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Peter

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  • September 3, 2020 at 7:29 am in reply to: Don’t WANT to completely let go the ex. #366046
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Jenny

    Is it possible to reach a place where i feel nothing for my ex-bf?

    I suppose it’s possible however that would be along the lines of ‘letting go’ by forgetting or more problematic repressing the experience and what we might learn about ourselves through them.

    There is a time for everything including a time of nostalgia. Nostalgia is a ‘longing for home’ and can teach us a great deal about ourselves. What it is that leaves us feeling safe, loved, content, at home in our own skin. That said it’s easy to get stuck in our nostalgia if we project this feeling of ‘being at home’ onto others or what we do instead of looking for these things within ourselves.

    Its possible your missing the mark with regards the Art of Detachment when you say “my mind telling me that i should detach every emotion”. That may be a kind of repression that could lead to indifference to our feelings and experience. To learn and grow from our experiences its important that we feel what we feel.

    Detachment is the art of feeling what we feel without attaching our sense of self to them. We have emotions we are not our emotions, I earn a living doing this or that job, ‘I’ am not my job… When we find ourselves attaching our sense of self to a emotion, job, person… it is often as indication that the ego it attempting to cling and or control which often comes from a place of fear.

    Asking the ego to “let go’  when we have attached our sense of self to the ego, will feel like dying to the ego.  Which in a way, metaphorically, it is. As we let go we detach our sense of self from the ego. The ego no longer in the driver seat, its going to resist that ‘dying’. .. Who am I if not what I do or what I feel?  Who I am without this other person? Scary stuff.

    Detaching ourselves from this fearful ego might start with seeing the ego as the bridge between the subconscious and conscious. It is through the ego that we communicate and become conscious or ourselves. The ego is an important a part of the whole that is the Self, it is not us.

    Nothing like a brake up for providing the opportunity to discover and awaken to our true selves. If were brave and honest.

    I wish you well on the journey of discovery, be brave.

     

    • This reply was modified 5 years ago by Peter.
    September 2, 2020 at 7:36 am in reply to: Don’t WANT to completely let go the ex. #365994
    Peter
    Participant

    The most painful state of being is remembering the future, particularly one you can never have – Kierkegaard.

    It may be a error to think that ‘letting go’ means forgetting. The reality of life is that it is a cycle of letting go, a cycle of birth, death and rebirth, the reality of each breath we take.

    We ‘Let Go’ as we detach our ego from the moment to better learn from it. the ego will attempt to cling, blame, control and identify the moment as being the self. So we detach (this is not indifference) the ego to get perspective.

    No experience is lost when we take what we learn forward.  Looking boldly at the best and worse our experiences the path forward become clearer.
    Love given and received is never lost. Sometimes love means a relationship ends but it remains Love. The ping pong nature of your relationship born out of love is not the love you need in this moment.

    How do you breath through this mental block? We work for that which no work is required. The thoughts that you have are a real as only you make them.

     

     

     

    July 27, 2020 at 11:41 am in reply to: NOSTALGIA: and its role in life #362876
    Peter
    Participant

    Nostalgia, the longing for home, pain for home.

    We can get lost in such longing if it becomes a escape into the past for the good old day’s.

    Often the time of nostalgia is a itch of the subconscious to re-remember a aspect of yourself that was perhaps lost and that the Self longs to reconnect with.

    When you visit the old haunts ask yourself what they meant to you then. How did you feel about your self when you were with that friend or in that location? How are you connected to those feelings, dreams, hopes now? Is their a part of yourself that you need to re-connect with?  Perhaps a ability of the imagination which we often ‘leave at home’ as we go out into the world?

     

    April 30, 2020 at 7:50 am in reply to: How to accept things as they are but still grow as a person? #352264
    Peter
    Participant

    Great question Dom

    I think this is one of the most important questions. If you find yourself able to say Yes to life as it is, how do you stay engaged in life. A attribute that is helpful is being able to hold what appears to be opposing ideas at the same time. Getting comfortable with Paradox

    The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. F. Scott Fitzgerald

    How to remain engaged in life and Accept (say yes) to the life (the moment) as it is?  How to “be grateful for the thing you wished most never happened” – Steven Colbert   How to “Participate joyfully in the sorrows of the world. We cannot cure the world of sorrows, but we can choose to live in joy.” – Joseph Campbell

    My understanding of Buddhism engages the idea of Detachment. This is not indifference which would lead to the issues of stuckness your concerned about. Detachment is the practice of acknowledging/accepting the moment as it is without attaching a sense of self (ego) to the experience while living your truth and engaging in that moment. Can you hold the two seeming opposing actions of accepting the moment while living your truth to engage that moment?

    This is action coming from a place of humility, honesty… vice anger, revenge… If one is in a brutal relationship the task is to see the relationship as it is and as Anita mentions changing what you can. Love may require that relationship end. Accepting the situation as it is in that moment does not mean you don’t stay in that situation. Accepting may be recognizing that you can’t time travel to undo the moment. Accepting is Seeing the situation as it is and acting on your truth as you know it to be in that moment.

    Perhaps the problem comes down to how we define the word ‘Accepting’ ?  If accepting is a surrender you will likely end in indifference. But if acceptance is seeing things as they are then your in a better position to recognize what you might influence

    April 22, 2020 at 8:43 am in reply to: My brutally honest journey as a man (now finding self love) #351068
    Peter
    Participant

    You appear to have done a lot of work trying to understand how your experiences have influenced your relationship to love and relationships. That’s a great place to start.

    I know that the terminology of individuation and the task of addressing the Father/Mother complex can be confusing.

    The goal as we examine our experiences is that we learn to parent ourselves in a positive way.  We learn how to nurture ourselves and discipline ourselves. This can feel to many to be a paradox of loving oneself unconditionally and conditionally (exactly the experience of growing up in a balanced up bringing.)   One learns to nurture ourselves and hold ourselves accountable and responsible – it is all Love. (unconditional/conditional love is the experience of loving and being loved.) This is how we learn  and learning better the call is to do better.  In this way we learn how to create healthy boundaries that are accepting  of ourselves as we are (unconditional) while working to do better (conditional/measured) . This creates the space for becoming and that IMO is a healthy self love.

    When we fail to do better, and we will, we don’t beat ourselves up (abusive self parenting)  but look at the experience honestly, learn what we can, take responsibility of what belongs to us, and move forward. Any labeling of oneself no longer necessary.

    The Paradox of Freedom is that it is not exercised in a unconditional allowing but exercised in the setting of healthy boundaries..  Balance between a  ‘freedom from’ and a ‘freedom to”. Like unconditional and conditional love these experiences are not opposites but intimately connected.

    Maybe that dons’t make sense, words tend to get in the way, that said I think your on the right path and which you  well in your journy

    April 21, 2020 at 2:59 pm in reply to: My brutally honest journey as a man (now finding self love) #350956
    Peter
    Participant

    As you said everyone journey is unique… well it should be – As in the Arthurian quest each Knight enters the woods where no one else has entered before.

    In the task of Individuation often involves coming to terms with our mother/father complexes. Often influenced by our relationships with our parents however the idea is to learn how create healthy boundaries with regards to how we nurture (mother archetype) and discipline (father archetype) ourselves. You might say take on the responsibly of parenting ourselves. Many people are uncomfortable with such exploring as ‘blaming’ ones parents how ever the task involves seeing ones parents as unique individuals who like all people  sometimes succeeded and failed. its not about blame but becoming conscious of the lessons learned and the sorting out what you wish to keep and what you need to work on. You appear to have started this process.

    Though I was never a ‘player’ I suspect there is much you learned about yourself through them. Perhaps the beginning of defining Love – What Loving and being loved might mean at a deeper level. You use the word crush interchangeable with the word love begging the question where the experiences of a crush a experience of love?  How deep did such experiences go?

    I would challenge you with the concept of ‘Self Love’. Many people use the words without defining what ‘Self Love’ might look like for them. Perhaps they have a vague imagining of loving oneself might feel like but nothing with regards to what it might look like. What would loving your self look like?  How would you know when you got their? If you did Love your self how would that influence your relating to others? What is the connection? Answering these questions and the questions they create will lead to a deeper relationship with the concept of Love.

    The statement Love your neighbor as your self  was not a command its a statement of fact. We can learn much about ourselves and how we Love ourselves in the ways in which we love others.

    We forget that the words we use are not the territory.  In your journey time and time again you will be ask to look past the words to what they point to.

     

    April 15, 2020 at 1:36 pm in reply to: I'm Over It #349714
    Peter
    Participant

    Dear Alyana

    It is important to have healthy boundaries and the strength to maintain them and I commend you for that.

    Healthy boundaries also applies to having the disinterment and knowing when to ‘speak ones mind’.  (picking one battles) My rule of thumb is to pause and ask myself where my need to respond is coming from. Ego, to teach a lesson, be right, defend myself, protect myself… Not that I wouldn’t ‘speak my mind if say it was a ego thing, just that knowing why I’m responding is helpful.  I also remind myself that any response can be used against me, possibly keeping the door open to further unhelpful dialog.

    Finally I  wanted to comment on your statement: “I used to feel guilt about that because you’re supposed to love your family” Sometimes ending a relationship and or creating strong boundaries to keep distance is a act of Love. Love does not require us to ‘Like’ someone nor does it require that we have a relationship with them. Love may ask you to let go of a desire for revenge, hurting them, resentment, even in time anger and quilt, etc, as such things require maintaining a kind of relationship.

    March 25, 2020 at 1:09 pm in reply to: Brain Science Behind Giving Up #345372
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Fiest

    You seem to have a good handle on how to proceed. I just wanted to add that most people assume they understand what hope is and how to hope. More often then not it gets entangled with existential angst, ego, control, desire for certainty, fear of uncertainty, desire to have life conform to our demands of how it ‘should’ be… Hope confuse as a kind of passive wishing.. waiting for that ‘something’ other then what it is.

    Hope is paradoxical. It is neither passive waiting nor is it unrealistic forcing of circumstances.

    Hope is like the crouched tiger, which will jump only when the moment for jumping has come. To hope means to be ready at every moment for that which is not yet born, yet hope is not desperate. Those who hope unskillfully settle down for self comfort (verses self care) or for violence; those whose hope is skillful see and cherish all signs of new life and are ready every moment to help the birth of that which is ready to be born.

    To Hope is a state of being, an inner readiness. “and yet it would not be wrong to say that the tree hopes for the sunlight and expresses this hope by twisting its trunk toward the sun” – Erich Fromm

    The Practice of hope is a art.. perhaps related to the idea of Zen’s doing by not doing…  keeping ones eyes open while continuing to engage with life.

    • This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Peter.
    March 25, 2020 at 12:22 pm in reply to: Maintaining Self in Relationships #345352
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Fiest

    I suspect your situation resonates with a lot of people. The paradox of loving others is that it opens us and open experience of both joy and pain.  Opening to other people is messy. One of the purpose of relationships is to ‘heal the past’. The healthy relationship creating the safe space to explore and discover ourselves. Nothing like a relationship with others to reveal our best and worst selves. (often it takes a breakup for us do the work and see these’s aspects of our selves.)

    In the work you have done you discovered that when not partnered up you are more authentically yourself but wondering it that’s a excuse not to continue trying. Society in general places a lot of pressure to partner up so its understandable to wonder.  My opinion for what is worth is that your self discovery is a valid one. One does not need a partner to be fulfilled, whatever that means, and more and more people are finding that the single life is the life that best suits them. That said the choice of having to chose one or the other may be a false  one. Remaining true to your self with a open heart… things happen/change. Sometimes not looking is the best way to find things.

    March 24, 2020 at 12:56 pm in reply to: My girlfriend said she has a soulmate but it isn't me #345110
    Peter
    Participant

    “Most people think of love as a feeling, but love is not so much a feeling as a way of being present.” — David Richo

    Hi Jordan

    It might help if you define what you and your girl friend mean when using words like soulmate and love. From the what you wrote about your girlfriend who describing Joe as her friend but not having any ‘passion for’ she is likely defining soulmate and love differently then you are.

    I am worried that her love for me is not pure. I always thought of love as what’s in the love stories… I really want to understand whether my girlfriend is someone who I can trust completely.

    You have answered your own question – you do not trust your girl friend. You want to know if her love is pure and if you can trust her completely and then go that her love is not pure and that you don’t/can’t trust her.

    I’ll be honest I had difficulty reading past your concept of love as being ‘whats in a love story’.

    Between the lack of trust and romanticized concept of relationships and love I don’t think your ready for anything deeper without out allot of personal work.  Your story reads more about a desire to have control over someone then loving them, writing down our thoughts is a tricky business so if I’m wrong I apologize.

    I do not mean to be cruel. This idea of a ‘pure’ love doesn’t mean much to me. I think its something that people just say without defining for them selves what it means to them. And trust comes from having healthy boundaries and sense of self, trusting yourself. If you don’t trust yourself you will never trust another. The idea ‘completely trusting’ to me imply s having boundaries that are so ridged that any trespass will be enough to knock them down, or so week that they don’t exist.

    We see things as we are not as they are. If you want this relationship to work you will have to trust her and get over her having any male friends. If you can’t do that , that’s fine, this relationship is not for you. That boundary, that choice/issue is yours. I will say this In partnerships where one gives up (asked to give up) their friends to make the other feel better about the relationship… its not love, its fear and possibly control, not relationship.

    • This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Peter.
    • This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Peter.
    • This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Peter.
    March 24, 2020 at 11:04 am in reply to: How to stop myself from loving anyone anymore? #345094
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Paradox

    Now I don’t want to fall in love ever again. I feel that love is annoying…

    Your alias PardoxMusic may not be a coincidence as I suspect the answer lies in the Paradox of Love

    I suspect that if you meditate on LOVE. Love as it is and not some movie version of the experience of ‘falling’ into something other…  What if Love is a falling towards yourself and life as it is. a letting go that is not a giving up or into/expectation of something but a embrace of wonder of uncertainty… That falling isn’t a choice… we are all of us falling the question is in choosing how we fall. Its all Love

    • This reply was modified 5 years, 5 months ago by Peter.
    March 24, 2020 at 10:53 am in reply to: Transition out of a deep depression #345090
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Katie

    Now I am in a place where I so strongly want to move out of this depression but I feel like I am not sure who I am anymore

    The thought that came to my mind when I read that was a question I’ve asked myself when feeling/thinking the same way. Who would I be without this depression? The feeling being that in some perverse way I had attached my senses of self to this experience of depression. The truth being that depression provided a kind of safety net, even a odd comfort, a excuse to remain as I was/am..

    My experience of depression has always been rooted in existential angst. Unskillful dwelling on meaning, purpose, loneliness. Eventually I suspect their is a tipping point where the body reacts and depression becomes chemical. Reading your post Its not clear where you are on the scale. A bit of both perhaps, each feeding the other? Have you ever talked to someone about your depression? Medication could help and give you the space to deal with the question of who you are.

    I wish you all the best… you are not your depression, you experience depression…

     

     

    March 13, 2020 at 8:47 am in reply to: My teacher said I'm lazy? #343120
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Katie

    It is very understandable that your teachers’ words have resulted in anxiety. I suspect that most of us have had this experience, if not from a teacher someone else’s who’s opinion matters to us.

    When I was troubled in a similar way, I wrote an author of the book, Philosophy for dummies and for whatever his reasons he responded and gave me some advice I have never forgotten… I have forgotten the issue that was bother me. Isn’t that true of almost all such issues?

    Tom’s advice: ‘We work for that which no work is required” and the rule of charity. The rule of charity states that if there are multiple possible explanations for an event and there is no way for you to determine which possible explanation is the correct one then chose the most helpful explanation.

    The recommendation here might be to sit down with your teacher and have a real conversation. Scary.

    In the Book: Critical conversations suggests that before you enter such dialog taking the time to understand your stories, identifying when they are victim and villain stories. Victim and villain stories are sure fired way to end a conversation before it begins. So again, the rule of charity applies as it allows you to enter dialog with an open mind.

    You may also find that by going through the exercise of choosing the better possible explanation that there is no need for a conversation. Its possible you don’t need your teacher’s validation in this matter

    March 10, 2020 at 12:42 pm in reply to: Dissappointment after meeting with lecturer #342654
    Peter
    Participant

    Your Welcome Sky

    I’ve found the rule of charity helps in the process of letting go. In the past I would have let a experience in which I imagined the others intentions negatively overwhelm my inner dialog for days. That’s the thing with such inner dialog is never about the person that hurt us, we aren’t actually talking to them, were talking to ourselves through a imagined them.  Such dialog teaches us more about ourselves then about who they may or may not be.  The rule of charity allows us to recolonize that and let it go.

    I like your very possible explanation. no victim or villains just people.

    March 10, 2020 at 12:26 pm in reply to: Am I being paranoid and insecure? #342650
    Peter
    Participant

    Hi Bell

    What is troubling me is often when I cannot differentiate between my “burden” of the past or just simply actions that I should not tolerate.

    So it is I think for most people especially those that are sensitive to other peoples feelings.  The only way out of that is as Socroties said. “Know thy Self”.  The key to discernment is doing the work to know ourselves as we are… and then the task is self acceptance. Knowing your self will help you determine what issues and feelings belong to you and which don’t and with that knowledge the ability to set up healthy boundaries.

     

     

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