Perhaps it is as well to say explicitly that the purpose of these extracts of my conversations with the other side is to provide hints to help you live more effectively and joyously.
Setting your dials
[Friday, January 13, 2006]
Well, I don’t know how well connected we are at the moment: I feel pretty drowsy, distracted. But I think it is a way of putting off the question.
Then, if you wish, ask something easier.
That’s interesting. I do see, it is a matter of “ask something easier” for me to allow, not, for you to say.
Precisely. In practice it amounts to the same thing but the distinction is important.
Okay. I have questions of everybody, really; it’s impossible to figure out where to start. I could start “at random” but that seems dumb, or – maybe not so dumb. Maybe that implies that the easiest to access would sort to the top unhampered by my opinions or expectations.
That is one result of choosing by “randomness,” yes. It is a sort of deliberate deferring to the forces of the moment. Yes, equivalent in its way to Monroe letting the total self decide. A good plan when you don’t have your own priorities.
All right, let’s try that. Who’s up?
I think perhaps I had better begin the process, laddie. [I immediately recognize this as David Poynter.] You and I have been down this road more than any of the others, it’s a familiar “feel” to the process between us. You’ll notice you can hear my voice in your head. Eh? Well, think, laddie, that’s a first isn’t it? You have often heard the words or the sense of the words or the vague feeling behind the words, you’ve even heard my words on the tape recorder. But have you heard my speaking to you like this?
So what is going on with the [background mental] music that’s drowning it out? (The old song, “my guy!”)
That’s more of your remaining 50%, y’ see? There are all these tricks your minds have to keep us out. No point here in going into the “why” of it all, it’s just so. But when you begin to experience contact in the absence of the static, so to speak, then that is the first time you can recognize static for what it is.
Yes, I do see it. And for the record I’m writing the words as we’d write them, rather than trying to reproduce David’s way of speaking, but he cuts the final “g” off of most “ing” words – just as I often do – and I can hear it, today.
So, David, how do I cut the level of static – change the dial setting?[That is, change the setting on my visualized mental “control panel.”]
This is why people meditate – though they don’t think of it that way. It helps them to experience radio without static – doesn’t mean they’re hearing voices, but they get the relief from the static.
Yes. Is there a rhythm to it? Does the radio get turned way up when there is information coming in that someone doesn’t want? And, in any case, who is operating the radio?
You are, of course – and it’s the same old story, isn’t it – who are we talking about when we use the word “you”? Big subject.
I can feel you wanting to go off in another direction. Go ahead.
The purpose of dials is to be moved to different settings at different times. You can have your default setting be 50% and change it to 100% — or 0% — on demand.
I feel myself drifting off, daydreaming again. Defense mechanism inside?
You need to begin thinking of yourself in the plural. You means a community of you. There are disagreements, specialties, just like any community. But this means you need to decide who you are and what you want and in a way it is impossible, because as Gurdjieff said, there are all those different yous and each one in turn drives the machine and often forgets that other yous exist. Forgets they have rights too. Forgets that that particular you is not the same as the greater you.
Now this goes off into a major discussion, very valuable but we don’t have time. To be practicable about it, you need a tool to decide whish part of you is you. So to speak.
Ritual, habit, journaling all help put one you in continuity. (But not quite the same you, eh? The routine of going to work in an office and functioning there brings forth a different you than the routine of sitting at your desk at home and writing.) That is one thing that habits do, or may do if you use them that way: They may ground a certain you in routine so that you are not scattered –
“You” see how difficult the discussion. We need to begin to talk about you-1 and you-2 and it all goes up in the air.
I feel very distracted. Is it a matter of focusing will-power?
Being easily distracted is a habit like any other, one focused (so to speak) behind the scenes by some of you against other of you.
So it is a matter of resisting internal subversion?
Sure – and that’s what the other parts of you would say about resisting your desire to concentrate.
I begin to see even from this brief discussion that it cannot be from the chaos of multiple influences and little-yous that we find stability, but only in letting the total-self drive. And that implies that the total-self has preferences and goals, which implies a structure more like this. [I drew a segmented ball hanging from a thread that extends to “the other side.” The segments of the ball are smaller selves, part of the total self that the ball represents.]
In fact this is too simple too, because the smaller selves are supported by and connected to the other side in their own way – and it does not even begin to address past-life connections. But the attempt to visualize it will bear result.
Seems to me I should explicitly do what I now think I have been doing implicitly in the black box – concentrating is the equivalent of setting the controls at 100%.
Of course, and good for you. You came to that.
Why the sense of looking at my writing this through another’s eyes?
Because in a way that is what is happening. You have broken through to another way to be, that will bring you far. (You’re broken through an unlocked door – we smile – but still, you’re through.)
And when I stand up to go take a shower or make some coffee or do anything at all, how do I hold it?
One way is to ritually – that is, consciously make a habit of – moving the slide-switch (since you prefer the image to that of a dial) up and down at appropriate times. In a way it is “only” a visualization. In another way it is an effective way of focusing intent.
Man, I thought I’d realized, years ago, the effects of the drunken monkey. I see them – feel them – ever more clearly as this short session proceeds.
This is the access you wanted, and want still. You cannot teach what you haven’t experienced.
I hope I can get this into a book, or books. But it certainly is worth the while for itself!
You have vaguely realized already that you are more aware of things around you in your life – at your request. This to a degree counter-acts against your equally strong intent on concentration. This is not a problem, merely a situation to be dealt with – a sliding between two polar opposites. Fine, if you choose which way to slide, which means fine if you know which you to choose, and how, and when. We didn’t say it would be easy, but it won’t be boring either.