Considering the ways and reasons for the birth of this English forum, it’s probably unavoidable that the first topic be the one on my first article on my blog dealing with the offences.
In the article I tried to summarize some aspects about the question, knowing that a lot more can be said.
The idea is that the article should be a starting point for the comments in this forum that will contribute to the development of the question (but not only this quite circumscribed question…).
The link to the article:
http://en.irinushka.eu/category/massimo-blog/
Article on the offences
Great and deep article indeed...I like the main idea of it, importance of the "moon", no matter what discussion we are having, or the way we are going to the final destination, main thing is to "get there" and if ego is an obstacle on this way, than finding a way around it will be a key...
I'll have my further comment later on...
I'll have my further comment later on...
Slava, I’m happy you appreciated the article!Slava wrote:Great and deep article indeed...I like the main idea of it, importance of the "moon", no matter what discussion we are having, or the way we are going to the final destination, main thing is to "get there" and if ego is an obstacle on this way, than finding a way around it will be a key...
I'll have my further comment later on...
About the question of the ego I think this is really a key issue in the approach not only to this problem, but to many others and in this transition between the old and the new reality.
I was trying to answer something briefly as a forum message, but I see it's not possible to compress the subject too much and so I think I will use your implicit suggestion for a new article.
Greetings to you too to!BеLеZhy wrote:Greetings, We have not met yet, but i've heard a bit about u.
I hope you heard good things...
It looks like a fairly vast question to be answered with a forum message..BеLеZhy wrote: May i ask u couple questions, just to really figure out what is truth about what i've heard.
May u tell us, what's ur life positioning, where do u position ur self in life, and thats it..
As you see I have difficulties even for condensing an answer on a lot more circumscribed subject...
In general (and I really mean in general, not only for this question) I would say that the best approach is that of inferring my *positioning* from my answers and posts on specific subjects. You should form your opinion on my positioning (and that of anybody else) by examining and evaluating my (his) thoughts, actions, ideas.
Because in general, what matters FOR YOU is where YOU position me, not where I position myself: I could position myself on the top of the Universe, but if you positioned me at the bottom, this would be my positioning for you (even if I really and undeniably were at the top of the Universe). And your conclusions about me would anyway be based on YOUR point of view, not on mine...
But if you want you could try with a slightly more specific question...
Good!BеLеZhy wrote: about ur post. i'd sign it up, absolutly..
well to be honest, u've answered my question wellMassimo wrote: But if you want you could try with a slightly more specific question...
i would enjoy reading ur though and other things u will offer and share with us! but still there is more, with the question, i have no idea why i had to ask u what i've asked.. i havent asked anyone this questions before, but tawords u it always comes up.. in this, i think im just being a mere pawn delivering an encoded mesage with that questin
or maybe there is still something for me to learn out of it...Let’s imagine that someone who is perfectly detached, not involved in the fight between the “offender” and the “offended” and with a great clarity of mind and understanding is called to examine the question of the offense.
Hello Massimo,
Thanks for the article. Many interesting helpful ideas. Could you please give some ideas who do you think could be that "someone" or maybe "something" you described in the quote above. I mean on the human level (with his own truth which should be considered)
Or who could it be the closest to that "imaginary someone"?
Thanks a lot
Hello Massimo,
Thanks for the article. Many interesting helpful ideas. Could you please give some ideas who do you think could be that "someone" or maybe "something" you described in the quote above. I mean on the human level (with his own truth which should be considered)
Or who could it be the closest to that "imaginary someone"?
Thanks a lot
Good!BеLеZhy wrote: well to be honest, u've answered my question well
I think that for this there won't be any problem!BеLеZhy wrote:i would enjoy reading ur though and other things u will offer and share with us!
Perhaps it's a question that regards both of us, very likely in a completely unrelated manner, but in some way is in foreground right now both for you and me... in my case, I have actually been asked to focus on this subject by other "interlocutors" before, therefore I thank you for drawing again my attention to the question, probably there is still something that I should "do" about it...BеLеZhy wrote: but still there is more, with the question, i have no idea why i had to ask u what i've asked.. i havent asked anyone this questions before, but tawords u it always comes up.. in this, i think im just being a mere pawn delivering an encoded mesage with that questin
Hello aspie,aspie wrote:
Hello Massimo,
Thanks for the article. Many interesting helpful ideas. Could you please give some ideas who do you think could be that "someone" or maybe "something" you described in the quote above. I mean on the human level (with his own truth which should be considered)
Or who could it be the closest to that "imaginary someone"?
Thanks a lot
Thank you for your appreciation!
About the "imaginary someone", actually this was simply a kind of "logic instrument" for building the argument.
I think that such a figure doesn't exist, at least not in an absolute and perfect form.
What I was trying to point out are essentially two things:
1. What really matters is focusing on the content of the message, not on its form, and then understanding if the content is "right".
2. YOU need to be totally sincere and detached, YOU must behave like that "imaginary someone" or at least try to be as close as possible to that imaginary someone’s behavior while you examine the so-called offense (or any kind of concept or argument) to see if there is something useful for you. You have to put yourself in the position of being ready to sincerely and detachedly reconsider your opinions and points of view in the face of the new concept or argument or offence’s content you are receiving in input.
Depending on how close you will be able to be to that “imaginary someone”, you will be able to really see if the message is meaningful, correct, helpful or vice-versa, useless and “wrong” or plainly offensive FOR YOU.
As often happens, this very simple advice is actually not so easy (i.e. terribly difficult
) to be put into practice, it requires a long work, a growth, a deep knowledge of things, even a long experience in quarrels and discussions and confrontation with different ideas and people.Therefore I would say that there are three possible main cases:
1. The two persons confronting are both very “advanced”: easy case, first of all none of them will probably ever need to offend the other, secondly, they will both express “understandable” and appreciable concepts for the other and finally they will both reach a personal and useful view of the other’s perspective. This could change a bit or a lot their previous points of view, or simply be a confirmation, but in general the exchange will have been as good as possible.
2. The two persons are both very “under-developed”: easy case too, the probability of an understanding or of a passage of useful concepts from one party to the other is quite limited, the most pleasant situation occurs when they both share the same concept (right or wrong doesn’t matter) and therefore feel confirmed in their beliefs (which is basically the most important thing for the under-developed approach, a lot more important and satisfactory than that of finding out something new or unexpected). If they don’t share the same ideas… well, anything can happen, but none of it will be good!
3. One person is “advanced”, the other isn’t: this is the real case, in a way the only real one, because we are all in an intermediate position between the under-developed and the advanced position, so there will probably be two persons with two different degrees of “development”.
Depending on how close we are to the advanced position, we will be able to acquire as much as possible from the confrontation. If nothing is there for us (sincerely and detachedly) we will drop the question and in any case, this is the best we can do and, I can assure you, a lot more interesting and really helpful than receiving the “truth” from an “imaginary someone” who knows everything and tells us ”Nah, that man is wrong, believe me”!
So the final message is: try to be as close as you can to the “advanced approach” because this is not only the best approach for you (and for the other party) during the discussion, but also the only one if what you are really looking for are hints, suggestions, clues, ideas and concepts for better understanding the meaning of your life.
It is also possible that two persons, both rather “advanced”Massimo wrote:
… The two persons confronting are both very “advanced”: easy case, first of all none of them will probably ever need to offend the other, secondly, they will both express “understandable” and appreciable concepts for the other and finally they will both reach a personal and useful view of the other’s perspective. This could change a bit or a lot their previous points of view, or simply be a confirmation, but in general the exchange will have been as good as possible....
, have their respective “root files” (files of their legitimacy power) fixed (written) in two very different levels of the “living pyramid”.In this case, it is possible that one of those two persons or also both of them feel a kind of “offence” not for themselves as human beings, but for the levels they are serving and which they consider the main source of their individual “living” and eventness.
In this case I’d prefer to speak not about an offence, but about an insufficient number of excitations and “pixels” that, gradually supplied by both the levels and by the Whole, would have to form a kind of bridge, a “wave adaptor”, an automatic regulator of those very different “reality views”.
A kind of “energetic translator” that creates a perfect and a very advanced understanding inside the pyramid, between all the parts of the new reality “file system”.
Then, what can we do to get this magic “energetic translator”?
First of all, we must be open to the Whole.
And secondly, we must be patient.
And in that case, "the things will come by themselves ".
And all of us will be Winners.
...The Winner takes it all
The loser standing small...
http://it.youtube.com/watch?v=Zwuv2mMNg ... re=related
If I had been offended I could consider closing the question with an offensive reply (with the clear awareness that this offensive reply would be just an expression of my belonging to the human race and would serve no purpose other than that of pleasing my offended ego
Hello Massimo,
thanks for the answer about "non-existed someone"
What if 2 sides/parties with their different Truths need to find "common ground" or stop the offense (they cannot just walk away from the Situation)
In old System usually one gave in to another (by different reasons)
What about that in a new System?
And what do you think
Does the concept "offense" belong only to Ego or to not-Ego also and what would be the difference?
Thanks a lot
Hello Massimo,
thanks for the answer about "non-existed someone"
What if 2 sides/parties with their different Truths need to find "common ground" or stop the offense (they cannot just walk away from the Situation)
In old System usually one gave in to another (by different reasons)
What about that in a new System?
And what do you think
Does the concept "offense" belong only to Ego or to not-Ego also and what would be the difference?
Thanks a lot
-
Joconde
I’d like to have a look at the question of the offences or of what is an offence from a different perspective or different point of view.
So, what an offence in essence is?
An offence is simply an emotion. (In the contrary of that, a joy, for instance, is a state of being, not an emotion).
The person who is offended and the person who is an offender are both in an active state of negative emotion such as anger, sadness, disappointment and etc.
And how can we identify what an emotion is?
According Eckhart Tolle, the author of the book “A New Earth” (it is really one of the most incredible book I have ever read), our physical organism, our body has its own intelligence which is inseparable part of the universal intelligence. That intelligence runs our body (the conversion of oxygen and food into energy, the heartbeat and etc). And that intelligence also reacts to what our mind is saying to us, reacts to our thoughts. In other words, an emotion is the body’s response to a thought. Although the body is very intelligent, it cannot tell the difference between an actual situation and a thought. It reacts to every thought as if it were a reality.
The energy field of old but still very much alive emotion that lives in almost every human being is the pain-body. It has its own primitive intelligence that like all life form periodically needs to feed-to take in new energy that is compatible with its own, energy that vibrates at a similar frequency. Any emotionally painful experience can be used as food by the pain-body. Emotion from the pain-body quickly gain control of your thinking, and once your mind has been taken over by the pain-body, your thinking becomes negative. The voice in your head will be blaming, accusing, complaining and etc.
And you are totally indentified with whatever the voice says. At that point the addiction to unhappiness has set in. It is not so much that you cannot stop your negative thoughts but that you don’t want to. This is because the pain-body at that time is living through you, pretending to be you. As long as you blame others, you keep feeding the pain-body with your thoughts and remain trapped in your ego.
The beginning of freedom from the pain-body starts first of all in the realization that you have a pain-body. Than, more important, in your ability to stay present enough, alert enough, to notice the pain-body in yourself as a heavy influx of negative emotion when it becomes active. And when it is recognized, it can no longer pretend to be you and live itself through you.
So, in other words, all you need to do to get rid of pain-body or negative emotion and take the control over your thoughts is to stay Presence and Conscious.
The thinking mind cannot understand Presence and so will often misinterpret it. It will say that you are uncaring, distant, have no compassion, are not relating. The truth is, you are relating but at a level deeper that thought and emotion. In fact, at that level there is true coming together, a true joining that goes far beyond relating.
And below, please have a look at the small part of the incredible film “What the Bleep Do we know”, which is giving the scientific point of view or explanation of what is our emotion.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGYyEtZe ... re=related
So, what an offence in essence is?
An offence is simply an emotion. (In the contrary of that, a joy, for instance, is a state of being, not an emotion).
The person who is offended and the person who is an offender are both in an active state of negative emotion such as anger, sadness, disappointment and etc.
And how can we identify what an emotion is?
According Eckhart Tolle, the author of the book “A New Earth” (it is really one of the most incredible book I have ever read), our physical organism, our body has its own intelligence which is inseparable part of the universal intelligence. That intelligence runs our body (the conversion of oxygen and food into energy, the heartbeat and etc). And that intelligence also reacts to what our mind is saying to us, reacts to our thoughts. In other words, an emotion is the body’s response to a thought. Although the body is very intelligent, it cannot tell the difference between an actual situation and a thought. It reacts to every thought as if it were a reality.
The energy field of old but still very much alive emotion that lives in almost every human being is the pain-body. It has its own primitive intelligence that like all life form periodically needs to feed-to take in new energy that is compatible with its own, energy that vibrates at a similar frequency. Any emotionally painful experience can be used as food by the pain-body. Emotion from the pain-body quickly gain control of your thinking, and once your mind has been taken over by the pain-body, your thinking becomes negative. The voice in your head will be blaming, accusing, complaining and etc.
And you are totally indentified with whatever the voice says. At that point the addiction to unhappiness has set in. It is not so much that you cannot stop your negative thoughts but that you don’t want to. This is because the pain-body at that time is living through you, pretending to be you. As long as you blame others, you keep feeding the pain-body with your thoughts and remain trapped in your ego.
The beginning of freedom from the pain-body starts first of all in the realization that you have a pain-body. Than, more important, in your ability to stay present enough, alert enough, to notice the pain-body in yourself as a heavy influx of negative emotion when it becomes active. And when it is recognized, it can no longer pretend to be you and live itself through you.
So, in other words, all you need to do to get rid of pain-body
or negative emotion and take the control over your thoughts is to stay Presence and Conscious. The thinking mind cannot understand Presence and so will often misinterpret it. It will say that you are uncaring, distant, have no compassion, are not relating. The truth is, you are relating but at a level deeper that thought and emotion. In fact, at that level there is true coming together, a true joining that goes far beyond relating.
And below, please have a look at the small part of the incredible film “What the Bleep Do we know”, which is giving the scientific point of view or explanation of what is our emotion.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGYyEtZe ... re=related
My take on the question is that in the "new reality" there will be more means of understanding each other's Truths. When Irinushka is speaking about the undular nature of each one and of the "magical adpaters" that create a common undular field where the interaction between different undular beings becomes possible and profitable, she is practically speaking of a scenario where each one understands of the other party what is necessary to sustain the needed or desired interaction.aspie wrote: What if 2 sides/parties with their different Truths need to find "common ground" or stop the offense (they cannot just walk away from the Situation)
In old System usually one gave in to another (by different reasons)
What about that in a new System?
As I wrote in my article (http://en.irinushka.eu/2008/09/07/ego-bad-or-good/), I don't think that the Ego should be perceived as a separate (and more or less disgustingaspie wrote: And what do you think
Does the concept "offense" belong only to Ego or to not-Ego also and what would be the difference?
) thing. You feel offended when you feel that somebody is not respecting you, is not respecting your characteristics, is not taking into account your needs and desires. The question is not if these desires are egoic or Spiritual, but if they are real, deep, important and undeniably part of your being or if they are distorted, superficial, plainly wrong, born from a long story of lack of understanding of your real nature. In the same way, on the other side, that of the "offending party" it's important to understand if he is seeing the actual truth or again basing his statements and actions on a view that is distorted, superficial, plainly wrong, born from a long story of lack of understanding of your and his real nature.
Let's make a simple and clearly extreme example: let's imagine a man with a very high degree of awareness but that is at the same time a bloody bastard and a very fearless and bold one. Now if you tell him that he is a bloody bastard he won't feel offended because he knows very well that he is such. So what is generally considered as a heavy offence will not offend him at all. On the other hand, if you tell him that is a coward, again he won't be offended because again he will know very well that he is not so, and therefore he will understand (thanks to his awareness) that you are the one who doesn't have a clear enough view of things and cannot express a reliable opinion.
Perhaps we could say that you feel offended when either you don't have a clear enough sense of yourself or you don't have a clear enough sense of what the others are or both things together...
Margarita, what you are saying is not that different from what I was saying: we both agree on the fact that the offence is an emotional response generated by an underlying thought.Margarita wrote:I’d like to have a look at the question of the offences or of what is an offence from a different perspective or different point of view.
So, what an offence in essence is?
An offence is simply an emotion. (In the contrary of that, a joy, for instance, is a state of being, not an emotion).
The person who is offended and the person who is an offender are both in an active state of negative emotion such as anger, sadness, disappointment and etc.
I would say that your view (and that of Eckart Tolle) is part of my view: in practice, while you and Tolle reduce everything to the effects that a negative attitude has on existence, I see it with a wider perspective that includes also other types of distortion. In practice, for me, any type of distortion in understanding the world can be the cause for feeling offended or for offending.
And certainly this distortion will first of all cause a negative emotion, then the offence, but the problem is in the distortion or confused understanding that was at the origin, not in the final symptom, i.e. the negative emotion.
What I don't like of this approach based on the dichotomy negative-positive attitude is that it is too simplified, reality is much more complex. There certainly are many situations where a person keeps feeding his own pain and reclaiming each day a painful situation, but there are also a lot of actually painful conditions (perhaps not so apparent, perhaps even related to fairly deep layers of his being) that would be a distortion to negate and that cannot be solved simply denying their existence or forcing ourselves into pretending they don't exist.
As usual, the boundary between these two conditions (real or illusory pain) may be quite thin and moving, but it exists and the conditions are always partially real and partially an illusion. The ability stays into finding out as precisely as possible where that boundary is located in each given situation or moment, and unfortunately this is not easy at all...
Another thing I don't appreciate too much is the "chemical approach" illustrated in the video: everything in that video is true and correct, but the perspective in my opinion is overturned. The chemical reactions, operations, effects are the consequence of our thought, of our feeling, in the new reality of our thinking-feeling. It's true that if we change our thoughts the chemical reactions will change and this will help us to break a possible vicious circle, but if this change of thinkng will be superficial and simply aimed at changing the chemical reactions in our body, the consequences will be superficial and unstable, actually in some cases and under some circumstances we could see violent overshots in the opposite direction with quite unpleasant practical side effects.
This way of perceiving things looks to me very similar to the old way of curing diseases based on the cure of symptoms: the symptoms of a negative attitude are these kinds of chemical reactions, therefore I use drugs to change the chemistry and at the same time I use a psychologic technique to induce a change in the attititude because I take it for granted that the negative attitude is just a consequence of the pain-body mechanism, nothing else, nothing more to be understood about the question.
Way too simple, unfortunately!