Conversation Board - Questions...

1796

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Re: Questions...
Reply #15 - Aug 20^th, 2015 at 8:52am

The terms positive and negative are used differently by different people. Some use them to mean effective and effected, and some use them as beneficial and detrimental, and some use them to mean feels good and feels bad. But what is beneficial can feel bad, detrimental may feel good, and effective and effected can be either beneficial or detrimental, and may feel good or bad. And others use them to mean optimistic and pessimistic, or realistic and unrealistic, or to refer to energising emotions and energy draining emotions........ So the terms positive and negative have little meaning anymore.

Feeling close to God can be a deceptive feeling:

Google Islamic beheading videos and watch Muslims feeling close to God while puddling in flowing blood and severing one head after another to the sounds of koranic verses, holy muslim songs, and chants of allah hu akbar (God is great).

Even love can be a deceptive feeling:

Love can go wrong while feeling quite convinced it is the purest and truest form of love. If love forgets to love others for their freewill, then it becomes not love but an oppressive affection that stifles others, seeks to restrict the ones it claims to love and care for. It oppresses their freewilled life and their potential to freely learn and grow, and ultimately such love becomes hatred that believes itself to be love. And yet all the time it feels itself to be love, feels itself to be right and good and caring.

For example, see the oppressive love of a domineering and manipulative parent who oppresses the life of their “child” through most of their adult life. All the while the parent's love feels and believes itself to be genuine caring love.

The same sort of love is sometimes see in a manipulative controlling spouse of either gender, who treats the other like a puppet, and the marriage becomes a dreadful dance of mutual struggle against each other, rather than mutual helpfulness.

And see the oppressive “caring” and “compassion” of those who like to be seen as society’s do-gooders, telling others which words they can and cannot use, and which thoughts and opinions are acceptable to have, and are always looking out for another item and activity to ban or restrict.

Such oppression and suffering inflicted on others by deluded love, caring, compassion, that feels itself to be so good and right, but does not appreciate and respect the freewill of others.

And affairs of the heart, so powerful, driven by blinding misplaced love that feels to those involved to be so true, real and perfect. Eventually the blinding bubble of seemingly perfect love bursts, and with restored vision the affair couple look around and see their families and lives in ruins.

Other feelings can be deceptive too:

Hate (the desire to harm or see harm done to another/s) seldom feels as it is so often portrayed to feel, angry and vicious, but so often feels righteous, energised, motivated, even spiritual, purposeful, and love driven.

Jealousy, that most mad, insane and destructive of emotions/feelings, is always convinced it is love.

Envy so often feels fair minded.

Indignation and rage, always feel justified.

Anger always feels itself to be in the right. That is what makes is so difficult to give up. Yet it is usually wrong.

The junkie's habit and all the crime and misery that comes of it to himself and others, driven by him holding the value to "feel good" uppermost above all other values. And most of his life, the media, teachers, mothers, youth workers, have all continually emphasised to him the importance of feeling good. Even his drug and alcohol counsellor continues to do so.

People are currently so neurotically obsessed with their feelings and with feeling good that in some democratic states we see the do-gooders/feel-gooders pushing through legislation to prevent people from hurting other people’s feelings. People play the victim, convince themselves they are traumatised, sue each other and claim compensation, because someone made them feel an unpleasant emotion or feeling.

Psychologists and counsellors commonly teach clients made vulnerable and receptive by crisis that “there is no truth, only different people’s perception and feelings”, and ask clients “what do your feelings tell you to do?”, and advise clients to “honour your emotions”, and “follow your feelings”, and "your feelings are true", "listen to your feelings", and "don't start your sentences with I think..., but with I feel...", and "don't think - feel".

And as we see, so many marriages are ruined by following extramarital feelings, both carnal and the more powerful feelings that come with affairs of the heart; and so many crimes are committed and jails filled by those who follow their feelings. Feelings that felt so good and right at the time.

So many people reduced to being weak and neurotic by over valuing their emotions and feelings.

Emotions do not make good decisions, and feelings are not good guides. Our worst decisions in life are usually made by following our feelings, and mostly by following feelings that feel good or right and justified. Ask any prisoner, drug addict, divorcee, or nearly any responsible person whose life has been off the rails, and who has found their better judgement.

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recoverer

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Re: Questions...
Reply #16 - Aug 20^th, 2015 at 12:28pm

Good point Kathy.

Regarding 1796's response, the more a person recognizes the existence of his psychological conditioning and overcomes it, and the more he finds fulfillment by reconnecting to Source; then the more he will be able to listen to his heart without being fooled by subconscious thought patterns that aren't in line with what his heart is trying to tell him.

I believe that what our heart tries to tell us and what our conscience tries to tell us is the same thing. I figure that Source (God) isn't a mindless expanse of love. God's being contains much wisdom and truth. The more we silence our inaccurate subconscious thought patterns and attachments, the more our heart will be able to connect us to God's wisdom. We have this ability.

Regarding the Do-gooders 1796 likes to talk about, sometimes it is better to see the glass as half full rather than half empty. Going by my experience there are Do-gooders that have genuine reasons for doing what they do. When it comes to atheistic Do-gooders, I believe it is commendable that they try to help others even though they aren't thinking in terms of being rewarded with heaven some day. Radical Islamic terrorists show that the reward angle doesn't always have the best results. Fundamentalist Christians that try to tell consenting adults of the same sex whether or not they should be allowed to get married, is another example of when a non-atheistic do-gooder attitude can be wrong.

Sure Do-gooders can have ego problems at times. This is true with pretty much everybody including myself. This is the nature of living in this World while inhabiting a self-serving animal body.

Lights of Love wrote on Aug 20^th, 2015 at 12:54am:

Yes, but only if they're of the negative variety.

Negative thoughts and feelings affect the subconscious and create our life experience just as easily as positive ones. The subconscious shows no partiality. What we put into it is what we will manifest in our life. Probably a good idea to choose wisely and hold fast to focusing on feeling Love/God, even if... perhaps, especially if we are going through some sort of disaster, illness and such.

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Justin

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Re: Questions...
Reply #17 - Aug 20^th, 2015 at 1:46pm

Would also add that there can be, and often is, a difference between emotions and feelings even though they are linked/connected.

Feelings are connected to our original way of perceiving and differentiating one experience or consciousness from another. In other words, it's a Soul and Spirit sense that's always existed.

Emotions on the other hand, seem to be more related to the body and the physical experience of being human. Emotions are much louder than the more subtle feeling sense. Ironically, stronger emotions can dampen down awareness of the feeling sense.

While positive emotions can be experienced in combo with the Soul and Spirit feeling sense, often times emotions relate more to what some call the ego part of us and tend more towards the limiting then.

The feeling sense is often related to empathy in some way or form.

The interesting thing about psychopathic types is besides severely lacking conscience and empathy, they also lack a range of both emotional and feeling experiences. They seem to only experience anger/frustration/rage emotionally, otherwise they are flat and practically emotionless. And forget about the subtle feeling sense.

There seems to be a general consensus in psychology that for whatever reason(s), there are more psychopathic men than women. But what's interesting is that there have been some studies done, which show that in both gender's cases, there are higher levels of the hormone testosterone in the bodies of those who fall into the psychopathic spectrum.

Elevated testosterone is well known to increase things like aggression, dominance, sex drive, and dampen down things like empathy, compassion, and intuitive, heart centered feelings of connectedness.

Perhaps one of the reasons why there are more male psychopathic types, is because more males in our western and male dominated society are more concerned about developing the intellect, and put less emphasis on things like feelings, empathy, and other traits that are culturally considered more "feminine" in nature.

That, and the female body in general, seems to be more wired for empathy and connection.

Does this mean that women are "better" than men? Course not, but speaking in a general sense, their respective strengths and weaknesses compliment and balance each others.

While the huge majority of men are not psychopathic, many still have an issue with understanding the importance of experiences like the subtle feeling sense, empathy, receptiveness. Many men are overly polarized to their intellect.

There is a re-balancing going on, and more individuals of both genders are starting to integrate their inner unconscious Yin or Yang as to become more balanced and merged.

Men that are polarized to the intellect and ego, see this as "sissification" of men, and see it only as a negative thing. They also tend to feel threatened by women that are consciously in touch with and integrating their own inner Yang/Masculine. To such men, women like these are bossy, and often labeled derogatory names like those that begin with b.

Truth is, this re-balancing, while it sometimes has it's extreme and imbalanced and thus limited and unwanted reactions, it is the best thing to happen to humanity in a long time. It's one of the many processes occurring, which will lead, in a probability sense, to a Golden age of high spiritual, collective attunment among humanity.

But since Like attracts, begets, and ultimately tends to like Like, those whom are imbalanced and polarized within as to their inner Yin-Yang disconnection, these don't understand nor like this growing, collective process. Ultimately, these types tend to be more slaves of their bodies, which DO tend to be more polarized according to their physical gender, than the informing Soul and Spirit levels of self. The Soul and Spirit levels of self can become stronger than that of the body and it's influences and urges, but it's not common yet in the consistent sense.

Think i may write a separate thread about this interesting topic in relation to Bob Monroe's He/She experience.

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Lights of Love

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Re: Questions...
Reply #18 - Aug 20^th, 2015 at 5:42pm

This discussion has turned to the subject of morality, judgment, consequences and so on, and I agree with what has been said regarding this.

My point is that there is a process in which we humans create/manifest that which we desire regardless of whether or not it is deemed moral, appropriate, healthy, and so on. Each of us has the ability to choose and the more experiences we have, the more possibilities become available to us to choose from. Certainly our cultural beliefs and previous conditioning enter into our available choices.

However, the process is the same for all of us by initially planting an idea/thought in our imagination/subconscious mind and feeding it with feeling in order to manifest what we wish such as become a doctor or that which we would like to become such as peaceful.

Of course, it takes practice, just like learning to drive a car or ride a bike takes practice, but once the know-how is firmly implanted, the subconscious goes on auto-pilot; acts automatically. Most of us spend about 95% of our day being run by the subconscious mind auto-pilot. Only about 5% of the time do we actually use our conscious mind to direct our lives.

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Tread softly through life with a tender heart and a gentle, understanding spirit.

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recoverer Super Member Offline Afterlife Knowledge Member Posts: 5027 Gender:	Re: Questions... Reply #19 - Aug 20^th, 2015 at 7:04pm Kathy: When I read your post, I used my conscious mind 95% of the time and my subconscious 5%. When I drive home tonight I will use my... Perhaps we can reduce some of the 95% when we realize not all of it is needed.
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1796

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Re: Questions...
Reply #20 - Aug 20^th, 2015 at 9:49pm

Light of Love makes some clear and true points about the subconscious.

Recoverer,

Contrast clarifies, and should be used in communication. Nothing can be clarified without contrasting it with other things, particularly with its adjacencies and with its opposite.

Notice that contrast is used right through the Christian gospels; to clarify the concepts taught in the parables, and the contrast between sincerity and hypocrisy is used to clarify the teachings on love, which is essential to do in Christianity because it has within its practice the potential trap of insincerity/hypocrisy which is unique to Christianity because it is a religion of love and goodwill.

Definitions enable us to think.
To progress in any field we need to be able to define things, to recognise how they differ from and articulate with adjacent things, we need to be able to recognise opposing concepts and forces and the workings in between. Ask any physicist, engineer, or master mechanic.

Yet amongst spiritual people words are thrown about with no definitions, used differently from one sentence to the next without explanation, platitudes and thought bubbles presented as if they are established or easily verifiable facts. It is all such vague and fluffy thinking, and it makes to and fro communication almost impossible.

Justin,
Your comments on psychopathy and testosterone are mistaken and typical of poor studies. There exists good tight studies that reveal an entirely different picture. Genuine studies often have to be purchased, but not always.

When assessing studies, look at the raw data, the definitions and categories that underpin the statistics. They should be crisp with clearly defined boundaries. Vague raw data indicates a deceptive study. Notice where definitions are overly wide, where definitions and descriptions include other unsaid subdivisions, especially opposing or contrasting subdivisions, and particularly notice what is not included in the study - the elephants in the room. Assess the questions and their boundaries. A social study is essentially a mindset of those who undertook the study, and by putting our self "into" the raw data then the mindset of those who undertook the study can become apparent. A study tells us more about who designed it than it does about anyone else.

Consider how different the study and its stats would be if the definitions and categories were different to what they are, if they were tighter and more sub-categories included. When raw data is not released or is only partially released, then that is a probable sign of professional fraud and it goes on in psychology and sociology all the time.

Published studies determine the direction of push of psychology and sociology, they steer the industry, establish in-industry status of specialist fields, and underpin psycho-social programs of all sorts, in effect they are significant drivers and steerage of society, so those with vested interests and agendas and who seek to influence individuals, the industry and society are always concocting studies to serve their own interests.

For example, there are many studies that describe psychopathy to include high achievers, successful people, and even good and virtuous people who spend their lives helping others, and such studies like to survey certain occupations, and of course they usually conclude that occupations with people who achieve a lot and who give great personal sacrifice are occupations that are rife with psychopaths. It is all deceptive stats based on ill defined definitions, slippery descriptions, overly broad categories, and with many carefully omitted factors.

Imagine if psychopathy was defined as the love and use of power and control over others for one's own sake, and if psychopathy at its most extreme and effective was defined as that same quality multiplied by the ability to influence others, that influence measured individually and numerically, and if that measure of the amount of influence the psychopath has was used as the measure of the psychopath's power. And naturally the ability to empathise with and sense other people's mindsets and emotional states would be included in that base definition. Then grossness and impulsiveness of the psychopath's deeds would not be a measure of his power, nor would his ability to control one individual for a set period of time indicate great power, but his or her overall ability to control collective others at a deep level, over longer periods of time, even well after contact, even control other psychopaths and potentially get them to do his or her dirty work for his own satisfaction or to make use and personal advantage of it would be the measure of his power. Then instead of the usual group of people statistically classified as psychopaths we would see an entirely different group classified as psychopaths, and they would be graded according to power, and the traditional criminal psychopath would likely be classified as a mere tool of the trade for use by more powerful psychopaths. See, it all comes from stats, which are underpinned by definitions and categories, and which are deliberately designed.

By the way, if you access the raw data on many studies on psychopathy you will notice that the professions of psychologist and sociologist are seldom if ever included in the categories of professions surveyed, and neither is influence used to measure power.

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Justin

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Re: Questions...
Reply #21 - Aug 21^st, 2015 at 5:24am

Briefly re: psychopathy. The defining elements of same are a severe lack of emotionally felt empathy and severe lack of conscience. But it's determined from a multi point cluster of traits. One can argue though, that those cluster of traits stem from those two fundamental lacks.

It's also considered a spectrum btw, hence some are more severely psychopathic than others. Some generally "play by the rules" because they have learned that it benefits them (and keeps them from being discovered by others, because most seem to know they are fundamentally "different"--i know this from reading forums/blogs where such folks frequent and talk about themselves). This does not meant they are virtuous, do gooders in any internal or intention sense.

Re: testosterone link, i did over simplify it, but there is enough research to suggest there is some kind of average link. Does it apply to all cases? Most likelly not. Does it "cause" psychopathy, most likely not. Also, there are people with higher than typical testosterone whom are not technically psychopathic.

Some of the studies i have read, deal with it indirectly. For example, there are a few studies to date that find a link between unusually wide faces in men and at the same time tendencies to cheat and/or lie. Other linked studies indicate those same men with unusually wide faces also tend to have higher than average testosterone levels.

If you would like to discuss this more, feel free to bring this over to the He/She thread i started.

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seagull

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Re: Questions...
Reply #22 - Aug 21^st, 2015 at 4:24pm

I am thinking about the quest to communicate with whomever/whatever in the great beyond which might be called God or whatever word which pleases you. Words such as guides, loved ones, or spirits might be used as well.

We find that we can go "within" to search or "without" to search but, in doing so, what are we really searching for?

I am reminded of the suggestion made by others to seek God in the faces of other living creatures, our fellow humans and also all those "others" who surround us.

The meaning of that kind of encouragement often leads us to the remembrance that we are all one, and we are not truly separate. This does not necessarily cause us to lack individuality, in my view, but it is not clear to me how important any of our separateness remains in the other world we enter after this life.

I write this after having a kind of waking dream the other night which seemed to focus on doors. I was viewing what I understood to be multiple doors with no outstanding features, but one came into better view, seemed to be a yellow color; however, there was no handle to grasp and I was confused about that. I was reaching for something that wasn't there.

I then made no further effort to open the door. But it reminds me of someone talking about seemingly getting out of their body and floating toward the ceiling and returning quickly back to their body because they got confused about how to go through the seemingly impenetrable surface.

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recoverer Super Member Offline Afterlife Knowledge Member Posts: 5027 Gender:	Re: Questions... Reply #23 - Aug 21^st, 2015 at 5:31pm Seagull: I figure you know what doorways can symbolize. Yellow can symbolize will power.
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Justin Ex Member	Re: Questions... Reply #24 - Aug 21^st, 2015 at 5:48pm Yellow can also symbolize things like intellect, and thus also things like discernment/discrimination in a positive sense. It's a color that is very linked to the Mercury archetype in astrology, which relates to a lot of "left brain" type characterizations (though that is over simplified and not quite accurate to say).
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1796

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Re: Questions...
Reply #25 - Aug 24^th, 2015 at 10:15pm

Quote:

Briefly re: psychopathy. The defining elements of same are a severe lack of emotionally felt empathy and severe lack of conscience. But it's determined from a multi point cluster of traits. One can argue though, that those cluster of traits stem from those two fundamental lacks.

It's also considered a spectrum btw, hence some are more severely psychopathic than others. Some generally "play by the rules" because they have learned that it benefits them (and keeps them from being discovered by others, because most seem to know they are fundamentally "different"--i know this from reading forums/blogs where such folks frequent and talk about themselves). This does not meant they are virtuous, do gooders in any internal or intention sense.

Re: testosterone link, i did over simplify it, but there is enough research to suggest there is some kind of average link. Does it apply to all cases? Most likelly not. Does it "cause" psychopathy, most likely not. Also, there are people with higher than typical testosterone whom are not technically psychopathic.

Some of the studies i have read, deal with it indirectly. For example, there are a few studies to date that find a link between unusually wide faces in men and at the same time tendencies to cheat and/or lie. Other linked studies indicate those same men with unusually wide faces also tend to have higher than average testosterone levels.

If you would like to discuss this more, feel free to bring this over to the He/She thread i started.

Those are popular/Hollywood opinions of psychopathy and testosterone.

There exist contrary views by many who work in the forensic industry and have working knowledge.

There are thousands of studies on these subjects. Most are just class exercises for psych students to practice on each other doing studies and publishing. They are full of holes.

Psychology has a powerful morally corrupt element in it who are always doing studies to suggest that those they dislike are psychopaths, and that testosterone is the hormone that causes anger and violence in men. It is mostly ignorance, lies and propaganda, but what can we expect from those who actively claim and teach that there is no such thing as moral truth.

If they are wrong or lying they don't have to answer for it, so they just keep putting out the claims. That is the nature of psychology, it is not based on measurable tangibles as other sciences are, it is based on statistics which are underpinned by fuzzy or absent definitions and categories, and usually non-scientific method leaving much room for dispute. Psychology is not a science, it is a fashion parade of ever changing fads, phrases, catch cries and buzzwords. Psychology is never held accountable for mistakes its makes. Over the last 60 years psychology/sociology has come up with different outrageous models and claims about human behaviour every 5 to 10 years, and each time they do, the old claim and all the buzz-speak that went with it gets left behind and is mocked by those in the industry as being outdated, and the present claim is held up as the "Truth", but that "Truth" soon passes too and inturn gets mocked by the same fickle people. They change their psychological fads and buzz-speak like they change their fashion in clothes, shoes and hairstyles.

Not only is the industry not held accountable but individuals are not held accountable either to the degree they are in the real sciences. If a forensic clinician documents that a prisoner is suitable for release and he is released and murders again, then the psychologist is not held accountable. An engineer though, who says a structure will hold up a bridge will be held accountable if it fails.

The medical industry, like engineering, is expected to get results and is held accountable. In medicine natural testosterone (not synthetic) is well known as a hormone of calmness and confident friendliness, and is often prescribed for men with anger problems, which can arise when testosterone levels drop for any reason. Psychologists though, being the testosterone haters that they are, often claim that the less testosterone that men have then the calmer, friendlier and more "socially adjusted" men will be. That is nonsense, of course. Psychology can say what it likes and is seldom if ever held accountable, but medicine is accountable and gets results.

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