{"id":1744,"date":"2010-02-04T21:10:40","date_gmt":"2010-02-04T20:10:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/?p=1744"},"modified":"2010-02-04T21:10:40","modified_gmt":"2010-02-04T20:10:40","slug":"changed-or-painted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/2010\/02\/04\/changed-or-painted\/","title":{"rendered":"Changed or painted?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A new outlook, but is it not the same person looking out?<\/em><\/p>\n

I have previously mentioned how I felt different here in Riverview than I did in the previous house. \u00c2\u00a0But then I have only been here for a few days. \u00c2\u00a0It is hard to say which of the changes are permanent, and which come from being uprooted and taken out of the “everyday” state of mind.<\/p>\n

It is possible to paint over a rotten wall or a rusted car and hide the bad stuff somewhat for a time. \u00c2\u00a0But this does not really change anything. \u00c2\u00a0The rot and the rust keep doing their work. So I will not just automatically rejoice when I seem to have a fit of spirituality here. \u00c2\u00a0It could be just from being around a man of prayer and good deeds for two days. \u00c2\u00a0It could be just from a glimpse of how much money and time I have wasted on hobbies that now mean nothing or nearly nothing to me. \u00c2\u00a0I could be just from being reminded that everything in this world is temporary, that the things we took for given are certain to change and leave us, or we them.<\/p>\n

Is there anything I can do to wake up now that I am half awake? \u00c2\u00a0Is there any way to secure my gain before it slips through my fingers again? \u00c2\u00a0For it is obvious that if we take anything with us when we leave, it is not of this realm. \u00c2\u00a0And eternity is hard to deny when you have seen it so many times. \u00c2\u00a0 It could certainly be an illusion, but so could the world.<\/p>\n

I am not so much thinking “how can I know” but rather “how can I act on what I know”. \u00c2\u00a0How can I avoid being fooled again and again the same way I was in the past. \u00c2\u00a0I spent a small fortune (by my personal standards at \u00c2\u00a0least) on CDs, another small fortune on computer games, another small fortune on clothes, another on comics and light fantasy \/science fiction novels. \u00c2\u00a0I still have remnants of all these things with me, even after having pruned them over and over. Like karma, they follow me around, remind me of my past stupidity, and force the question: Is there perhaps a current stupidity of the same size but invisible because I still live in it?<\/p>\n

Another possibility is of course that my seeming change of mind is somewhat real. Perhaps it is because I am currently on my second reading of The Philosophy of Progress<\/em> – after all, according to the product description on Amazon.com, “By repeatedly reading this book you will experience this extraordinary feeling that your soul is making great progress.” \u00c2\u00a0As I said last time I quoted this, there may be a difference between making great progress and feeling that one is making great progress. (Although feeling that you should have made much more progress is probably a fairly reliable sign of actual progress.)<\/p>\n

I picked up the small leaflet by Elias Aslaksen the other night, in Norwegian “M\u00c3\u00a5ten \u00c3\u00a5 ta det p\u00c3\u00a5” \u00c2\u00a0(the way to take it), where he explains the path to happiness in a few pages, lucidly and intensely. \u00c2\u00a0Nothing other people do or say can decide my happiness or unhappiness, only the way I react to those things, and the way I conduct my own life. I may feel bad for them if they do something wrong, but there is no reason why this should make me do something wrong too. \u00c2\u00a0After all, what I do is my responsibility.<\/p>\n

This small tract made an enormous impact on me when I was about 15, and my life changed direction completely and never quite went back. \u00c2\u00a0Actually I continued to act as if other people could move my mouth and my hands, because I forgot myself over and over. I still find the compass needle of my mind swinging like crazy because of other people, but there is a slowly growing space inside where I have the chance to correct myself before I derail. \u00c2\u00a0Perhaps if I had read that leaflet over and over when I was 15, my soul would have continued to make progress until today? \u00c2\u00a0Well, I guess in some ways it has, but wow. \u00c2\u00a0It is very much like the movements of a badly drunk man. \u00c2\u00a0I guess you could call it “staggering progress”… It is truly humbling (or should I say humiliating) to have wandered for 35 years and come back and see how much I truly had, if I had been able to see it. \u00c2\u00a0But of course these 35 years may have been the only way to show me that, and even now I wonder if I can hold on to it.<\/p>\n

Whatever can help me increase that space, that bubble of expanded Now between impulse and action, I want more of it. \u00c2\u00a0As long as I still have time to play The Sims, right? \u00c2\u00a0Right?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reflections on the state of my soul. Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1744","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-autobiography","category-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1744"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1780,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1744\/revisions\/1780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.chaosnode.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}