"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master - that's all." - Lewis Carroll (Through the Looking Glass")
OBJECTIVES:
(a) To establish the importance of definitions.
(b) To define "cow dung" - "conventional wisdom of the dominant group;" to suggest that certain people may have an investment in the ignorance of others.
(c) To formulate flexible principles of definition, allowing for evolu-tion in the meaning of concepts.
(d) To emphasize the incredible power of definition.
(e) To start prompting the reader to jump out of whatever mental or intellectual system he or she may be in.
(f) To define concept, notion, habit, and principle.
(g) To persuade the reader to question the concept of "law."
(h) To indicate the arbitrariness of the mental symbol fictions we use to represent the world.
(i) To suggest the notion: To the extent that you create your own definitions, you become master of your thinking (see the Carroll quote above); but to the extent that your concepts, ideas, et., misrepresent actuality, you are likely to have a great fall.
(j) To introduce two new words: "unicept" and "groupcept." "Unicept" refers to a concept like "bird," where there is a direct, one-to-one relationship between word and thing; "groupcept" refers to a concept like "flock."
(k) To provide you with an effective, easy-to-use technique for achieving happiness in the face of disappointments and pitfalls, called the "option process."
Remember what Maslow said about defining the old words in new ways? About new definitions? About new ways of seeing the world?
Before I discuss anything with you, you must define your terms. - Voltaire
Cow dung:"Conventional wisdom of the dominant group;" generally, what is considered as "wisdom" by those in positions of coercive power; more accurately, what those in positions of coercive "authority" want the "masses" to believe in order for domination and submission to be perpetuated. Cow dung can masquerade as "scientific wisdom;" "religious wisdom;" "political wisdom;" "mystical wisdom;" "occult wisdom;" "everybody knows;" "the voice of authority;" and "education."
Without going out of the door, one can know the whole world; without peeping out of the window, one can see the Tao of heaven. The further one travels, the less one knows; therefore, the sage knows everything without traveling; he names everything without seeing it; he accomplishes everything without doing it. - Tao Te Ching
Principles of Definition:
(a) No definitions are final;
(b) The growth of knowledge will be enhanced by defining certain words and concepts in such a way that the evolution of their meaning is reflected in their definitions;
(c) Concepts are not cast in concrete;
(d) Questioning, from time to time, every concept, every word, every definition, will enhance knowledge;
(e) Concepts and words are tools - the master craftsmen and craftswomen improve both their tools and the proficiedncy with which they wield their tools;
(f) Certain things should be defined in terms of their potential, what they could become at their best (Aristotle).
At the beginning of the century, when physicists extended the range of their investigations into the realms of atomic and subatomic phenomena, they suddenly became aware of the limitations of their classical ideas and had to radically revise many of their basic concepts about reality. The experience of questioning the very basis of their conceptual framework and of being forced to accept profound modifications of their most cherished ideas was dramatic and often painful for those scientists, especially during the first three decades of the century, but it was rewarded by deep insights into the nature of matter and the human mind. - Fritjof Capra ("The Turning Point")
The Power of Definition: Hurtling down a narrow chute of rushing water, in a kayak, with a girlfriend - the River Lesse, Ardennes Mountains, suddenly it hits me like an unseen submerged rock: It's all a matter of definition. The river is the definition of where the water flows. The water has no choice but to flow along its definition. On entering the kayak, we defined ourselves - now, we are pulled down the rapids in the kayak. We have no choice but to go where the water takes us.
And having defined (confined?) ourselves this way, we have to "obey" the "laws" of the water and the kayak. If we don't keep the kayak heading in the right direction, we are likely to get wet and/or hurt.
Of course, we know that we defined (confined?) ourselves in this way. We didn't have to assume this definition (confinement?) if we didn't want to. We are doing it for fun. When this particular pastime is over, we will define (confine?) ourselves as passengers in an automobile and drive home. Then, we will have to "obey" the "laws" of the road and the car. If we don't keep the car going in the right direction at the right speed, we won't get home. We might even get hurt or killed...
Man is the animal that speaks; understanding language is, thus, the key to understanding man; and the control of language, to the control of man.
Hence, it is that men struggle not only over territory, food, and raw materials, but today, perhaps most of all, over language. For to control the word is to be the definer: God, king, pope, president, legislator, scientist, psychiatrist, madman - you and me. God defines everything and everyone. The totalitarian leader aspires to similar grandeur. The ordinary person defines some aspects of himself and of a few others. But even the most modest and powerless of men defines something no one else can: His own dreams.
And we are all defined, as well: By our genes, which shape us; our parents, who name us; our society, which classifies us; and so on. - Thomas Szasz ("The Second Sin")
My friends, dare you take your lives in your own hands and define yourselves?
My friends, dare you create and define your own concepts, words, and language?
Or would you rather leave that task to those who would slaughter you?
Concepts, in the field of cognition, perform a function similar to that of numbers in the field of mathematics. - Ayn Rand ("Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology")
Concept: (From concipere: to take in): What one is pregnant with (it can become a "baby"); the cause of the beginning or origin of something; what one has taken into one's mind; a mental representation of some aspect of reality: thing, process, event, value, condition, phenomenon, pattern, regularity, or structure; an image or picture in the mind; a unit or building block of information; a unit of meaning or significance; the meaning of a word; a thought, idea, notion, or understanding; an abstract or generic idea generalized from particular instances.
Philosophers...have trusted in concepts as completely as they has mistrusted the senses: They have not stopped to consider that concepts and words are our inheritance from ages in which thinking was very modes and unclear.
What dawns on philosophers last of all: They must no longer accept concepts as a gift, nor merely purify and polish them, but first make and create them, present them, and make them convincing. Hitherto, one has generally trusted one's concepts as if they were a wonderful dowry from some sort of wonderland; but they are, after all, the inheritance from our most remote, most foolish, as well as most intelligent, ancestors. - Friedrich Nietzsche ("The Will to Power")
In all I have read and learned about philosophy and psychology, no one comes close to questioning basic concepts to the extent that Nietzsche did; G. I. Gurdjieff was probably a distant second...
Jumping Out of a System: It is an inherent property of intelligence that it can jump out of the task which it is performing and survey what it has done; it is always looking for, and often finding, patterns. Now, I said that an intelligence can jump out of its task, but that does not mean that it always will; however, a little prompting will often suffice...of course, there are cases where only a rare individual will have the vision to perceive a system which governs many people's lives, a system which had never before even been recognized as a system; thne, such individuals often devote their lives to convincing other people that the system really is there and that it ought to be exited from! - Douglas Hofstadter ("Goedel, Escher, Bach")
Notion: An inclusive general concept; an individual's conception or impression of something known, experienced, imagined, or dreamt; a theory or belief held by a person or group; a personal inclination; a general, vague, or imperfect conception or idea of something. (Example: The "second notion of thermodynamics" which, in its most general form, states: "The universe is running down." I am suggesting that maybe we should excise the concept/word "law" (in all its meanings) from our brains and our dictionaries and replace it with "notion"? Consider the implications...crazy? Frightening to one's mental stability and sense of security?...Whether we should go to such extremes to escape from our conceptual straightjackets is, of course, debatable.)
"Do you believe in ghosts?"
"...the laws of science contain no matter and have no energy, either, and therefore do not appear except in people's minds."
"...and what that means is that the law of gravity appears nowhere except in people's heads! It's a ghost! We are - all of us - very arrogant and conceited about running down other people's ghosts, but just as ignorant and barbaric and superstitious about or own."
"...your common sense is nothing more than the voices of thousands and thousands of these ghosts from the past. Ghosts and more ghosts. Ghosts trying to find their place among the living." - Robert Pirsig ("Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance")
(I have taken the liberty of replacing "exist" by "appear" in the above quotations, as I think the latter is more appropriate.) Note that the above does not deny the usefulness of utilizing notions of gravity as descriptions for certain observable phenomena. Also, the fact that you can write some notion concerning gravity on a piece of paper does not mean that "the notion appears on paper;" it does mean that when someone reads the squiggles on the paper, the notion appears in his or her head. Finally, the notion appears only momentarily in the mind while it is being thought of. - "AS"
Habit: Clothing; a costume characteristic of a calling, rank, or function; manner of conducting oneself: bearing; the prevailing disposition or character of a person's thoughts and feelings; mental makeup; a settled tendency or usual manner of behavior; a behavior pattern acquired by frequent repetition or physiologic exposure that shows itself in regularity or increased facility of performance; an acquired mode of behavior that has become nearly or completely involuntary: addiction; characteristic mode of growth or occurrence (like crystal formation).
There are, basically, two kinds of habits: Universal habits (also called "natural habits") that govern the universe; and human habits that govern humans. Some habits are more difficult to change than other habits. This "governing" occurs in an interesting manner: In the center of the universe sits the "universal habit maker" (also called "Mother Nature") at a computer console from where she initiates universal habits, which are relayed via galactic centers to individual suns, being the centers of solar systems. In this way, planets are "governed." Humans have habit centers in their brains connected to the solar habit center. This is the way humans are "governed," and this is also the reason why sun worship is the only sensible religion.
Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed. - Francis Bacon
Really...? You must listen to the "voice of nature" and obey it; then, you will be in command. - "AS"
Seriously, if you don't believe that habits "govern" the universe, I suggest you read "A New Science of Life" by Rupert Sheldrake:
"A New Science of Life" is a extraordinary and revolutionary new theory, which puts forward a radically new way of looking at life and nature.
Existing science explains the regularities of nature in terms of laws assumed not to change through time. Dr. Sheldrake suggests that these regularities are, in fact, more like habits, depending on what has happened before and, also, on how often things have happened.
He calls this new type of causation across time and space "formative causation" and argues that it is responsible for the shapes and instincts of all living things. Experimental evidence shows that when several rats have learned a new pattern of behavior, subsequent rats all over the world tend to learn the same pattern more easily. In other words, living organisms "tune in" to the experience of their predecessors. - From the frontispiece ("A New Science of Life")The hypothesis put forward in this book is based on the idea that morphogenetic fields do, indeed, have measurable physical effects. It proposes that specific morphogenetic fields are responsible for the characteristic form and organization of systems at all levels of complexity...
If morphogenetic fields are responsible for the organization and form of material systems, they must themselves have characteristic structures. So where do these field structures come from? The answer suggested is that they are derived from the morphogenetic fields associated with previous similar systems: The morphogenetic fields of all past systems become present to any subsequent similar system; the structures of past systems affect subsequent similar systems by a cumulative influence, which acts across both space and time...
The hypothesis is concerned with the repetition of forms and patterns of organization...- Rupert Sheldrake ("A New Science of Life")
Certainly, I don't think Sheldrake's ideas should be accepted without a great deal of careful and critical verification. Readers may be interested in pursuing some related ideas from the book, "The Selfish Gene" by Richard Dawkins. The last chapter of this book is called "Memes: The New Replicators," from which I quote:
Examples of memes are tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, clothes fashions, ways of making pots, or of building arches, just as genes propagate themselves in the gene pool by leaping from body to body via sperms or eggs, so memes propagate themselves in the meme pool by leaping from brain to brain via a process which, in a broad sense, can be called imitation. If a scientist hears, or reads about, a good idea, he passes it on to his colleagues and students. He mentions it in his articles and his lectures. If the idea catches on, it can be said to propagate itself, spreading from brain to brain. As my colleague, N. K. Humphrey, neatly summed up an earlier draft of this chapter: "...memes should be regarded as living structures, not just metaphorically, but technically. When you plant a fertile meme in my mind, you literally parasitize my brain, turning it into a vehicle for the meme's propagation in just the way that a virus may parasitize the genetic mechanism of a host cell. And this isn't just a way of talking - the meme, say, "Belief in life after death" is actually realized physically, millions of times over, as a structure in the nervous systems in individual men the world over."
Consider the idea of God... - Richard Dawkins ("The Selfish Gene")
What is the importance of all the above? Clearly, there are some "mechanisms" that "cause" the repetition of "forms," "patterns," and "structures." Careful - we could be falling into a trap here. You see, "mechanisms," "cause" (even "repetition"), "forms," "patterns," and "structures" are all abstract mental symbol fictions we have invented in order to "describe," "explain," and "understand" what we call the "universe."
An important principle of meta-information is that we need to become aware of the difference between concepts like "bird," on the one hand, and "flock" on the other hand. These have different "kinds of concepts," or concepts at different levels of abstraction. The crucial difference is that you can actually see the "entity" we call "bird." You cannot see a "flock." What you see are several birds flying "together" (for a while). In actuality, there is no supposed "flock." If I ask you to bring me a bird, you can catch one and give it to me; I can see it, hold it in my hand, and feel it. If I ask you to bring me a "flock," you cannot do so. You catch some birds and give them to me, I can hold them in my hand, and I can see and feel them; I can see and feel individual birds, but I cannot see nor feel any imagined "flock."
Nevertheless, some symbol fictions, like "flock," are very useful for efficient thinking and communication - they enable us to group together a number of entities with a common property (or several common character-istics), into one concept at a higher level of abstraction, which "represents" all the individual entities lumped together. This facilitates economy and efficiency in thinking and communication.
I have coined the word "groupcept" for concepts like "flock," "herd," "tribe," "nation," "society," "state," "war," etc. For concepts where there is a direct one-to-one relationship between word and thing (like "bird"), I shall use the term "unicept." Note that a groupcept can never represent a volitional entity; only unicept birds can fly; in the case of an abstracted "flock," there are still only unique, individual birds that fly individually.
This ability of abstraction is also a double-edged sword. It can be used and it can be abused. It can empower and it can enslave. Individual birds are volitional entities who can fly on their own. There is no supposed "flock" that can act; only individual birds can fly and chirp. The imagined "flock," as such, does not have two wings with which to fly nor a beak with which to chirp; but some birds are gullible and will swallow almost anything. In fact, there are birds with the most extraordinary "flock beliefs." These birds believe that supposed "flocks" have magical powers to perform miracles of which ordinary birds are not capable; and some birds are so "flock-washed" that they kill other birds and are willing to die "for the flock;" they call it "patriotism..."
Certain concepts are stupefying and violence-breeding. Maybe "law" is one of those. It has these connotations of absolute rigidity, blind obedience, and violent punishment. By the way, how can a so-called "law" be "broken"? What are the consequences of carrying such a concept in our brains? I am suggesting that we excise the concept/word "law" from both our dictionaries and our brains and that we replace it by the much more appropriate "habit" (e.g., "the second habit of thermodynamics"). (Whether we should go to such radical extremes in order to break out of our self-created mental prisons is, undoubtedly, debatable?)
Every word or concept, clear as it may seem to be, has only a limited range of applicability. - Werner Heisenberg
Some words or concepts, clear as they may seem, have an unlimited range of mis-applicability - maybe it would be better to scrap them altogether. - "AS"
Of course, if you want to continue to believe that "laws," as is often said, "govern" the universe, then you would have to explain what kind of creatures these supposed "laws" are and just how they go about their business of "governing" the universe.
Maybe the concept "law" constitutes an obstacle that prevents the discovery of the real basic principles. Could this be an example of a concept which is both stupefying and violence-breeding?
The pretended "law" - that apparently realistic formalization of certain cond-itions for the self-preservation of a community - forbids certain actions directed to certain ends; namely, those that are allegedly directed against the community: It does not forbid the disposition that produces these actions, for it needs these actions for other ends; namely, against those perceived as the "enemies" of the community. Then, the moral idealist appears and says, "The action itself is nothing; one must exterminate the coercive disposition that produces it." Under instances when a community lives abso-lutely outside the necessity of waging war for its existence does one lend an ear to such notions. One abandons a disposition whose utility is no longer apparent.
Then the idealist emerges from a quite different context and is not merely a fantasist: He has arrived at the knowledge that for his kind of reality, such a coarse injunction forbidding definite actions, has no meaning...The idealist formulates a number of new self-preservative principles for men of a quite definite species: In this, he is a realist - he points at the coercive dispositions that lie at the root of life-destroying actions...
To disengage oneself, but without rancor: That presupposes, to be sure, an astonishingly mild and sweet humanity saints.
One is healthy when one can laugh at the earnestness and zeal with which one has been hypnotized by any single detail of our life. - Extracted and paraphrased from: Friedrich Nietzsche ("The Will to Power")
Is it possible that beliefs about the supposed "law" tend to hide (or even reinforce?) the "evil disposition" which manifests as "harmful behavior"? Could it be that attempts to "make laws" tend to result in the opposite or inverse of what the advocates of pretended "laws" claim as their intentions? And if "making laws" could solve problems...
Principle: A fundamental or comprehensive explanation; a rule, code, or explanation of conduct; an underlying faculty, endowment, or ingredient; a meta-description of a thing, process, characteristic, or phenomenon; an abstract human mental construct used to explain or describe the universe or some aspects of the universe.
Principles can be descriptive or predictive or prescriptive or proscriptive.
A utilitarian meta-principle is that descriptive and predictive principles are worth more than prescriptive and proscriptive principles.
Let us here dismiss the two popular concepts "necessity" and "law:" The former introduces a false constraint into the world; the later, a false freedom. "Things" do not behave regularly, according to a "rule": there are no "things" (they are fictions invented by us); they behave just as little under the constraint of "necessity." There is no "obedience" here; for that something is as it is, as strong or as weak, is not the consequence of an "obedience" or a "rule" or a "compulsion."
The degree of resistance and the degree of superior power - this is the question in every "event": If, for our day-to-day calculations, we know how to express this in "formulas" and "laws," so much the better for us! - Friedrich Nietzsche ("The Will to Power")
I am suggesting that we eradicate the concept/word "law" from our brains and dictionaries and that we replace it with the much more appropriate and utilitarian "principle" (in the descriptive or predictive sense); e.g., "the second principle of thermodynamics."
All our notions of "law," "principle," "cause," "effect," "thing," "process," "event," etc. are more and less useful fictions we have invented in order to interpret what we call "the world." At the profoundest level, it becomes obvious that all our concepts, all our language, is arbitrary fiction and can never be anything but falsehood.
But we do need to "describe," to "explain," to "understand," to "communicate," to "interact;" so we utilize our "arbitrary fictions," knowing full well that they are merely convenient lies and pretending that they constitute "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth" when it is expedient to do so.
And we also "know" (because it is "convenient" to "know") that it is "expedient" to be very "judicious" in our choice of fictions because "consequences" will "occur!" (This is a "principle" which may be worth "testing.") - "AS"
Question: If prescriptive and proscriptive principles are to be imposed by some people upon others, by what methods can this be done, and what are the likely consequences?
Question: Is it possible to formulate a system of descriptive and predictive principles concerning human behavior and interaction such that the application of these principles would result in spontaneous order and natural harmony? If so, what would these principles be? How could people be persuaded to apply these principles?
Rules serve best when broken. - Robert Heinlein ("Time Enough for Love")
It is interesting (to me) that, several times, I have considered expunging the above Heinlein sentence from this book. It is just too corny and absurd, I thought, and it just cannot be true; yet, on further reflection, is it not the one sentence which epitomizes all of meta-information: the ultimate profundity?
Note that Heinlein does not say that rules don't serve nor that rules must be broken. He says, "Rules serve best when broken." Maybe we should expand this meta-principle as follows:
Some principles serve some of the time;
Some principles should be broken from time to time;
Some (or is it all?) principles serve best when broken.
There was another point which a little perplexed him at present. I had said that some of our crew left their country on account of being ruined by "law;" that I had already explained the meaning of the word; but he was at a loss how it should come to pass that the "law," which was intended for every man's preservation, should be any man's ruin; therefore, he desired to be farther satisfied what I meant by "law" and the dispensers thereof, according to the present practice in my own country, because he thought nature and reason were sufficient guides for a reasonable animal, as we pretended to be, in showing us what we ought to do and what to avoid..
I said that there was a society of men among us, bred up from their youth in the art of proving by words multiplied for the purpose that white is black and black is white, according as they are paid. To this society, all the rest of the people are slaves...
...these judges are persons appointed to decide all controversies of property, as well as for the trial of criminals, and picked out from the most dexterous lawyers who are grown old or lazy, and having been biased all their lives against truth and equity, lie under such a fatal necessity of favouring fraud, perjury, and oppression...
It is a maxim among these lawyers that whatever hath been done before may legally be done again: and therefore, they take special care to record all the decisions formerly made against common justice and the general reason of mankind. These, under the name of "precedents," they produce as authority to justify the most iniquitous opinions; and the judges never fail of directing accordingly...
It is likewise to be observed that this society hath a peculiar cant and jargon of their own that no other mortal can understand, and wherein all their "laws" are written, which they take special care to multiply; whereby they have confounded the very essence of truth and falsehood, of right and wrong...were my master, interposing, said it was a pity, that creatures endowed with such prodigious abilities of mind as these lawyers, by the description I gave of them, must certainly be, were not rather encouraged to be instructors of others in wisdom and knowledge, in answer to which, I assured his honour, that in all points out of their own trade they were usually the most ignorant and stupid generation among us, the most despicable in common conversation, avowed enemies to all knowledge and learning, and equally disposed to pervert the general reason of mankind in every other subject of discourse, as in that of their own profession. - Jonathan Swift ("A Voyage to the Houyhnhnms")
Many species have become extinct as a result of what are called "evolutionary errors." Is it possible that the concept of "law" is an evolutionary error of such magnitude that it alone can result in the extinction of the human species?
The Option Process:
Think of the collection of debilitating, stupefying, and self-destructive beliefs carried by any one member of the human species as a giant iceberg; nine-tenths of the iceberg is below the surface of the water in which it drifts. Most of the iceberg is invisible, except to a deep-sea diver. The beliefs about imaginary "laws" are very near the bottom of the iceberg - so deep that very few divers can dive down far enough to find them. The top of the iceberg is in sunshine, above the surface of the water, and is slowly melting. In this part of the iceberg, we find the beliefs about happiness and unhappiness as a result of which many humans are unhappy a lot of the time. As these surface beliefs melt in the happy sunshine of enlightenment, the rest of the iceberg rises closer to the surface, and more crazy beliefs become available for melting; for some humans, it might take many years of "surface melting" before the deeper beliefs rise to the surface; some humans build bigger and better ice factories on top of their icebergs; and maybe every human has the ability to dissolve his or her entire iceberg in a flash? Is it not all in the mind?
Perhaps the person who has dissolved most of his or her iceberg can maintain a high degree of happiness and will find it relatively easy to contemplate the notion that belief in ghostly "laws" is absurdity! If you are not one of these fortunate (!) individuals, then I suggest that you forget all I have said about so-called "law" and that you work on dissolving any surface beliefs that may be the source of any unhappiness you may be subject to from time to time.
Consider these options:
In love relationships: (a) Each of us is responsible for his or her own unhappiness; (b) If my lover does not do what I want, that says nothing about his loving me.
In parent-child interaction: (a) What my child does is not a statement about me; (b) I do not cause my child's unhappiness; he does not cause mine.
In self-discovery: (a) There are no good or bad beliefs; (b) Each of us is our own expert."To love is to be happy with" shows you how to listen to the truth of your own nature for guidance and direction in all areas of your life, and you can do it because all you have to do is choose to do it.
There's no need to wait for happiness. From this page on, it's yours whenever you want it. - Barry Neil Kaufman ("To Love Is To Be Happy With")
So begins the option process. Of course, if human beings are volitional creatures with power of choice, then they can choose to be unhappy and be unhappy - or choose to be happy and be happy; but it can't be that simple - we need a method or a technique or a system.
The option process:
(1) What are you unhappy about? What do you mean by that? What about that makes you unhappy?
(2) Why are you unhappy about that? What do you mean by that?
(3) Why do you believe that? Do you believe that?
(3) (Alt.) What are you afraid would happen if you weren't unhappy about I?
You ask yourself these questions, as appropriate, not necessarily in the above sequence. You verbalize them - out loud, if possible. (Note that the second (3) is an alternative to the first (3). There is a fourth very useful question that can be asked at any point during the process: "What do you want?" - Taken from "To Love Is To Be Happy With" by Barry Neil Kaufman
The option process is based on the notion that all our behavior, including our emotional responses, are based on underlying beliefs; furthermore, we can change our beliefs and, hence, both our emotional responses and our behavior; we can change the information we carry in our brains.
...I began immediately to crystallize a knowledge I had always had, but which had never been brought into awareness. As it materialized for me, I could feel the blood racing through my arteries. All my feelings and behavior did come from my beliefs, and those beliefs could be investigated and changed by my own choosing. It seemed disarmingly simplistic...
Unhappiness was finally taken out of the closet of mental health and put back into what the ancient Greeks called the arena of philosophy. Questions and dialogues were not indictments or judgments being made for diagnosis...they were merely catalysts to help clarify my beliefs and my thinking process. "Why am I unhappy?" and "What do I want for me?" became a profoundly moving perspective by which I could approach myself and precipitate new choices. I realized how I had used myself against myself because of what I had believed. What really dazzled me was my increasing awareness that I had learned to be unhappy.The unhappy mechanism had been internalized and operated with consistent regularity. Being uncomfortable was an unquestioned ingredient in my life as well as in the lives of all those around me. It was a way of dealing with myself and my environment...essentially, there was nothing to do to be happy but to remove the unhappiness and let go the self-defeating beliefs that short-circuited my flow. It almost appeared too easy, too permissive, too soft - not concrete enough. There was no one telling me what to do or adding to the already overwhelming mountain of "shoulds" and "have tos." I was at the throttle, giving myself opportunities to unpack a lifetime of self-destructive beliefs. As I continued to explore and unearth them, I found many which I immediately and decisively chose to discard.
The concepts and ideas of "option" came through to me with such clarity and substance that they required no support other than my own acknowledgment. There was no directing expert who asserted his vision and authority by reasons of credentials, age, or money. The meaning and truth transcends the voice and personality of the teacher who transmits it. Ultimately, the prominent voice we learn to respect is our own...
There is only one expert on me and my world, and that's me. Only one expert on you and your world, and that's you!
...We have experienced change as we have come to perceive, understand, and discard self-defeating beliefs. As "believing animals," we have always set our own limits. But it is also within our power and providence to remove those limits or barriers which stifle us...for they remain only as living relics of a distrusting and fearful culture.
Our beliefs are judgments, freely made and maintained, yet alterable. Each of us has the freedom to choose and change...
We learned to be unhappy (acquired beliefs of unhappiness) which, in scope and content, taught us to move against our flow with self-defeating ramifications. If nothing is wrong with us - and nothing ever was - then to listen to the truth of our own nature for guidance and direction is an affirmation of self...and an act of trusting our humanity. For some, this thrust might appear anarchistic, selfish, and - perhaps - anti-social; yet, in order to conceive moving in harmony with myself as an act against those around me, I would still have to be believing "something was wrong with me"...that in my wanting and moving from my good feelings, I would be acting in a manner harmful to others...
Thus, "option" is a path back to ourselves, not so much a rigid tool or learned technique as it is an attitude and a developing process of seeing. The truths and revelations come through us rather than to us. What we confirm and affirm is on no one's authority but our own. We verify what is so based on our knowing. No one will stand at the crossroads directing us to the left or right, no one at the blackboard outlining the desired activities. It is for us to decide...
Once we peel away the multi-layered skin of beliefs which we have acquired (by acting on them and giving them power), we find our own equilibrium and learn to heed the direction of our inner currents. This expression of our individuality and creativity is an act of nature...in conformity with other acts of nature...
As happy people, we will find ourselves getting more of what we want and wanting more of what we get. Being everything we ever wanted to be begins here.
Having begun to dispose of the burden of acquired beliefs and judgments which are self-defeating - and having learned to shift gears in perceiving our lives through using the option process dialogues - our newly enriched self-acceptance will liberate previously blocked energies and endow us with new power to move comfortably and lovingly with ourselves and our lives. - Barry Neil Kaufman ("To Love Is To Be Happy With")
Whatever the level of your happiness, I recommend that you purchase Barry Neil Kaufman's book and/or that you test the option process yourself. For further information, write to "Option Living," P. O. Box 388, Roslyn, New York 11576, U.S.A.
The book is well-structured, including chapters on:
Each chapter is followed by "Questions to Ask Yourself;" "Option Concepts to Consider;" and "Beliefs to Consider Changing." In my opinion, all the suggestions in these lists are worth considering. In addition, the book contains eleven "dialogues" demonstrating the option process in action. All in all, it is a pearl of meta-information.
Points to Remember:
(a) The importance of definition.
(b) There is a great deal of "cow dung" in the world.
(c) Concepts are not cast in concrete.
(d) The meanings of concepts need to be questioned from time to time.
(e) The significance of notion, habit, and principle.
(f) You may be operating out of an arbitrary system without realizing it; all your basic concepts could be more or less useful mental symbol fictions.
(g) "Law" might be a stupefying and violence-breeding concept.
(h) Principles can be descriptive, predictive, prescriptive, or pro-scriptive.
(i) In order to become the master of your thinking and responsible for your behavior, it may be necessary that you create your own concepts.
(j) The meanings of "unicept" and "groupcept."
(k) The possibility that the belief in imagined "law" could be a terminal evolutionary error.
(l) The option process:
Clarity Check:
(a) How do you think concepts or words should be defined, if at all?
(b) Do you think it is possible to jump out of "one's system," or is this just an illusion?
(c) What do you think about the concept, "law"?
(d) Do you think any of these concepts are useful: Cow dung, concept, notion, habit, principle?
(e) Are concepts or ideas realities in themselves, or are they merely more or less useful mental symbol fictions we have invented in order to think, to understand the world, and to communicate?
(f) Do you find it uncomfortable or threatening to question the most basic concepts which are usually taken for granted?
(g) Do you think that there are certain basic concepts that are absolutes, which should not be questioned, but taken for granted? If so, what are they?
(h) Could you create your own concepts? If everybody created their own concepts, would communication still be possible?
(i) Have you read "The Annotated Alice" by Lewis Carrol, edited by Martin Gardner?
(j) What is the difference between "groupcept" and "unicept"?
(k) What do you think of the notion that the belief in imagined "law" might be a terminal evolutionary error?
(l) What are you unhappy about?
(m) Why are you unhappy about that?
(n) Why do you believe that?
(o) What are you afraid would happen if you weren't unhappy about it?
(p) What do you want?
(q) What is your general opinion of the book so far? Do you think you might modify or refine this opinion as you continue?
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