Esoteric knowledge for skeptics

[lorenzop]

I’m not asking whether you can confirm that from your experience but only if you understand what this whole thing implies, whether you understand what it means to live in a reality where there’s something similar to X behind happenings in the dreamscape?

Let me give an example where I would answer Yes - You and I are strolling through a forest, we discuss how we value this forest and wish to preserve it. This value we perceive 'belongs' to the forest.
We can say the forest offers a gesture, and we appreciate this gesture.
A single tree provides shade, this shade is a gesture offered to anyone and all who seek it.
A Stop sign offers a gesture . . .

[AshvinP]

I’m not asking whether you can confirm that from your experience but only if you understand what this whole thing implies, whether you understand what it means to live in a reality where there’s something similar to X behind happenings in the dreamscape?

I would answer 'no'. I can navigate city streets with purpose and deliberation - pay attention and know the meaning of a Stop sign, and understand the consequences of oncoming traffic. However, I don't see the meaning of a Stop sign as lying within or behind the Stop sign. When perceiving a dog - the notion of dogness is not buried\latent within the dog.
You used the phrase 'willing spiritual activity' to describe the process of deciphering an How To poster on how to do Squats . . . why use this phrase when traditionally the phrase would refer to philosophical or religious activities? When all activity is 'willing spiritual activity' then the phrase loses it's utility.

Imagine you were navigating a city street in Greece (assuming you don't know Greek) and came upon a sign on the road. Clearly, this sign has some meaning, it makes a meaningful gesture, but you don't understand if it's gesturing to "stop", "yield", "10 miles to Athens", etc. What word do we use to differentiate your understanding of the meaningful gesture from the local who speaks/reads Greek? Could we say that additional meaning perceived by the local is 'behind' or 'within' the sign with respect to your thinking, that it is 'latent' or 'implicit' and would become 'manifest' or 'explicit' if you learned Greek?

You are entirely correct that such words generally denote a misleading way of thinking about meaning, i.e. when people think the sign is an 'icon on a dashboard' that stands in for some other meaningful thing or process 'behind it'. On the other hand, we need some words to speak about this differentiation. Whatever word we choose, it is simply pointing to the experiential fact that our thinking does not currently resonate with the full depth of meaning. The key is that it is our thinking that lacks the full depth - there is no inherently "secret language" that the Greeks are using to confuse everyone.

"Spiritual activity" simply means whatever we do inwardly to actively attend to meaning in our environment. Sometimes that involves setting our whole physical body in motion, sometimes it only involves setting our thoughts in motion. Often it involves both - we perceive the meaning of 'stop sign', set our thoughts in motion about the consequences of oncoming traffic, and set our foot in motion to hit the brakes. A person who decides to drive in Greece without knowing Greek may perceive some meaning in his thoughts but not enough to discern that it gestures to oncoming traffic, so he fails to set his foot in motion to hit the brakes.

[Federica]

There’s another, deeper aspect of our attempts to explain things to people and change their minds. Probably anyone who struggles with these new ideas and meditates on them, at one point or another has caught themselves to argue with people in their imagination. This should be a fairly common experience especially for those here on the forum, who occasionally get into heated debates and certainly the arguments continue to reverberate in our thoughts and feelings even when we are away from the keyboard.

We should be aware that there could be a great amount of egoism in these debates. It is possible that we try to convince others just because of the fulfillment we would get when we turn out victorious. Or it might be that we just don’t want to thread the path on our own, we want to make those around us esoteric buddies.

In the course of development, such tendencies are gradually purified.

I thought I would add a comment here, since I may be one of "those here on the forum, who occasionally get into heated debates''. I definitely acknowledge a part of egoism in debates, be it here on the forum or IRL, but not along the suggested lines.
My impression is that, in my case, the attempt to have an influence on others by presenting them with spiritual reflections (and the replaying of those conversations in imagination) may be egoistic, but not because I hope to win over their perspective and feel victorious. First, I know well that, when this does happen (rare occasions) the feeling that emerges has nothing to do with triumph and victory; moreover, I find that, when our close ones are concerned, the 'debate' is almost inevitably underpinned by either the need to explain our new lifestyle and goals, and/or by genuine affection towards the other person, and the attempt to make them aware of something that could make a crucial difference in their life like it does in ours. This is very different from a debate with BK type situation, when it may be more about winning an argument.
Still, I do recognize a part of egoism in it. For me it's related to replaying my own arguments and expressions in my imagination and confirming to myself that they are good enough - alternatively how I could improve them. In other words, there is a focus shift towards an utilitarian use of the debate to self reassurance and self focus that is essentially a weakness, and wrong.

But the main reason for this post, Cleric, is what you indicate as another possible egoistic aim: that "we want to make those around us esoteric buddies". I do acknowledge that, but at the same time I don't think it's an expression of egoism. Rather, it's the expression of a fundamental - and I would say entirely justified and beneficial - need for community. A Steiner lecture comes to mind in this respect, that I will arbitrarily quote below, to illustrate that. I apologize in advance if I am simply misunderstanding what you mean by searching for "esoteric buddies''.

Modern man wants the purely human element in himself to relate him to the purely human element in others. He does indeed want social ties, but he wants them to have an individual character like that experienced in personal friendships.

Once a community has equipped an individual with knowledge, he can do something with it by himself. But that direct experience of the spiritual world, which is not based on thought but rather on feeling and is religious by nature, this experience of the spiritual world as divine can only be found by forming communities.

...

All community building eventuates in a higher being descending from the world of the spirit to reign over and unite people who have come together in a common cause.

...

But as I said, many individuals are presently entering the Society, seeking anthroposophy not just in the abstract but in the community belonging that satisfies a yearning of the age of consciousness. It might be suggested that the Society too should adopt a cultus. It could do this, of course, but that would take it outside its proper sphere. I will therefore now go on to discuss the specifically anthroposophical way of building community.

...

Observing people nowadays, one simply cannot imagine them being carried away by anything in the nature of a proclamation of religious truths such as used to take place in earlier ages. Of course, sects do form, but there is a philistine quality about them in great contrast to the fiery response of human souls to earlier proclamations. One no longer finds the same inner warmth of soul toward things of the spirit.

...

In ordinary waking life one awakens only in meeting another's natural aspects. But a person who has become an independent, distinct individual in the age of consciousness wants to wake up in the encounter with the soul and spirit of his fellowman. He wants to awaken to his soul and spirit, to approach him in a way that startles his own soul awake in the same sense that light and sound and other such environmental elements startle one out of dreaming.
This has been felt as an absolutely basic need since the beginning of the twentieth century, and it will grow increasingly urgent. It is a need that will be apparent throughout the twentieth century, despite the time's chaotic, tumultuous nature, which will affect every phase of life and civilization. Human beings will feel this need — the need to be brought to wake up more fully in the encounter with the other person than one can wake up in regard to the merely natural surroundings. Dream life wakes up into wakeful day consciousness in the encounter with the natural environment. Wakeful day consciousness wakes up to a higher consciousness in the encounter with the soul and spirit of our fellowman. Man must become more to his fellowman than he used to be: he must become his awakener. People must come closer to one another than they used to do, each becoming an awakener of everyone he meets. Modern human beings entering life today have stored up far too much karma not to feel a destined connection with every individual they encounter. In earlier ages, souls were younger and had not formed so many karmic ties.

...

So, in addition to the need to recall one's super-sensible home, which the cultus meets, we have the further need to be awakened to the soul-spiritual element by other human beings, and the feeling impulse that can bring this about is that of the newer idealism. When the ideal ceases to be a mere abstraction and becomes livingly reunited with man's soul and spirit, it can be expressed in the words: “I want to wake up in the encounter with my fellowman” and this is the particular form in which community can be nurtured in the Anthroposophical Society. It is the most natural development imaginable for when people come together for a communal experience of what anthroposophy can reveal of the super-sensible, the experience is quite a different one from any that the individual could have alone.

...

Through experiencing the super-sensible together, one human soul is awakened most intensively in the encounter with another human soul. It wakes the soul to higher insight, and this frame of mind creates a situation that causes a real communal being to descend in a group of people gathered for the purpose of mutually communicating and experiencing anthroposophical ideas. Just as the genius of a language lives in that language and spreads its wings over those who speak it, so do those who experience anthroposophical ideas together in the right, idealistic frame of mind live in the shelter of the wings of a higher being.

[Cleric K]

But the main reason for this post, Cleric, is what you indicate as another possible egoistic aim: that "we want to make those around us esoteric buddies". I do acknowledge that, but at the same time I don't think it's an expression of egoism. Rather, it's the expression of a fundamental - and I would say entirely justified and beneficial - need for community. A Steiner lecture comes to mind in this respect, that I will arbitrarily quote below, to illustrate that. I apologize in advance if I am simply misunderstanding what you mean by searching for "esoteric buddies''.

I completely agree, Federica, and thank you for providing the valuable quotes. What I meant with 'esoteric buddies' was in a quite narrows sense, where we need to feel secure in our "new hobby" by seeing that others also get into it. The point is to distinguish our inner reasons to do it. Would we continue if no one in our immediate surroundings shows interest? Or we'll say "well maybe it's not yet the time for this stuff. No one else does it!"

Other than that, community and real exchanges are of course crucial. The ascetic path is no longer viable. Steiner's example is very exact, because we're indeed learning a new language (with quite new inner gestures, which do not produce only replicas of sensory sensations) capable of grasping the invisible. The group souls of nations are archangelic beings. Among other things, they also inspire the specific language. In this way souls who live united with that being, live in common thinking space. Until now, these relations with the group soul have been based on blood ties. Today a new kind of group soul is taking shape which is not based on blood ties but on complete freedom. We live under the wings of that group soul when we seek to find the common language through which we transcend the blood ties and senses, and express the reality of higher life. The being in the shelter of whose wings we live, which Steiner was referring to, is, of course, Michael. He presently Inspires the new common language through which we can have sharable experiences in the supersensible. The whole impulse of spiritual science manifests as this Michaelic Intelligence descending onto humanity.

[Güney27]

When you try to deal with concepts from Spiritual science, you quickly come to the problem of having to think about things that cannot be perceived by the senses.
Here everything can quickly be absorbed abstractly; one can imagine ether or astral body as color forms and prescribe attributes to them, but then one forms various abstract fantasies. That's why I understand one hundred percent those people who say that esotericism is nonsense.

The abstract images that one creates lead to nothing and are mostly fantasy.
The great difficulty is to try to use spiritual scientific concepts, such as ether body astral body......
to relate vividly to the inner experience. For today's people it makes no sense to start with esoteric teachings, one should first learn the thinking that can give one an understanding of these topics. How would you try to give a skeptic a meaningful and simple introduction to esotericism?

To the extent that it is at least taken seriously and is not directly labeled as new age.
Giving someone Steiner's epistemological books will do no good, because hardly anyone will take the time to study it, and most won't be able to understand it.

These are good points, Guney. Frankly, I don't think it's possible. I think of a 'skeptic' as someone who won't lift a finger to exercise their thinking muscles unless everything is presented to them in abstract conceptual proofs. Such a person cannot even follow a phenomenology of thinking-perception, let alone more involved esoteric discussion. The inner realities are what give rise to our ability to formulate 'proofs' yet cannot themselves be proved - that would be like trying to reconstruct a living person from the broken shards of a mirror that once reflected her image. It is even difficult for people well-versed in spiritual science to get a concrete inner understanding of the stages of evolution, planes, bodies, ethers, etc. for this reason.

It is all about re-orienting our normal intuition of the 'way the world works', deconditioning that intuition from very narrow assumptions, beliefs, and preferences. But our normal intuition is also conditioned by a narrow memory, a narrow experiential landscape, that has nothing to compare itself to. It can't remember its more living and organic childhood mode of thinking, let alone its modes of thinking in previous epochs of human history. So it needs to perceive the helplessness of its current situation and take a reasoned leap of faith towards trusting in a Wisdom beyond its narrow confines. The skeptic is practically by definition someone unwilling to trust in anything that is not already spread before him in known perceptions and concepts that can be passively absorbed.

Any person who wants a chance to understand their inner experience concretely needs to be very open and willing to struggle with their thinking, to sacrifice many accumulated beliefs and habits in the pursuit of Truth. And this is how it should be. It would be a terrible thing if we could 'prove' genuine esotericism to a skeptic or anyone else through a passively absorbed set of logical arguments. That would practically be the end of all striving towards inner perfection of creative and moral capacities, which is practically the end of human evolution. So we shouldn't get too concerned about convincing others of these inner realities. First, we need to continue working on our own intuitive orientation because there is surely a lot more work to be done at any given time. The most powerful means of transmission is through living examples to others of the noble ways we think, feel, and act.

Ashvin,
I myself sympathize with an esoteric world understanding, but even after reading a lot, I cannot check whether all of Steiner's statements are true, I have to trust him. And hardly anyone will change their life so much, which one has to do in order to set an occult development in motion, if they don't have a sensible reason for it.
The intellect needs a reason to pursue these pursuits.
Maybe it would be better to start with something else, something like Owen Barfield or jung perhaps.
It is also important to understand why materialism arises from unproven assumptions.

Actually, it's not about pushing anyone into anthroposophy, but about showing someone that materialism is not an adequate explanation of the world.
I'm having trouble with this myself, so I wanted to get help from the forum.

How would you explain to someone, in simple language, why materialism (and all other philosophical positions that go along with it) are not facts but assumptions, and that they have problems that cannot be solved (for example the Hard Problem)?

[lorenzop]

My .2 cents . . . re following any teacher, whether that be Steiner, Ramana Maharishi, Jesus Christ, etc. . . . there should be methods and guideposts available where one can measure one's progress . . . even if as simple and humble as noticing a more restful sleep at night. If the goals are expressed as something like better or higher faith I'd be wary.

Re Materialism . . . having an intellectual preference for Materialism is not an impediment for spiritual growth, nor is moving from having a preference for Materialism to some brand of Idealism alone an indication of spiritual growth.

There are no prerequisites - there are no preapprovals - for spiritual growth.

Perhaps a way to think about this - - tomorrow or a year from now, what do I want my life to look like, how do I want to be present in the world.

[AshvinP]

When you try to deal with concepts from Spiritual science, you quickly come to the problem of having to think about things that cannot be perceived by the senses.
Here everything can quickly be absorbed abstractly; one can imagine ether or astral body as color forms and prescribe attributes to them, but then one forms various abstract fantasies. That's why I understand one hundred percent those people who say that esotericism is nonsense.

The abstract images that one creates lead to nothing and are mostly fantasy.
The great difficulty is to try to use spiritual scientific concepts, such as ether body astral body......
to relate vividly to the inner experience. For today's people it makes no sense to start with esoteric teachings, one should first learn the thinking that can give one an understanding of these topics. How would you try to give a skeptic a meaningful and simple introduction to esotericism?

To the extent that it is at least taken seriously and is not directly labeled as new age.
Giving someone Steiner's epistemological books will do no good, because hardly anyone will take the time to study it, and most won't be able to understand it.

These are good points, Guney. Frankly, I don't think it's possible. I think of a 'skeptic' as someone who won't lift a finger to exercise their thinking muscles unless everything is presented to them in abstract conceptual proofs. Such a person cannot even follow a phenomenology of thinking-perception, let alone more involved esoteric discussion. The inner realities are what give rise to our ability to formulate 'proofs' yet cannot themselves be proved - that would be like trying to reconstruct a living person from the broken shards of a mirror that once reflected her image. It is even difficult for people well-versed in spiritual science to get a concrete inner understanding of the stages of evolution, planes, bodies, ethers, etc. for this reason.

It is all about re-orienting our normal intuition of the 'way the world works', deconditioning that intuition from very narrow assumptions, beliefs, and preferences. But our normal intuition is also conditioned by a narrow memory, a narrow experiential landscape, that has nothing to compare itself to. It can't remember its more living and organic childhood mode of thinking, let alone its modes of thinking in previous epochs of human history. So it needs to perceive the helplessness of its current situation and take a reasoned leap of faith towards trusting in a Wisdom beyond its narrow confines. The skeptic is practically by definition someone unwilling to trust in anything that is not already spread before him in known perceptions and concepts that can be passively absorbed.

Any person who wants a chance to understand their inner experience concretely needs to be very open and willing to struggle with their thinking, to sacrifice many accumulated beliefs and habits in the pursuit of Truth. And this is how it should be. It would be a terrible thing if we could 'prove' genuine esotericism to a skeptic or anyone else through a passively absorbed set of logical arguments. That would practically be the end of all striving towards inner perfection of creative and moral capacities, which is practically the end of human evolution. So we shouldn't get too concerned about convincing others of these inner realities. First, we need to continue working on our own intuitive orientation because there is surely a lot more work to be done at any given time. The most powerful means of transmission is through living examples to others of the noble ways we think, feel, and act.

Ashvin,
I myself sympathize with an esoteric world understanding, but even after reading a lot, I cannot check whether all of Steiner's statements are true, I have to trust him. And hardly anyone will change their life so much, which one has to do in order to set an occult development in motion, if they don't have a sensible reason for it.
The intellect needs a reason to pursue these pursuits.
Maybe it would be better to start with something else, something like Owen Barfield or jung perhaps.
It is also important to understand why materialism arises from unproven assumptions.

Actually, it's not about pushing anyone into anthroposophy, but about showing someone that materialism is not an adequate explanation of the world.
I'm having trouble with this myself, so I wanted to get help from the forum.

How would you explain to someone, in simple language, why materialism (and all other philosophical positions that go along with it) are not facts but assumptions, and that they have problems that cannot be solved (for example the Hard Problem)?

Guney,

We need to be clear on what we are challenging, to begin with. If it's only a matter of challenging the idea that mindless matter giving rise to consciousness makes no logical sense, i.e. it cannot even be conceived within the scientific paradigm, then there are plenty of ways to go about it in 'simple language'. BK uses quite simple language to debate materialists and these are quite convincing. Everyone on this forum has worked their way to that realization in one form or another, but we have seen on this forum that materialism (or reductionism) at a deeper level still remains alive and unchallenged for many such people. That is because reductionism isn't a world outlook adopted through a strictly rational or logical process. The heart will always continue leading the mind back to some form of reductionism (material or mystical) until the deeper 'arrows' that steer our thought-life are addressed.

How do we bring an intellectual thinker's attention to these deeper arrows of their own thought life? There is no really 'simple language' for this except for the phenomenology of intuitive thinking. So to answer your question, I would introduce them to something like Cleric's last essay. If that experiential path is pursued openly in good faith, then it will not only reveal the reductionist assumptions we have been clinging to in our thinking, but it will naturally elucidate the nature of spiritual science over time as well. Here we also return to what Cleric was pointing to. If we still feel that we have to trust Steiner (or anyone else) on esoteric claims, that we can't check those claims in our reasoning, then we have more work to do for our own intuitive orientation (and that is practically always the case). We should look at our encounters with others who challenge the spiritual nature of reality as primarily a way to strengthen and clarify that orientation, rather than logically convince them of anything. Great care is needed here because we always want to be conscientious of the risk of doing more harm than good in our interactions with others.

It is true that the intellect is now the 'bouncer' of the heart, but nothing makes it past the intellect to the heart unless it is approached from the inner side of the intellect. The latter needs to experience itself in the middle of the funnel, torus, etc. where holistic Ideas condense into fragmented concepts and perceptions, and where the latter feeds back and steers the development of Ideas. It needs to feel intimately involved with this process in all its daily activities. Usually, when we make logical arguments about these things, like the 'hard problem of consciousness', we end up distancing ourselves further from creative involvement with the inner experiential side. The arguments dictate a certain chain of reasoning that we passively absorb to spit out conclusions X, Y, or Z. The meaning of the conclusions, like "consciousness is all there is and brain processes are only the dashboard representation of consciousness", can be perfectly coherent and accurate but still distance us from the inner side of that reality.

The resolution to this conundrum comes when our concepts become more direct expressions of inner experiences, such as the physical exercise diagram that invites our thinking-will to set itself in motion and creatively experience the meaningful gestures of the pictures. If we do that also for our life of thinking on a consistent basis, then we will start to find all the esoteric concepts of stages of cognition, stages of evolution, higher planes, bodies, hierarchical beings, and so forth are of the same nature - they are pointing to the intimate layers of our TFW soul-life that can be creatively engaged and explored. Again, initially, this doesn't require any deep meditative experience but can be attained through healthy phenomenological reasoning. I have noticed that the more we talk about it in abstract terms, even if those terms are very clear and accurate, the more difficult it becomes for others to grasp the simple essence of what is being pointed to. The abstract arguments tend to play into old habits of thinking, reinforcing them, and these are precisely what blocks our higher insight into the inner gestures of the concepts being used.

This is why there is great value in the very simple imaginative metaphors that approach and engage the experiential layers of our soul-life from as many angles as possible. Metaphors are something we can really participate in with our thinking, actively discerning the connection between the object of the metaphor - like 'aliased frequencies' or 'decohered wave functions' - and our first-person perceptual experience where holistic, dynamic processes of Time have become fixed and static objects of space where we no longer perceive the underlying intents. But this requires a consistent effort, there is no one-time metaphor or explanation that will unlock the secrets of our inner life. As Lorenzo indicated above, every insight should have practical ramifications for how we work on our soul-life and establish harmonious rhythms with the intents of culture and nature. We find the most meaning in our lives when we gain more and more participatory responsibility for how that life unfolds.

[AshvinP]

In the course of development, such tendencies are gradually purified. Then when we reach deeper levels of meditation, these inner arguments begin to show themselves in their macrocosmic nature. We begin to understand that these oppositions are the Cosmic debate between Christ, Ahriman and Lucifer.

Since we have been discussing the nature of meaningful archetypes and how they pervade our experience, I think it would be appropriate to share on this thread a fascinating story of how Anthroposophy influenced Star Wars. Apparently, George Lucas' wife, Marsha Griffin, was a student of Anthroposophy and consulted with Dr. Douglas Gabriel and his Waldorf team to refashion the disjointed script. Some of the archetypal correspondences that resulted which were mentioned in the interview:

- Luke 'Starkiller' became 'Skywalker' in reference to ancient mythology
- The lightsaber references the impenetrable aura of the initiate
- Midichlorians in the blood reference the etherization of the blood
- Chewbacca, Han Solo, and Obi-Won Kenobe reference the sentient, intellectual, and spiritual souls respectively.
- C3PO and R2D2 reference the left-hand (Lucifer - thinking) and right-hand (Ahr - willing) paths of evil, but at a more amoral level.
- The Emperor and Darth Vader reference the left-hand and right-hand paths at the immoral level.
- Luke holds the balance of the middle path between them (Christ).
- Leia became the twin of Luke to reference his higher self, the Spirit to his Soul.





Or for those who prefer to read the article - https://themillenniumreport.com/2016/01 ... it-hidden/

[Federica]

Actually, it's not about pushing anyone into anthroposophy, but about showing someone that materialism is not an adequate explanation of the world.
I'm having trouble with this myself, so I wanted to get help from the forum.

How would you explain to someone, in simple language, why materialism (and all other philosophical positions that go along with it) are not facts but assumptions, and that they have problems that cannot be solved (for example the Hard Problem)?

Guney,

We need to be clear on what we are challenging, to begin with. If it's only a matter of challenging the idea that mindless matter giving rise to consciousness makes no logical sense, i.e. it cannot even be conceived within the scientific paradigm, then there are plenty of ways to go about it in 'simple language'. BK uses quite simple language to debate materialists and these are quite convincing.

Yes, I also thought about BK for convincing explanations of "why materialism is baloney". More specifically, the arguments against materialism are summarized in BK's Analytic Idealism Course, especially the first two parts.

[Federica]

I completely agree, Federica, and thank you for providing the valuable quotes. What I meant with 'esoteric buddies' was in a quite narrows sense, where we need to feel secure in our "new hobby" by seeing that others also get into it. The point is to distinguish our inner reasons to do it. Would we continue if no one in our immediate surroundings shows interest? Or we'll say "well maybe it's not yet the time for this stuff. No one else does it!"

Other than that, community and real exchanges are of course crucial. The ascetic path is no longer viable. Steiner's example is very exact, because we're indeed learning a new language (with quite new inner gestures, which do not produce only replicas of sensory sensations) capable of grasping the invisible. The group souls of nations are archangelic beings. Among other things, they also inspire the specific language. In this way souls who live united with that being, live in common thinking space. Until now, these relations with the group soul have been based on blood ties. Today a new kind of group soul is taking shape which is not based on blood ties but on complete freedom. We live under the wings of that group soul when we seek to find the common language through which we transcend the blood ties and senses, and express the reality of higher life. The being in the shelter of whose wings we live, which Steiner was referring to, is, of course, Michael. He presently Inspires the new common language through which we can have sharable experiences in the supersensible. The whole impulse of spiritual science manifests as this Michaelic Intelligence descending onto humanity.

Yes, in this sense, your point reminds me of what MS said, that "we need to discover how much we really desire the spirit". I believe the interest shown by the immediate surroundings is an early test for anyone who has affinity with the path of living thinking, but the real challenge with the immediate surroundings is probably not so much that they feel no need to explore a similar path for themselves, but that some may conclude one has fallen for some obscure faith or sect. Thanks for the thoughts on the language of Michael!