Uncertainty is a mathematical thing. Math is the language of the physical. The physical creates emotions, which in turn, influence the physical. Where does the mind fall – thoughts? Thoughts can impact the physical and vice versa. Do thoughts fall somewhere between, serving as a bridge between the physical and the emotional? Are we our thoughts, or something separate? Words are the language of the emotional. Words are physical. They say that words can hurt. Math speaks about the physical world to the emotional, the emotional world speaks to the mental world with words. Physical = math. Emotional = words. Thoughts are the how. What is truly the distinction between mental and emotional? If the difference is the presence of rationale, then math or logic has to be its language. I keep seeing a triangle in my mind. Flow charts too. Thoughts impact the emotional. Physical – MATH -> Emotional – WORDS -> Mental – LOGIC. Math transforms the physical into emotional, words translate the emotional into thoughts, and logic transforms thoughts into the physical. There is a bigger thought here. If I am not my body, then we can also infer that I am not my emotions, and I am not my thoughts. I am aware of and separate from all three. Awareness. Awareness is the only element that exists without translation or transformation. That is what I am.
Category: Random
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I had a conversation recently with a friend of mine and he was telling me about a comedy show where the dude also hypnotized the audience members. During the show, the dude instructed the audience members in a few things, but the final part was to put your palms together, press them together as hard as you can, and imagine that the two hands fused into one.
My friend told me he could not separate his hands after being brought out of the hypnosis, try as he might. This got me thinking.
Your mind really does have amazing power over your experience. In this case, you are guided to a place of openness by the hypnotist, given a task that makes you imagine something, reinforces that imagined reality with something physical, and once you bring your focus back to the moment, that imagined thing becomes your reality.
I don’t think most people realize how much your mindset and thoughts truly do shape your reality. If you want to change your reality, you have to start with your thoughts…
Interesting factoid. I read somewhere that your brain reacts the same no matter if you are experiencing an event, remembering it, or imagining it.
My friend is fine now, by the way. His hands are no longer fused together by the power of his mind.
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Which is worse for a child? Having parents who think you will never amount to anything, or parents who expect you to accomplish things that may be unreasonable?
There are bad consequences to each circumstance, without a doubt, but which is more damaging to the child in the long run? I think it kinda depends on the child, honestly.
There could be a child in situation 1, whose parents believe they will never accomplish anything, but they make a choice to prove the parents wrong, and wind up being a successful individual, but they deal with the knowledge that no one believed in them from the get-go. There could also be a child in situation 2, who does their absolute best to accomplish everything, but falls short, because, well… they are human and can’t do everything. They carry a sense of guilt and the idea of “I should have….” when in reality, they did everything they could at the time.
I am curious about this… admittedly, I feel that I belong to group 2, because I tried my damnedest to do what my parents expected, but that just wasn’t going to happen because, well…. life. At this point, I don’t blame my parents for any of that. They certainly had their own issues to work through, which bled on to me. But, what is it like on the other side of this? I don’t know what it is to be in group 1, but I want to know and understand that side of things.
If anyone reading this belongs to group 1, please reach out, I want to know your story. If you belong to group 2, please reach out, I want to know your story. I love to hear people’s struggles, and what they have done to cope with/mitigate them. Understanding one another and our various circumstances is one of the keys to growth….
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I just had a heart to heart with one of my dogs (sortof). Frak (yes, brother of Frik), who is the dominant one, the “scary” one, the one who believes he is in charge. Well, until Sandy sets him straight…
Anyway, after being gone for a bit this afternoon and then feeding them when I got back, Frak came up to me and licked my face in a rare expression of affection. I think he could feel that it was a rough day and has been a rough couple of weeks. He’s intuitive like that. I said to him, “I know you try to be the badass, but you’re actually nothin’ but a mush.” He turned away, so I continued, “and you know that I know, and that’s why you can’t even look at me.” I chuckled, he sighed, gave my nose a quick lick then jumped down.
I think we have an understanding now…
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What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
Keep it as simple as possible.
This has been a bit of a tough lesson, especially with certain things, but I have learned that simplicity is key. The Occam’s razor principle can and perhaps should almost always be applied.
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What’s your all-time favorite album?
Aenima by Tool
The answer to this question has not changed since the first time I listened to this album when I was 15.
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Responding to Weekly Prompts – Weekend Challenge
Weekly Prompts – Weekend Challenge – Wrong
Anyone who knows me knows that I am big on the meaning of words and their relationship to one another. Wrong is an interesting word. If you check out the dictionary definition, you will see that most of the definitions are saying that wrong is something that is not something else. Something that is not moral, not just, not successful, not accurate. The list goes on.
I think that “wrong” in many cases is actually a subjective term. Now, if you say 2+2 = 7, that is wrong. It is not a factual statement at all. In any given non-arithmetic situation, you could say, “That person was wrong for doing what they did.” Were they? Perhaps. But the idea of wrongness invokes and necessitates a certain amount of emotion, and therefore, subjectivity.
Something can feel wrong but not be wrong. And, at the same time, something can be wrong and not feel wrong. Allow me to explain. A child who deals with abuse at home will perhaps grow up to be a person who does not stand up for themselves. Doing so feels wrong to them because it is not familiar, but most people will agree that standing up for yourself is right, and it is important. On the flip side, you squish a mosquito or a spider. It doesn’t feel wrong because of the consensus that these creatures are pests, but in a way, it is wrong because you are ending a life.
And that’s the thing, isn’t it? In so many cases, the idea of “wrong” has to do with the societal consensus, with the overall judgements of the culture and the era. Where is it that we can find objective evaluations of what wrong is? I don’t know that we can. I don’t believe that life or the universe or perhaps even god in whatever form, is concerned with right vs wrong. It is concerned with balance. In any system, micro or macro, the net-net of any transaction or interaction is zero – you see this in finance, in physics, in math, in many personal relationships. The system is attempting to maintain homeostasis, to balance both sides of the equation for a net gain of zero so that things continue the way that they were designed to.
“Wrong” is largely a subjective judgement placed on things in a broad way to keep society in line. Perhaps we are on the right track with those judgements, but we have no way of knowing for sure because of our physiological and mental limitations.
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The first dog I had as an adult was Patch. She was a mutt, but definite pit bull and boxer in the mix.
This dog was my freaking world, and I know for a fact that she would have done anything to protect me. I love the dogs I have now, but definitely felt safest when I had Patch around.
Patch was multi-faceted, and very smart. She would oversee any home improvement projects, with a required test sniff/lick of any tools or materials being used. She would run behind the tv to catch perpetrators who ran off screen, and she absolutely loved fries from Five Guys. She would lick the peanut butter away, then spit out the medicine hidden inside it. She patrolled the yard relentlessly, and even protected us from two “assault” skunks.
We spread her ashes around the perimeter of the yard to commemorate her devotion to protecting her domain and her humans.
It’s been years, but I still miss her terribly.
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Share a lesson you wish you had learned earlier in life.
Well, this is a bit of a loaded question since hindsight is 20/20 and I don’t think I know a single person who would not want the opportunity to be better prepared for things. Having said that….
I wish I knew earlier in life that not everyone is going to work, play, and/or love as hard or as much as you do, and that it is unfair to expect yourself from other people. Had I known that from the get go, I could have saved myself a lot of stress, pain, and frustration.
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I had an awesome conversation with a friend of mine over breakfast today. For the record, conversation with her is always awesome, but I’m going to share this particular part of this one.
In the somewhat crazy and always varied range of topics, the word selfless came up, and how being selfless is generally considered to be a good quality. At most points in my life, I definitely agreed with this. But, I have learned that it can be taken to an unhealthy extreme. Like anything else in life, moderation is key. It is possible to be so selfless in your service of others that you literally find yourself without a sense of self (i.e. – “self-less”). Also, without a concept of caring for yourself, and knowledge of the fact that if you don’t do so, you cannot take care of other people.
It’s conversations like this that drive me and inspire me, talking about the human condition, why and how we do the things we do, how balance in everything is essential. All of it, and more. I just love it. This was a great start to the day.
Happy Sunday!
A Peculiar Cerebral Tangle 