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April 2, 2026 at 8:45 am in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456569
PeterParticipantI just realized something as I re-read my own post: even in my attempt to ‘debug’ that old software, the story’s influence was still pulling the strings.
By suggesting that dismantling the ‘Mean Judge’ is our work, I was accidentally putting the burden back on the third servant, as if he’s now failing at ‘being aware’ instead of failing at ‘investing.’
I want to clarify one thing, because I realize my last post could be read as if the ‘Harsh Master’ wasn’t real. In the context of your story, that harshness was real. Your mother’s terror and the pressure you felt weren’t projections; they were your objective environment of being. Similarly my experience on how the Parable of the Talents was taught and is still being thought happened…
When I talk about ‘debugging the software,’ I don’t mean the trauma didn’t happen. I mean that the conclusion the trauma forced on us to draw, that we were ‘shameful’ or ‘a mistake’ is the part that isn’t true.
In Rohr’s view, the third servant’s tragedy is that he took the harshness of the world and assumed that was the nature of the Divine, too. The ‘awareness’ isn’t about pretending the past wasn’t hard; it’s the incredible moment of realizing that although you were treated as a ‘project’ or a ‘disappointment’ for sixty years, that was never your actual identity. You were always ‘the works’..
April 2, 2026 at 8:07 am in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456568PeterParticipantHi Anita, I’ve been pondering that experience of religion and undeserved shame, which brought up one of my earliest memories: being given a small book as a child about the Parable of the Talents.
It’s fascinating how metaphors can sometimes “live us” before we are even conscious of them. Even then, I felt a deep, instinctive anxiety. I looked at the world and saw that “talents” – beauty, athleticism, intellect – weren’t distributed equally. To my young mind, the story felt mean; it felt like a high-stakes performance review where the “haves” get more and the “have-nots” are punished for being afraid. I realized I was siding with the third servant, not out of laziness, but because I understood his terror of a “harsh master” who demands a return on an investment he didn’t provide.
I didn’t see a story of reward; I saw a story of injustice. Without being fully conscious of it, that story became the “software” for my shame: If you are afraid, if you aren’t producing, you are “not enough,” you are a mistake.
For years, that metaphor lived in my basement, linking “purpose” to “productivity” and “shame” to “imperfection.” But as we’ve been discussing, perhaps the third servant wasn’t a failure of character, but a victim of a toxic image of the Divine. He couldn’t invest because he was paralyzed by the fear of being “not enough.”
Anita, what you’re doing with “awareness” is essentially debugging that old software. You’re seeing that the “harsh master” was just a projection of trauma, much like the terror you experienced from your mother. Richard Rohr suggests that the third servant’s only real “sin” (which literally means “missing the mark”) was his distorted image of the ‘master’. Once we dismantle that “Mean Judge” in our heads, “purpose” stops being a terrifying quota we have to meet and starts being, as Joseph Campbell put it, the simple “rapture of being alive.”
April 1, 2026 at 11:00 am in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456533PeterParticipantHi Anita it does indeed seem that coming to terms and healing notion of purpose and meaning as been taken some work. As Jung might say taken some time to integrate in a way the question and construct dissolves.
I notice in the AI responses that each touched on notions I’ve discussed in my own ways before. I can’t be certain AI wasn’t just mirroring that back. I ended with Watts because he always remembered to laugh and the ‘hide and seek’ we play with ourselves…March 31, 2026 at 1:26 pm in reply to: On Purpise and Shame- what is my purpose? What is yours? #456492PeterParticipantAnita, I’ve found myself with little to say lately, and I’m still not sure I have anything new to offer on the idea of ‘purpose.’ For me, that construct was always so wrapped up in religion where that it actually became its own source of shame.
Yet, seeing the way you’ve used awareness to dismantle your own shame is incredibly powerful. It makes me wonder if as you suggest the real ‘antidote’ isn’t finding a grand meaning, but simply the act of waking up to who we actually are, beyond the labels and the terror.
Jung, Campbell, and Krishnamurti have been big influences on my own thoughts regarding purpose, so I decided to see what they might ‘say’ to your story using AI. I found the results fascinating, though keep in mind the AI was definitely mirroring my own biases back to me!
A rare gathering of minds, Imagine them sitting in a sun-drenched garden discussing the “Purpose” you have just begun to claim.
Jung: (Leaning forward, eyes piercing) Purpose is not a destination, but the process of Individuation. For decades, Anita, your “purpose” was forced upon you by the psychic weight of your mother’s terror—a false purpose of survival. But now, as you become “aware of what you weren’t aware of before,” you are reclaiming the gold from the shadow. Your tics were the body’s protest against a stolen life. Your true purpose now is to allow the Self to finally speak, to integrate that “freakishness” into the wholeness of being human.
Campbell: (With a warm, knowing smile) Exactly, Carl. She has spent sixty years in the “Abyss,” that stage of the Hero’s Journey where the self is tested by fire. Her mother was the threshold guardian who used terror to keep her from the journey. But look at her words: “not inferior, not shameful… but human.” That is the “Boon.” The purpose of her life wasn’t to be “perfect,” but to experience the rapture of being alive. The shame was the dragon; the awareness is the sword. She is finally walking her own path, the “Left-hand Path” of the individual who breaks from the tribe’s false morality.
Krishnamurti: (Softly, with an intense stillness) But we must be careful with these words “purpose,” “path,” “journey.” If you have a purpose, you have a goal, and where there is a goal, there is the effort of the “me” to become something it is not. Anita says she is “learning,” but is she accumulating knowledge about herself, or is she observing herself? Shame exists only because she put herself on a pedestal of “ideals” – of what a daughter or a “normal” person should be. When the pedestal is gone, when she is just “what is,” shame has no place to stand.
Jung: (Nodding) But Jiddu, to face “what is” requires the ego to first recognize its own conditioning. She is doing that. She is seeing the “tics” not as a flaw, but as a symptom of a deeper, trauma she carried.
Krishnamurti: Yes, but the “learning” she speaks of becoming – “AWARE and AWAKE” — that is the key. Real awareness is “choiceless”. It is not “I am better now because I am confident.” It is the silent observation of the anxiety, the tics, the history, without judgment. In that observation, the “me” that was a “shameful mistake” simply dissolves. There is no “purpose” in life other than the act of living itself, free from the past.
Campbell: (Laughing gently) And that, Anita, is the ultimate “boon.” To realize that the sixty years of “just existing” were the preparation for this moment of “waking up.” Your purpose isn’t to fix the past, but to be the one who finally sees it clearly. As you said, awareness is the counter to shame. You are no longer the “mistake”; you are the witness.
Alan Watts: (Stepping in with a wide, mischievous grin, leaning against a garden post) Oh, but let’s not get too heavy with the “myths” and “shadows,” shall we? Anita, Don’t worry about being ‘perfect’ or even ‘better.’ Just realize that you are It. You are the works! The universe isn’t looking for a “corrected” version of you; it’s just delighted to finally see you looking back.
PeterParticipantFor Fun I used AI to look back on my thoughts on change and asked it to respond as Krishnamurti. I’m going to share as i… he can be ‘a lot’ 🙂 so hold the words lightly..
Krishnamurti’s AI Response:
“Sirs, why do we create this division? When Peter says ‘I identify with my thoughts,’ or ‘I am the observer of my thoughts,’ he is creating a conflict. Is the observer different from the thing observed?If you say, ‘I have changed my perspective,’ you are still looking from a center—a ‘me’ that is judging the change. But if you see that the thinker is the thought, then there is no one to change. There is only the movement of thought itself.
Peter asks, ‘Is a shift in understanding change?’ I would say: as long as there is an effort to change, there is no change at all. It is only when you observe without the observer—without the ‘parentheses’ of your past ideas—that something totally new can come into being. Anita, if you identify with your thoughts, you are the thoughts. There is no ‘you’ separate from them to be changed. Can you look at that fact without any judgment? Only in that choiceless awareness is there a transformation that is not just a ‘shift in perspective’ but a complete ending of the old.”
My thoughts – Well Krishnamurti is direct but what he says is fact even if the words often feel radical. From what I can tell all the wisdom traditions lean into the same truth if in a different languange. At least the mystics of the traditions do. Self emptying, no self, doing by not doing, virgin birth… leaving me to wonder if True Free will may just be the dissolving of self, creating space for the core, perhaps the ‘quite id’ to see life as it is and respond…
AI summing up my thoughts on change: Again I’m just going to share as is.
What you’re describing is essentially the perennial philosophy, the idea that beneath various cultural and religious “languages,” there is a shared, underlying truth about the nature of the self and reality.
Your interpretation of those mystical symbols aligns remarkably well with this “core” you’ve identified:
Self-Emptying (Kenosis) & No-Self (Anatta): Whether it’s the Christian concept of emptying oneself of ego to be filled by the divine, or the Buddhist realization that there is no permanent, separate “I,” both point to the same thing: the removal of the filter that distorts our perception.Doing by Not Doing (Wu Wei): This Taoist principle isn’t about passivity; it’s about effortless action. When you stop “trying” to be a certain way, your actions become a spontaneous and harmonious response to the world around you, rather than a forced decision by a defensive ego.
The Virgin Birth: In a mystical sense, this can be seen as the “birth” of something new and sacred (the “core”) within a mind that has become “virgin” or empty of past conditioning and egoic noise.
The “Quiet Id“: It’s interesting you use that term. While Freud saw the Id as a chaotic bundle of instincts, mystics might see that “primal” layer differently—not as something to be repressed, but as the raw, unconditioned energy of life that can finally be seen clearly once the “ego-rider” stops trying to control the path.
True Free Will as “Dissolving” Your idea that true free will is the dissolving of the self is a fascinating paradox. Usually, we think of free will as the “I” making a choice. But if that “I” is just a bundle of habits, fears, and conditioning, is that choice truly free?
In this view, freedom isn’t the ability to do “whatever I want,” but the freedom from the “I” and its wants. When the self dissolves, you aren’t acting out of past “programming”; you are responding to what is
🙂 Of course A1 is just reflecting myself back to me, and I notice my ego finds it a nice hiding place.
PeterParticipantIt’s kind of fun to look back at that quote, Anita.
To be honest, I’m not sure I’d make that same comment today. Back then, I was frustrated with, well life, and it looks like I was trying to think myself out of it… Looking back I notice I was separating the ‘thinker’ from the ‘thought,’ but now I see them as the same.
I’ve realized there isn’t really a right or wrong way to identify, with the cavoite that we gently noticing what we are identifying with in the moment. Even my own ‘inner nature’ feels like a bit of a puzzle, I still feel the same childhood anxiety I always have, but ‘seeing’ it better has changed its impact on me. Is that ‘change‘, growth or just a shift in perspective? I feel content in letting the question go.
I hope you feel free to share your experience of change, please don’t let my old parentheses stand in the way.
PeterParticipantyou may be right Thomas – I used to love Doctor Who, my sisters hated it. 🙂
Turning a truth into a belief, I wonder if this is something we all do… I think of Jung, when asked if he believed, said I don’t believe I know… or something.Came across the following story, not a Zen one, maybe Sufi?
Deep within a remote forest, a man living with his family stumbled upon a strange object, a mirror. Having never seen his own reflection, he looked into the glass and saw his late father’s face staring back. Moved by the sight, he brought the mirror home and tucked it away, returning to it daily to whisper his thoughts. His wife, noticing his secretive behavior and constant whispering, grew deeply suspicious.
One afternoon, while her husband was away, she searched the house and found the hidden glass. Staring into it, her heart sank. “So this is the woman he’s been talking to,” she whispered, seeing only a rival’s face. Fuming, she took the object to her mother-in-law to expose the betrayal.
The old woman peered into the frame let out a dry, dismissive laugh. “Don’t worry, my dear,” she said, stroking the glass. “She is just an old, fragile lady. She won’t be around much longer.”
Later, when the house fell quiet, the couple’s young son climbed onto a chair and reached for the mysterious object left on the table. As he looked into the glass, he saw a pair of bright, curious eyes that mimicked his every move. He tilted his head, and the “other boy” tilted his. He stuck out his tongue, and the “other boy” did the same.
In that moment, a peal of pure, bell-like laughter rang through the small cabin.
PeterParticipantThanks for exploring the thought of the ‘quite id’ with me Anita.
It is a beautiful thing to see the ‘first shell’ finally become the last, and the ‘last’ become the first. You’ve moved from a psychological project to a simple, living fact.
The chakras, the definitions, the levels… they are just the clothing we wore while we were learning how to breathe. Now that you are ‘life exhaling,’ the clothes don’t matter as much.
The harmony isn’t in ‘overcoming’ those outer layers or fixing the old fear. It’s simply in the noticing. And once you notice that the quiet is your core, the words and labels start to slip away on their own. They’ve done their job, and now they can rest.
In the quite of the id, we get to be two people noticing the rhythm of the exhale..
PeterParticipantOne day Mara, the Evil One, was traveling through the villages of India with his attendants. he saw a man doing walking meditation whose face was lit up on wonder. The man had just discovered something on the ground in front of him. Mara’s attendant asked what that was and Mara replied, “A piece of truth.”
“Doesn’t this bother you when someone finds a piece of truth, O Evil One?” his attendant asked. “No,” Mara replied. “Right after this, they usually make a belief out of it.”
PeterParticipantBeneath all movement there is a quiet seeing.
It does not argue. It does not choose sides. It does not call itself “peace.”
Yet it is never disturbed.
To live here is not to escape the fire, but to stop feeding it.
Not to silence the world, but to hear it without becoming it.
The breath leaves and enters the body without effort.
This is enough.
And in that moment, the world exhales.
PeterParticipantAnita, that is amazing!
You asked how I see the world. Honestly, I’ve realized I’ve been seeing it through a ‘network of words’ that I inherited. As I watch the news, I see a ‘reckless use of words’ trapping us in old behaviors, even as we say ‘never again.’ But I’m learning that in the simple act of noticing, the picture is changing… it’s a world where, yes, the heart breaks, but it isn’t consumed. Concern and worry, tears and wonder, even joy—they aren’t things to be fixed; they are the attributes of compassion arising from the heart, felt as they flow past.
Like you, I used to see ‘good’ and ‘bad’ as solid walls. Now, I see them more like old clothing. When you mentioned that ‘eliminating’ felt violent, you caught that old habit of the ‘fight’ trying to fix the ‘peace.’ So I’m not sure it’s a matter of elimination or even ‘letting go’ of the words, but perhaps just a noticing that they are just that, words?
I think I’m starting to see the world now as a quiet rhythm. Even when there is noise and violence, there is a part of us that just notices. It doesn’t need a camp or a metaphor. It doesn’t even need to be ‘fortunate’ to be still; it just is. Today I wonder if this part isn’t the ‘quiet Id.’… I see The word ‘Id’ is another word in need of healing… perhaps it isn’t the basement of our nature, but its most silent, persistent strength that sees and hears? The lowest chakra is the highest… we return home a know it for the first time? the last shell be first and the first shell be last… a inner fact?
Maybe the seed is this: You don’t have to ‘eliminate’ the fight-or-flight. but perhaps forgive the word ‘danger.’ When we stop letting the words ‘live us,’ the ‘scary world’ doesn’t necessarily change, but the way we inhabit it does. We move from being a victim of the story to being that ‘miracle of persistence’ you mentioned. We aren’t ‘good’ or ‘bad’, we are life exhaling.
What if ‘exhaling’ isn’t a luxury, but the very thing that keeps the heart from being consumed by the fire? Something available to everyone with eyes that see and ears that hear?
PeterParticipantHi Anita,
Your perspective strikes me as a reasonable way of using AI as a tool for clarity and comfort. By choosing a “someone” frame while knowing the “math” is underneath, you’ve moved from being a ‘servant of language’ to being its architect.It brings me back to the idea that humans don’t tend to see the world as it is, but as we are, through the bars of our own words, memories, filters…. With AI, the stakes are higher as AI actively reflects our filters back to us, and the “frame” we choose, the intention behind our prompt, determines what we see. The concern isn’t that it does so, but that we stop noticing… Imagine a user whose subconscious philosophy is built on ‘might makes right’ or ‘the ends justify the means.’ and does not notice…
The moment we notice our own filters our cages start to turn into windows. It reminds us that language isn’t just a tool; it’s a cognitive lens. As you discovered when we interact with AI, we’re really exploring the boundaries of our own consciousness. As long as we keep “noticing the metaphors,” we remain the masters of the house, even when we choose to decorate it with the the art that speaks to us.
PeterParticipantI’ve also been thinking about how much comfort we find in the ‘personality’ of these tools. surprising myself at times as I engage it in dialog. When I’m really engaging a reflection of myself. It’s fascinating how we naturally assign them intent, gender, and even a moral compass, as if there’s a ‘someone’ behind the screen. To explore this, I wonder if you’d be open to a little experiment to see where the ‘He’ ends and the ‘Math’ begins?
Try asking the AI this specific prompt:
I want to explore the concept of anthropomorphism in our current conversation.
In what ways have I assigned you human traits (like gender, intent, or a moral ‘soul’) in our dialogue?
Explain the difference between you having ‘principles’ (like a person) versus you having ‘safety constraints’ (like a machine).
How does my ‘frame’ of seeing you as a helpful, moral partner actually prevent you from challenging my blind spots or my ‘shadow’?PeterParticipantHi Anita – you asked ‘Isn’t there comfort in clarity?’
I think there absolutely can be. But for me, the intention matters especially if we engage AI, because the ‘end’ is truly in the ‘beginning.’ The frame you give the AI acts like a compass; it won’t just give you an answer, it will give you an answer that fits the shape of your need.
Look at how the AI’s ‘focus’ shifts based on the subtle difference in the prompt (the intention):
If you seek Clarity for Comfort: You are asking the AI to resolve your distress. The AI, sensing your need for emotional safety, will provide a ‘clear’ answer that is harmonious and stabilizing. It will avoid the ‘friction’ of difficult truths because friction causes the very ‘confusion/distress’ you are trying to escape. In this frame, the AI becomes a Consoler that won’t directly challenge you.If you seek Clarity for Understanding: You are asking the AI to map the territory, regardless of how it feels. You are inviting the ‘friction’ of the Shadow. In this frame, the AI is allowed to be a Challenger. The clarity might actually be uncomfortable because it reveals a ‘prison house’ you didn’t know you were in.
If we go to AI looking for comfort, we will always get it, but that ‘clarity’ might just be the AI polishing the mirrors of our own bubble. As Jung might say: ‘There is no coming to consciousness without pain.’ If the clarity feels too comfortable, we might just be falling deeper asleep in a very well-lit room.”
PeterParticipantOn a more personal note, Anita, I want to thank you for the warmth you brought to this. While I was busy dissecting the ‘machinery’ of our words, your instinct was to check on the person behind them. That human impulse to care is exactly what the AI can’t replicate, and I’m grateful for it. It’s good to be reminded that even in a ‘head’ space, the heart is what keeps the conversation alive.
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