Just One Look Forum Archives

I write today about my experiences, as so many have written here before. I'd like to comment on the fact that this 'you-ness' enlightens us onto the proper mode of being, however its not perfectly obvious how we ourselves should act under the presupposition of 'me'. Obvious as the question is, the answer not totally available among these forums. Self Directed Attention is perfectly logical and agreeable, in practice it provides us with the attending of life in front of us so that we may create the proper mode of being, and then to continue to embody the proper mode of being. I hope these forums are a combined effort into the description of the proper mode of being. With articulation we can produce in ourselves a greater life. I myself would like to aid in this effort.

First, 'Honesty,' honesty is something spoken about these forums and I would like to define Truth in the way I understand it. "The arrow flies true," in the sense of its going in the right direction, is my understanding of truth. This is so important in definition because being honest is whats going to help solve our problems in life. Maybe not all our problems, but it'll aid in the en devour of the right mode of being. And in the articulation of phenomenon within our lives and these forums.

Second, 'Sacrifice,' although not spoken among these forums directly, is among the cornerstone philosophies for the proper mode of being. Self directed attention solidifies what sacrifice means, because making a decision to direct attention to the breath implies sacrifice of all other stimuli. Therefore the decision to sacrifice all other sensations reinforces the ability to attend to whats meaningful.

Thirdly, 'Direction,' the addition of a honest direction can better solidify what needs to be sacrificed. Although this is less obvious, lets say SDA and the strengthening of the attention is the most helpful direction to aid in the meta-goal of a proper mode of being. Directions can inform us to what needs to be sacrificed.

Critique is welcome,

Thank you,

Larry Reutov

P.S. With a proper mode of being, we confront the chaos and order. The known and the unknown to which we attend and traverse, is facilitated by the proper mode of being.

Larry, if I understand your question correctly, you are asking how to act, how to be, once clear of the fear......that there are not specific, or even general guidelines or instruction in this matter on the Just One Look website, or in the forums? I understand this question as it's one I've had as well....what will life without fear look like? what will it feel like? What will I do? I believe John has purposefully avoided answering this question directly as the essence of self reliance is to allow others to live their lives as they see fit. It also seems that life after the looking unfolds differently for each individual. I would speculate that it Is a life based in integrity and truthfulness, however we are, of course, still human and make mistakes. In addition, being sane or growing in sanity, in an insane world is no picnic, and our actions, no matter how full of integrity they may be, can be misunderstood and distorted by the field of fear around us.

I personally find it more more difficult to lie or to distort the truth, even when it may be socially advantageous to spare someone's feelings.....I try to do my work thoroughly and with integrity, although there are still many minor failings and laziness in the whole process. We can never, it seems, be perfect or please those around us fully. Perhaps a life without fear allows us to do our best and not ruminate over failings or mistakes longer than it takes to make amends if necessary?

I like to think about this topic. I appreciate very much the freedom to find out for myself how to act, it is my life, done in my own style. However, is it possible to know what is the proper mode of being except when being in it? I don't know this, maybe we're different. "A sane mind is an open mind". There's something to that. Fear can block our ability to learn but without it we keep learning and taking in. Like there's no tomorrow in my case.

Something I've learned about honesty with myself is that I only seem to find it in the present. I mean I can't sit and debate with myself what to do next and then do it -it just won't happen, it never does, I think this is just the way I am wired. What will happen is I eventually get hungry, and then I start to prepare food -so long another feeling doesn't come along and take over, like laziness, or some random excitement for something else (a thought can create a feeling too). If I have work a sense of urgency will take hold sooner or later. Proper mode of being? Well, taken together with my prior mistakes and successes, I often seem to make something worthwhile and meaningful with it in the end in any case. Fast or feast -both are pretty good outcomes if you know what I mean? Other people may behave differently but I have learned to think that my normal mode of operating is to follow my feelings without too many judgements, and without self hate about making mistakes it's fine, I dare trust my feelings to lead the way. I can see how feelings are formed in relationship with thoughts, and with less fear in the way they inform each other better, and this guides me slowly forward. A major difference from before looking to now is that I was always stressed before. Now I know and accept I'm not good with making plans and sticking to them, I'm too feely floaty kind of a person, so until I learn how to do it myself I just ask the help of others when it is needed, and they often gladly help. If something important comes up I don't self doubt either, so it works out come chaos or come order. Just a reflection Larry, best wishes...

Not to confuse anyone, let me add: Reading this again I hear myself saying that I am at the mercy of whatever comes up - which is not actually how I experience it. Most of the time, albeit not all of the time, I feel like I have a pretty good grip on what impulses I follow. It feels like it is me who is setting most of the agenda. Here I was only reflecting some recent thoughts about personality and such things, miscellaneous stuff really.

Personally I like what you've said roed, your very aware of your own actions. Reading your post shows me you understand your own ruts and where they lead, yet somehow you've found a way around them, and you are aware that what your doing is making better ruts so that your future actions are more expedient. Expedient... expedient, yet although they maintain expedience they also have a strong sense of meaningfulness. I think i understand this meaningfulness in action. I also feel meaningful action because of the idea that its something that I caused and actively learned from.

I only feel that there is a framework of sanity involved in this healing of the 'you' (proper mode of being). I feel as if the framework isn't something new and has already been explained, that the addition of 'you' makes the framework naturally work itself into our action and attention without the knowledge of the framework. I don't know if knowing the framework helps us integrate the sanity more consciously. I think i dont know the answer because the experience of the framework is much more abstract in our daily lives, and its hard to get a grip on what exactly is "acting out sanity" and more over "acting out sanity consciously and with deliberation".

If that didn't make much sense then ill reiterate with. You describing that thinking about something only leads to you to not doing anything (and not learning anything). And that just making action helps you better learn and discern what actions should be made, because the "meaningfulness" that presents itself is better presented by engaging in something (however trivial). This inevitable feeling of urgency, like making food, is 'direction' in my opinion. This might help us better engage with the world qualifying itself in-front of us.

Like I said, i don't know if knowledge of the framework helps us in anyway towards sanity, but if it does i think itll be an indispensable tool for helping the recovery into our own lives (and increasing the attraction of the 'you' to laypersons.)

Autonomy of action is something I've thought about quite a bit. Certainly, we all agree that whilst in fear much of our thinking and actions are simply conditioned, in fact there are neurological experiments to show our nerves and muscles move a nanosecond before we have the conscious thought to move. A crass example is that our hand and arm may reach for a box of donuts a split second before we know it is happening. We then, it is theorized, create a back story to match the action of our muscles and nerves, like: I could really use a donut right now, or I've been eating healthy, I deserve a donut.

If we look at a typical modern human there is not much going on behaviorally. We sit or lie down most of the time, usually in front of a computer device, we stand occasionally, eat, drink, go to the bathroom, lie down, talk to others sometimes, etc. Not much is going on, right? Much of our lives are lived internally, with our thoughts, emotions, and imagination. The dream world of the internet is where our conditioning happens in my opinion. We are in a highly susceptible, trancelike state that opens us to the conditioning coming in so seductively through the blue light of the ether.

I believe recovery is undoing much of this conditioning, but the question remains, how much of our actions are conditioned and how much do we have agency over? I personally believe that 99% of my actions are conditioning, its just that I have been able to change the patterns. My hands reach out to grab some food before I make a conscious choice, only this time its an apple as I don't buy donuts any longer. I feel that I am in the midst of unraveling much of my conditioning from earlier in life and sometimes it takes conscious work, and sometimes it doesn't.....much of this has to do with the religious beliefs I was conditioned with at an early age and the attending emotional control mechanisms (guilt and shame) used to keep my behavior in line. I have awoken to the fact that much of what I was told and am being told now, are lies. We are being lied to constantly by religious/spirititual leaders, politicians, psychology, big food, big pharma, educators, and those around us.

So I believe that the looking allows us to reprogram ourselves so that our automatic actions are pre-programmed from an open, rational viewpoint based closer to truth, rather than a fear based one. Just my take on a very moving target.

So I believe that the looking allows us to reprogram ourselves so that our automatic actions are pre-programmed from an open, rational viewpoint based closer to truth, rather than a fear based one. Just my take on a very moving target.

This is the way I see it, Jack. After working with self-directed attention for some time, I find that when old fear-based reactions and neurotic thoughts arise, I am now able to view them with a certain amount of sang-froid and am therefore able to see them for what they are. This helps me to either turn away from them, or make better choices--whatever seems suitable. Some patterns are very stubborn, so I find myself having to repeat this process, sometimes many times.

That's brilliant Jackx. For the last several years I've had discussions with people about this. We are all products of our conditioning and we are all doing the best we can with what we know. That's why I don't believe in serving punishment to anyone for anything. That doesn't mean there aren't people that need to be separated from society and/or euthanized, but just not from the standpoint of punishment. It should be done from the standpoint of compassion.

The idea that, if we lost the fear of life, if we lose the influence of our conditioning, that we may then gain control/agency of our lives and have actual free will is very intriguing to me. It does make sense that this could happen I think. If we didn't act out of fear/programming from our conditioning, what influence would we be acting from? Even if we lose fear of life and don't act out of fear-based notions stemming from our conditioning, we probably would still be influenced from all of our experiences - perhaps even from our existence even before incarnating into our current physical forms. Well maybe one day I'll find out more about this. Thanks for sharing this man! Best, Lex