I recently found a few book notes and my own thoughts, written back in May of 1998. I believe they are from, and inspired by Further Along the Road Less Travelled by Scott Peck.
Senility is not just a biological disorder, it can also be a manifestation of a refusal to grow up. Those who stop learning and growing . . . . become fixed (and) often lapse into second childhood.
I see no virtue in unconstructive suffering. Constructive suffering you ought to bear and work through. When you are suffering, ask yourself:
Is my suffering existential (+) or neurotic (-)?
How would I behave if I did not have this anxiety?
Then, behave that way.
A definition of evil: militant ignorance, militant unconsciousness.
Anger is basically a territorial mechanism. We have psychological territory as well as physical.
We cannot forget anything. We cannot truly forget. We only truly forgive.
The mystery to life is that we are here to learn. Everything that happens to us helps our learning. Self-love is the core, respect, responsibility for and knowledge of the self. Without loving oneself one cannot love others. (Self-esteem is preserving one’s image of oneself in the face of truth.)
If you think you can plan your spiritual growth, it ain’t gonna happen. Be willing to be surprised by forces beyond your control, and realize that a major learning on the journey is the art of surrender.
Evil – destructive; good = creative.
No matter how far you progress, you retain vestiges of all of the earlier stages in your psyche. (Check your dungeon regularly.)
From an interview w/ Jung:
Q: “Do you believe in God?”
Jung: “We use the word ‘believe’ when we think something is true but don’t have . . . evidence to support it. No, I don’t believe in God. I know there is a God.”
The work ‘integrity’ comes from the same word as ‘integrate’. You cannot be whole unless you put away compartmentation and remain open to the forces and stresses of life.
Be conscious! through it all (Kali Ma). Wake up, or you will never live. So much to do, but if you don’t do it now (or at least start to) it will never get done. Waiting for the perfect moment, or for you to ‘be ready’ means it will never happen.
Change is a law.
Random thoughts that distract you are symptoms of your dis-ease with your environment.
What do you mean when you say ‘my body is sore today’? Who is the ‘I’ who is separate from the body and speaking of it as a possession?
The fall from grace happens to each of us when we start thinking and become knowers and namers.
Happiness = satisfaction divided by desires.
(A thought from reading An Anthropologist from Mars by Oliver Sacks:) Does color have a reality other than as a process of judgment on our part? It is part of an active rather than passive connection with the world.