Philosophical Speculations

Yes I've developed some leeway, but I can't activate it other than in purposeful meditative prayerful intent. I guess age is also a factor. When I was younger I could find myself more casually 'in the clouds'. Feeling the gesture of the rushing mind is not a concept, but a real experience, though ...

Thanks for sharing this experiment, Federica. I do find it helpful to feel how the sequential verbal mental flow can be condensed more imaginatively. I noticed another way of anchoring this intuition is by experimenting with the semi-conscious state in the process of waking up from sleep. Before we ...

The Dasher metaphor is superior, because it points at the first-person living flow in the making. It goes in the same direction of thinking, so to say, from meaning to perception. However, I've found this fast reading experiment useful to get a feel for the gesture of relaxing the unpacking reflex ...

Great part, Ashvin, thanks! Stated in this way, I believe this can make the novice reader dizzy: Modern science also recognizes this polarity and conceives of the intuitive pushing pole as invisible ‘forces of nature’ or the ‘unconscious’. Modern philosophers likewise conceive of it as ‘things thems ...

“Whereas the tactician knows what to do when there is something to do, it requires the strategist to know what to do when there is nothing to do.” - Gerald Abrahams The Temporal Depth of our Intuitive Navigation Previously, we tried to get a better feel for our thinking (imaginative rehearsal) pr ...

I think the way to detect impatience in meditation is to recognize it in its direct consequence which is a gesture of giving up. That’s basically the same sin. When the feeling is “Ok I give up” it’s because there’s been impatience first, and I am certainly familiar with giving up in meditation. Imp ...

Thanks for the sneak peek of a future post! It’s an uplifting vista that you share, of the redemption of all decadent human activities, of which Chess is one example. In the meantime, yes, one can get hooked on anything (as I exemplified above). Interesting that there are these top players who c ...

Thanks for these observations, Federica. It stimulates many ideas about the nature of occult development for me. There is definitely a real concern with getting 'hooked' on any occult exercises, which I don't take lightly. The concern arises when we subtly adapt such exercises to our already ...

“There must have been a time when men were demigods, or they could not have invented Chess.” - Gustav Schenk Chess Incepts as a Sacred Rite We previously explored how our seemingly ‘private’ imaginative rehearsal space took shape through perforations in the encompassing instinctive orientation of ou ...

Could you elaborate on this question? :) Well, this is like in the Holy Week's workshop: a question that remains open, not to call for an answer, and I am also not allowed to comment on it so, unfortunately, I can't elaborate :) I see :) The reason I ask is that the question evokes an explosion of ...