anything new? It takes courage and inspiration, not only energy and motivation, to challenge the status quo by refusing to conform.
      
      “Well, that’s me, that intellectual part is for me, the damn cowards. To the dungeons with all of them, we’ll torture their books while they watch!!”
      
      Hedges can be very judgmental. Part of me wants to criticize his criticisms because he seems to want to put most of the responsibility on one small segment of society. That seems unfair. However, he criticizes in this way because he genuinely cares and he is criticizing those he identifies with. His criticism is partly self-criticism… which does seem to be a trait many liberals have. Most liberals have no problem blaming conservatives for the problems of the world (and vice versa). But what distinguishes liberals is that they tend to include themselves in their own criticisms.
      
      Even psychological research confirms this. It probably has something to do with the liberal sense of empathy. Liberals usually end up empathizing and sometimes even sympathizing with those they disagree with. To a liberal, the ‘other’ is more often seen as an extension of their own sense of self. Liberals feel conflicted in that they fundamentally want to include everyone even though sadly not everyone wants to include them.
      
      Hedges is critical because of his idealism. He genuinely believes in the potential good that comes from the role liberals can and should play in society. A free and fair society is usually destroyed from without only after it has been weakened from within. The liberal class is the moderating force in a free and fair society. The far right, by nature, doesn’t ultimately care about a free and fair society. In fact, the far right are opposed to a free and fair society. It would be silly to expect anyone other than those on the left to defend a free and fair society. So, if a free and fair society is destroyed, the ultimate blame falls upon the liberal class.
      
      “For the archives. Igor, bring your head, let me place this one there. Remember, don’t let it fall, this one is French, you know how vengeful they are”
      
      Exactly whose head is it that you want? Camus’ head? I’d be careful with Camus’ head, if I were you. Camus fought the Nazis, and even as a bodiless head I bet he could take you on.
      
      Reply
Monarc, on May 18, 2011 at 10:48 am said:

Not Camus’ head but his statement and it’s Igor’s flat head I’m using as tray to convey my new gem from Camus

Reply

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