In my meditations, I stumble upon thoughts and concepts that cannot always be described fully by language. These thoughts need to be expressed in words that convey feeling, not reason. In my meditations, and throughout my life in general, I may thus share words that are not at all clear in meaning. In order for readers to better understand these concepts, and to keep me from having to repeat myself, I present to you the codex of my mind.
The art of staying flexible in your appointments. The more we constrain ourselves by our calendars, the less we are able to make time for unexpected events in our life, and the less luck we have. Just like how yoga is an excercise that makes you more flexible, calendar yoga is an excercise that makes your time more flexible.
In an absence of (the) god(s), we ourselves must become Creator. Creating myself and eventually beyond myself is the highest goal, and I believe that (once needs like survival are met, although this can also be viewed as creation of yourself and your world) this is what gives us purpose. The world we know does not exist outside of ourself, but only within ourself and through ourself. Then, the only logical conclusion is that we are the Creator of all things.
The cycle of challenging yourself more so that you fail more and thus succeed more so that you can challenge yourself even more next time. This process is the way by which we create ourselves, and from there beyond ourselves. Those who understand the flywheel of becoming understand that both success and failure are only part of the cycle, and are thus not the sole metrics by which we must define ourselves.
The social forces that keep you down and work against your own goals and aspirations. When you are in doubt because the masses of people doubt that you could be able to achieve something, that is the force of gravity that is keeping you down from climbing to the heights you have set for yourself.
Whenever I talk about love, I don’t mean it in the romantic sense which is common in most mouths. I view love as the abstract warm and fuzzy feeling you get whenever you are surrounded by things that bring you joy, comfort and other positive feelings. Love, then, is just as strong in friendships, peaceful walks, good books and a good meal. I think that viewing romance as the be-all and end-all of love is something that may distract us from the true love that we can find for ourselves and the world around us. Love, then, is more of a feeling and an ideal than it is a tangible thing you can hold, and it is by no means something that is only contained in romance. I believe that giving a more formal definition of love than this takes away some of the power this word holds because, as Laozi tells us, the name that can be named is not the eternal name.
I am a firm believer that luck is as you wish and as you make it. Whenever I talk about luck, i am referring to it as a skill, and not as the mysterious force that causes autcomes to be fortunate. I believe in a metaphysical sense that everything becomes what it is, and that everything happens as it happens. Therefore, chance is simply the nature of the universe, as all happenings occur at the wills of the Way. Luck, then, has only a place in our ability to control the rivers of life, and to open ourselves up to the Way of the world. If we embrace everything that happens to us, we increase the amount of ways in which life can be gracious to us, and thus we increase our luck.
I see meditation as a practice that consists of two parts of the whole. Introspective meditation, as turning inward to create yourself and beyond yourself in order to manifest these changes, can be seen as an outward form of meditation (beginning in yourself and ending in the world). Reflectie meditation, as observing the world around you and using your senses to turn the world back into yourself, can be seen as an inward form of meditation (beginning in the world and ending in yourself). By combining these forms of meditation, it gives me all contemplation that I need. I use introspective meditation when I want to bring about change in the world, and reflective meditation when I want to learn and deal with the world.
A bad thing. We can focus on mutliple tasks at a time, and this is called multi-tasking. Similarly, when we multi-time, our thoughts are living in two moments at once. For example, when we are anxious for an interview tomorrow, and therefore forget to enjoy a dinner with friends today while feeling a sense of unease for tomorrow. This is a pattern of thought that we should aim to let go.
The art of spontaneity and action through inaction. Also called wu-wei in Chinese. This is the level of expertise where without thinking about a task, we achieve a spontaneous and creative manifestation of the self. This helps us work towards becoming the Creator.
A north star is a goal which we aim to achieve, which is not actually reachable, or is very unlikely to be reached. Setting such a goal can be used as a compass in ones life, just like the north star has been used as one for ages.
Wikipedia describes a gravedigger as a someone who is responsible for digging a grave prior to a funeral service. In order to create beyond ourselves, we must also be prepared to put ourselves under, and I dub the abstract person that wills their own demise a gravedigger. Not only do these gravediggers dig their own graves, but also those of the concepts and ideas that riddle our society and lives. The gravedigger does not murder, it only wills and prepares for the death of ideas.
A gravekeeper is one that ensures that ideas stay burried underground, where we do not fall under the illusion that they are immortal. Then, once the gravediggers of this world have lain the groundwork for all thought, we will need to transform to the gravekeepers, yielding us a freedom of thought hitherto unthinkable. While gravediggers dig deep into the earth and question all that was once holy, gravekeepers are the final step where humanity views all knowledge for what it is, impervious to biases and traditions. Where the mind ceases, there is clarity. The gravekeeper makes sure that knowledge that is let go is let go forever, and the mind of the gravekeeper is the clearest mind imaginable. (Being a gravedigger is achievable in a humans life, but the ideal of a gravekeeper is but a north star)
Once we have risen above all old paradigms and norms, the world itself will have become a graveyard of knowledge, and we are finally free to go beyond all things and view ideas as living and moving instead of dead and static.
A form of meditation where you manifest an action to be performed on a given cue, such that it may happen without thinking. By meditating on a trigger and response, you create a contraption by which you are more likely to perform an action on occasions where you want to perform that action.
The opposite of love.