Marco, Roger, Rich and assorted Davids
DAVID_ATHERFOLD wrote
> The caveman who decided to try planting food where HE wanted it
> instead of searching for it was exhibiting Dynamic quality. Once he'd
> done it, figured out the rules, (Static Latching) he was in a better
> quality situation.
Which succintly captures the balance between static and dynamic which is itself as
ancient as the universe. You see the "betterness" you capture it then you use it to
propell yourself to even better betterness.
> All obvious stuff.
Right, but we've got to start somewhere.
> Can this be applied at a personal level - well yes but people have
> much more variation than societies. I know people who are in a high
> quality situation (measured by their own feelings) in an almost 100%
> static environment. Go to work, untaxing job, get money, go to pub,
> watch soaps on TV, go to the soccer match, sex on a Friday night. Low
> stress perfectly happy and content. I know others who would be driven
> to suicide by this routine.
It's definitely different for different people. Bo's warnings about the dangers of too
much static are true enough, but we're not all aging Norwegians;-) An excess of static
is definitely the problem in my life and I imagine in most others.
> OR you can make the dynamic leap to free yourself from the static
> behaviour of "always looking for something better". For many people
> this latch results in a very low quality situation - constant
> dissatisfaction with the NOW.
Right again, too much change is static too. Basically there is no definition of static
or dynamic, change can be static, stability dynamic. Even dancing naked round bonfires
can get kinda old after all while. It all depends on your initial static patterns.
> The real life person who causes a dynamic shift in static values of the
> intellect or of society (as opposed to his own values) does not necessarily
> end up in a high quality situation himself (Jesus, Van Gogh, Mozart,
> Galileo etc.)
> I believe the Buddha made it. I hope Phaedrus has.
See your point but I'm not so sure that they would all agree with you entirely on
that. Death isn't the worst thing that can happen. Perhaps they would have considered
their lives worse had they not pursued the Dynamic Quality that they saw.
And another newcomer Marco wrote:
>First, the knowledge of the evolutionary nature of the universe, as Pirsig
>has evidenced in Lila.
>We know that Pirsig has defined the weight of past experiences as an immune
>system, and we know that it is moral that a new idea modifies the status
>quo, so we can be ready to face new experiences.
Indeed, sometimes just acknowledging and understanding the process of evolution makes
it easier to handle.
David B wrote:
>this is just one guy's opinion. But I think the dearth of
>substantial ideas is pretty obvious. And where is all the anger coming
>from? Does this topic upset people? Is it something I've said? We've got
>ten days left. Let's put it out on the table. What's going on here?
I'm also surprised because I thought this would be an easy, lighter topic. I knew the
skientific hard-heads would ignore it, but I thought it would bring out new ideas that
had previously been stifled by too much ungrounded theorizing. But actually it has
turned out to be harder than I anticipated.
I've found that the prescription "obtain dynamic and static at the same time" is
accurate but not very practical. This was coldly brought to light in Rocky's
"every-American-man" post. You couldn't just blab some nice mystic verse in return to
that, obviously we need a practical answer. Roger seemed to have it in his wonderful
post on attending to everyday life. I think he captured the essence of motorcycle
maintenance in that and applied it creatively for working people.
Marco seems also to be onto the same thing
>If you consider your job, the kiss for
>your wife every morning, the games with your children, the lunches in family
>as a ritual, you do not feel that weight, and you do not need time for
>yourself: every your moment is time for yourself, even if it's spent in
>routine activities. And every your RTA moment can be the right one to
>become unexpectedly a moment for a dynamic increase for yourself.
I felt that David B's investigations into dhyana were the most intriguing path this
month though. Ironically I was the one lecturing everyone on paying attention to chap
30, but I was really refering to the arete "rt" journey in which dynamic is found
through the perfection of static. I hadn't paid so much attention to dhyana. But going
back to the book it's right there preceding the "rt" section.
Been thinking about Roger's post and dhyana and wondering how to reconcile the two. It
seems that while attention to the details of everyday life is clearly right, first, it
isn't entirely practical -
