Jolt Country

I believe in one sense you wish to be rid of your suffering, but in another, I believe you're totally identified with it. "Hi, I'm Retro, and I carry a lot of suffering with me."

If you'd like, we can try some experiments here to see if that's true, or perhaps there is some true, lasting relief on order for you.

If not, that's completely fine, it's just an offer.

I'm up for a thought experiment or two!

How do we begin?

Well, let's try this. And if you've done/heard of stuff like this before, please excuse the rehash, but indulge me anyway.

I call this one, "Are you a man or a woman"?

Let us take a sound. If you have a bell handy, marvelous. If not, you can use any ol' sound, preferably something repeatable so we can do the experiment a few times. Preferably not a song you like, otherwise you might start GROOVIN' and forget what we're doing here.

Something like this, perhaps:

Jesus, is there any way to keep it from loading up the preview image for youtube links? ROBB?

Anywho, play that sound (or whatever you want to use), pay attention to it, and then confirm for me whether or not you are hearing it.

Assuming your speakers/headphones work, and you've not suffered serious neurological trauma recently, I am going to, for the sake of moving this along, assume that your answer is "yes".

What is very clear in this experience is that there IS the hearing of a sound. Whatever else we don't know about what's goin' on with ourselves and the rest of this crazy world, we know as we play that youtube, it is positively incontrovertable that there is hearing going on there. Ding! There it is. Regardless of any of our thoughts about the experience, DING, there it is.

So, we have the hearing of the sound. And you say, "I am hearing the sound."

Now, since you said (or since we're assuming you said) "I am hearing the sound", I want you now to play the sound again, but this time move your attention from the hearing of the sound to that which is hearing it. The "I" in the sentence "I am hearing the sound". Not a story about Retro, but the result of your acute investigation of whatever it is that is hearing the sound, in the very moment.

Try a few times if you'd like, and after you're done, I want you to answer for us whether you were able to determine, based on your investigation, whether the hearer of the sound, the "I" in "I am hearing the sound", was a man or a woman.

If you're tempted to answer "well, I played the sound and looked down at my dick, so the hearer was a man", then notice that this is a story about the experience, added after the fact, and return once again to the sound to see if you can pick up any "man" or "woman" attributes in that which was experiencing the sound.

My self-imposed timeout does not apply to this discussion, should it ever continue.

Can other people take part in this experiment or is it designed for RR specifically?

Sure, if you'd like.

This line of experimentation is solely concerned with the relief of psychological suffering, though, and other than Retro, I'm not picking up on much of that from anyone else on this board. That's the only reason I singled him out. Everyone's welcome to join in, though.

No rules, just right!

pinback wrote: Mon Feb 12, 2018 7:36 pm If you're tempted to answer "well, I played the sound and looked down at my dick, so the hearer was a man", then notice that this is a story about the experience, added after the fact, and return once again to the sound to see if you can pick up any "man" or "woman" attributes in that which was experiencing the sound.

Gender is a fundamental part of an individual's identity and can't be separated from the "I" they associate themselves as. Similarly, if you were to ask the question: "Is the hearer of the sound a human or a polar bear", you wouldn't need to look down and see the absence of fur and claws to affirm the correct conclusion.

Is that reflected in the actual experience of hearing the bell? Or is that a conceptual story, occurring in thought, which appeared afterward?

Is there a "gender-ness" to your hearing of the sound? Or a "human-ness", or "polar bear-ness"?

(Also, make sure you're actually doing the experiment, not just reading what it is and assuming you know how it's gonna go.)

As far as gender is concerned I identify as "attack helicopter."

All memes are welcome, here in the Don Rogers base. Thank you, Paul!

Maybe we also get Retro an avatar? Since he wanted us to go to phpBB3 and all? Can you work that in to his treatment?

Although initially expressing interest, attempts to engage Retro further in this program have proven... challenging.

pinback wrote: Wed Feb 28, 2018 4:41 am Although initially expressing interest, attempts to engage Retro further in this program have proven... challenging.

Maybe he doesn't identify his gender as "warp drive."

I liked that one. Good job, Paul!

HAHAHA Splendid, Paul.