I've felt this the first time I did a static line parachute jumps to earn my jump wings in the military. Walked out of a plane 2,500 feet in the air. Never hesitated nor flinched. I was filled with an amazing euphoria that must be felt to understand it. I'd get similar feelings in live fire exercises, and in martial arts training.
Regarding the esoteric although I am a baptized Orthodox Christian, my personal spirituality is very wide ranging ("God" is not "religion") I've studied esoterica for decades and I'm a first class very accurate tarot card reader. I've read the works of the major "religions" and then some. All have given me pause to reflect and think. However, four works in particular have been very inspiring for me and made much "practical sense", AKA can use the wisdom in my everyday life with no hinderance to my personal standards and life style.
These books are in particular order:
"The Secret Sayings of Jesus: A Modern Translation of the Gospel of Thomas" by Robert Grant and David Noel Freedman
"The Art of War" by Sun Tzu Translated by Thomas Cleary
"Tao Teh Ching" by Lao Tzu Translated by John C. Wu
"I Ching, The Book of Changes" Translated by Thomas Cleary
"The Quiet Mind, Sayings of White Eagle" (A fascinating blend of North American Indian lore and mysticism with Christianity.)
I've found much wisdom and spirituality in these works than can be used in a practical way in today's chaotic, nihilistic, collapsing society. I take what works and leave the rest behind. No heavy handed preaching nor forced asceticism. The problem with most dogma is it tries to force you into a construct. Liken it to telling a guy this shoe is perfect for him it will make his day and change his life. Except it's a 9D and they guy needs an 8E. He's told to force his foot into the shoe even though it's not wide enough. Problem is it will hurt him, it won't benefit him no matter how hard he tries to make it fit and work. He needs what fits what works for him. Not what he's told will work for him. It's time for Eurocentric nationalists everywhere to rethink everything they've been taught and to take what works and reject what doesn't work, or benefit our culture. Given the circumstances we find ourselves in today it's a question of our civilizations survival.
Hi Rolo, for some reason this article brought to mind the Protestant work ethic. And while Max Weber's theory and connection to capitalism has largely been rebutted, I think an argument can be made for the 'promotion of excellence' in all things. Also called the doctrine of vocation or calling, the idea is that practice of doing a thing well can move us beyond mere labourers to that realm of 'masters'. More than 'mindfulness', the pursuit of excellence elevates our thought processes as we undertake work -- repetitive tasks or as an approach to life -- which can achieve the flow state you discuss.
The English designer David Pye explores the inherent economic tension in this approach in his concept of "Workmanship of Risk". I can attest that the trade offs are profound and rewarding but often result in the cobbler's children having no shoes
Not sure I totally buy or even comprehend the entire conceit BUT I can absolutely vouch for flow state when deploying long practiced physical skills and three dimensional thinking as a professional cabinetmaker and boat builder of almost 40 years. And further, mastery of economically unrewarding skills for their own sake, e.g., applying a close to perfect high gloss finish by brush whilst having a fully equipped modern spray facility at hand, brings very unique spiritual rewards
A well written article. I don't disagree with the whole concept of spiritual attainment through practice.
The problem is that this whole discussion is happening too soon. If you're going to war you first have to know how to win the fight before figuring out where to host the victory parade.
Can a thief attain the same level of spirituality through picking pockets? Yes. He can. But should he? Ought he pick pockets or ought he not pick pockets? How do we answer this with orthopraxy w/ out first having a very objective (communicable) orthodoxy?
A monk digging ditches with a shovel can attain a high degree of spirituality but should he maybe, learn to use a tractor to dig ditches better?
I would argue what gave Europe better weapons to win the wars is precisely because their version of "orthopraxy" was guided by a very objective "orthodoxy". Why do you fight -- to win (orthodoxy). So all orthopraxy which did not fit that very rigid orthodoxy was judged heretical.
Nothing illustrates this concept in times of peace like heavy lifting. There is always a weight that will defeat us. Just short of that weight, the magic happens. The more closely we search for that limit, the more it recedes.
The special significance of lifting heavy is that success never depends on the fickleness of a competitor or judge.
200 pounds is always 200 pounds, and when our relationship with it changes, it is not the weight that has changed.
"Point being: the only true religion of the wise man is the cult of the best practice." My question is to what purpose is this "best practice" to be applied? To kill well? To live well? To live morally? To live for others? To accumulate wealth? To lie best? Technique is important but the motivation and end are also crucial? Best practice in and for itself does not amount to much good.
I really appreciate your writing Rolo and am glad that you approached metaphysics through its proper starting point: near-death experiences and mysticism.
Some critique. First, for one Ernst Junger that managed to reach the higher spiritual meaning of war, there were tens of thousands of men with shell-shock; these subsequently lived in alcoholism. Ernst Junger was a true warrior and war revealed him but how many people are there like him ?
Second, in the same vein, not everyone has the innate ability for mysticism. Learning the right techniques is not enough to make everyone reach higher states of conscience or develop new mind states. I often run into women into mindfulness yet the actual outcome of their exercises is pitiful and seems designed to impress their circle rather than to develop their conscience.
Third you cannot put near-death experiences on the same level as mysticism. In a near-death experience, the person usually meets parents or ancestors, angels, and formless creatures. They are given some explanation and they have to make the choice of dying or of returning to terrestrial life. Thus the person that undergo such an experience are those who came close to death but did not die outright, were given the choice, and came back. A very small subset of people with a deep interaction with the supernatural. They are at the origin of ancestor worship and the belief in angels. Mysticism has a wide variety of effects including the flow state, mind-to-mind communication, sight beyond walls, dowsing, etc. However interaction with supernatural beings is mostly absent. This leaves the men with creating their own interpretation rather being given one, which has resulted in the variety of religions humanity experienced in the past.
Fourth point, spiritual orthopraxy reveals actual powers of the human mind, powers that I believe our tribal ancestors used extensively but have been left undeveloped since the agricultural revolution. The increased size of human communities increased the need for interaction which resulted in the development of speech. It also increased specialisation in manual work and the necessity of acquiring skill. The time allotted to spiritual training diminished until most people with limited innate abilities could not gain much out of it. The priests and monks are those that could afford the leisure to develop spiritually. The trend continues. Today social networks destroy whatever inner life was left in most youngsters reducing them to mere corporeal nodes in a human mesh. A true tragedy for the common man.
>Some critique. First, for one Ernst Junger that managed to reach the higher spiritual meaning of war, there were tens of thousands of men with shell-shock; these subsequently lived in alcoholism. Ernst Junger was a true warrior and war revealed him but how many people are there like him ?
I'm not writing in defense of mechanized mass-war. I'm saying that war used to be a spiritual exercise for an elite class of specialists who went into war seeking a NDE and a brush with the divine.
>Second, in the same vein, not everyone has the innate ability for mysticism. Learning the right techniques is not enough to make everyone reach higher states of conscience or develop new mind states.
That's very likely. Which is why I posited in the previous essay that not all people are equal on a spiritual level.
>Mysticism has a wide variety of effects including the flow state, mind-to-mind communication, sight beyond walls, dowsing, etc
Yeah, I know. This isn't an extensive in-depth analysis of mysticism.
>Fourth point, spiritual orthopraxy reveals actual powers of the human mind, powers that I believe our tribal ancestors used extensively but have been left undeveloped since the agricultural revolution. The increased size of human communities increased the need for interaction which resulted in the development of speech. It also increased specialisation in manual work and the necessity of acquiring skill. The time allotted to spiritual training diminished until most people with limited innate abilities could not gain much out of it. The priests and monks are those that could afford the leisure to develop spiritually.
Either that or this sort of thing was condemned as heresy and shut down violently and systematically.
Nothing that elevated. Just suggesting that the elements (organization, disciple, hierarchy, and any number of intangibles) of an organized religion could have been factors conducive to the development of superior weapons of war.
The Catholic church re-instituted the old indo-european tripartition of society into priests, warriors, and workers. It also placed a high value on human life. The secular organisation/hierarchy followed those principles, which resulted in the joint development of human and horse armour and better weaponry to overcome those. Catholic Europe was ahead of nearly everyone else in this area from the around the year 1000. So Rexford Gibbs is right.
>The Catholic church re-instituted the old indo-european tripartition of society into priests, warriors, and workers.
Nope. That preceded the Church.
>It also placed a high value on human life
Only if you obeyed the dogma of the Church.
>The secular organisation/hierarchy followed those principles, which resulted in the joint development of human and horse armour and better weaponry to overcome those
Steel and horses were used in Europe before the Church and not only in Europe.
>Catholic Europe was ahead of nearly everyone else in this area
Europe had a powerful warrior culture that Catholicism wasn't able to subdue immediately.
I must admit, that some exceptions intruded when I was reading your general points.
1. Weber's "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" directly attribute behavior to spiritual belief.
2. The tenets of Islam do enjoin the Jihadi warrior to embrace fighting to the death.
3, The role of celebrity (rather than pure spirituality) in conferring status described in Veblen's "The Theory of the Leisure Class", only recognizes spirituality as only one possible characteristic of the high-status "drone" caste.
What does seem to be a common thread in this article is that spirituality raises industrial or productive activity to a higher plane, and once this is realized, 2 things may happen. a) Spirituality takes on meaning above and independent of the activity that engendered it. b) Ideology comes about when someone tries to articulate, or worse, assert, what that spirituality means in words.
In short, what's toxic about ideology is that it presumes to intrude verbally on spiritual matters , brushing aside the warning, "The Tao that can be spoken is not the true Tao."
Unfortunately, the pack tendency to make cult leaders over those who make outlandish claims overrides this wisdom that we should know in our more thoughtful moments.
>1. Weber's "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" directly attribute behavior to spiritual belief.
Literally Judaism for goys. Protestantism is Old Testamentarianism. Yahweh rewards Jews in the OT with material gifts as proof of his love. This is the origin of the prosperity gospel. Get rich or go to Hell.
Point is, Protestants get rich doing business because of their belief. Their work flows from from their ideology. According to Weber, get religion, live as it says, get rich. As if Catholics made steel because of some sort of Cult of the Holy Spear Tip, and then took their show on the road.
Ideologies can cause mass action when whole societies act ritualistically, like drinking Kool Aid. With strongly embedded ideologies, rites have more significance to society than reality. I think that's the situation in the West today, which is why it appears to be governed by madmen by Russians and other outsiders. That's because it is.
>Point is, Protestants get rich doing business because of their belief. Their work flows from from their ideology. According to Weber, get religion, live as it says, get rich. As if Catholics made steel because of some sort of Cult of the Holy Spear Tip, and then took their show on the road.
Spiritualism refers to 19th century practice of seance experiments, most of which were fraudulent. It's a more limited case than a philosophy of spirit (metaphysics)
I've felt this the first time I did a static line parachute jumps to earn my jump wings in the military. Walked out of a plane 2,500 feet in the air. Never hesitated nor flinched. I was filled with an amazing euphoria that must be felt to understand it. I'd get similar feelings in live fire exercises, and in martial arts training.
Regarding the esoteric although I am a baptized Orthodox Christian, my personal spirituality is very wide ranging ("God" is not "religion") I've studied esoterica for decades and I'm a first class very accurate tarot card reader. I've read the works of the major "religions" and then some. All have given me pause to reflect and think. However, four works in particular have been very inspiring for me and made much "practical sense", AKA can use the wisdom in my everyday life with no hinderance to my personal standards and life style.
These books are in particular order:
"The Secret Sayings of Jesus: A Modern Translation of the Gospel of Thomas" by Robert Grant and David Noel Freedman
"The Art of War" by Sun Tzu Translated by Thomas Cleary
"Tao Teh Ching" by Lao Tzu Translated by John C. Wu
"I Ching, The Book of Changes" Translated by Thomas Cleary
"The Quiet Mind, Sayings of White Eagle" (A fascinating blend of North American Indian lore and mysticism with Christianity.)
I've found much wisdom and spirituality in these works than can be used in a practical way in today's chaotic, nihilistic, collapsing society. I take what works and leave the rest behind. No heavy handed preaching nor forced asceticism. The problem with most dogma is it tries to force you into a construct. Liken it to telling a guy this shoe is perfect for him it will make his day and change his life. Except it's a 9D and they guy needs an 8E. He's told to force his foot into the shoe even though it's not wide enough. Problem is it will hurt him, it won't benefit him no matter how hard he tries to make it fit and work. He needs what fits what works for him. Not what he's told will work for him. It's time for Eurocentric nationalists everywhere to rethink everything they've been taught and to take what works and reject what doesn't work, or benefit our culture. Given the circumstances we find ourselves in today it's a question of our civilizations survival.
Great write up, and I appreciate the author reference (Ernst Junger).
Hi Rolo, for some reason this article brought to mind the Protestant work ethic. And while Max Weber's theory and connection to capitalism has largely been rebutted, I think an argument can be made for the 'promotion of excellence' in all things. Also called the doctrine of vocation or calling, the idea is that practice of doing a thing well can move us beyond mere labourers to that realm of 'masters'. More than 'mindfulness', the pursuit of excellence elevates our thought processes as we undertake work -- repetitive tasks or as an approach to life -- which can achieve the flow state you discuss.
The English designer David Pye explores the inherent economic tension in this approach in his concept of "Workmanship of Risk". I can attest that the trade offs are profound and rewarding but often result in the cobbler's children having no shoes
Not sure I totally buy or even comprehend the entire conceit BUT I can absolutely vouch for flow state when deploying long practiced physical skills and three dimensional thinking as a professional cabinetmaker and boat builder of almost 40 years. And further, mastery of economically unrewarding skills for their own sake, e.g., applying a close to perfect high gloss finish by brush whilst having a fully equipped modern spray facility at hand, brings very unique spiritual rewards
This was exactly what I had in mind when I wrote my comment above
A well written article. I don't disagree with the whole concept of spiritual attainment through practice.
The problem is that this whole discussion is happening too soon. If you're going to war you first have to know how to win the fight before figuring out where to host the victory parade.
Can a thief attain the same level of spirituality through picking pockets? Yes. He can. But should he? Ought he pick pockets or ought he not pick pockets? How do we answer this with orthopraxy w/ out first having a very objective (communicable) orthodoxy?
A monk digging ditches with a shovel can attain a high degree of spirituality but should he maybe, learn to use a tractor to dig ditches better?
I would argue what gave Europe better weapons to win the wars is precisely because their version of "orthopraxy" was guided by a very objective "orthodoxy". Why do you fight -- to win (orthodoxy). So all orthopraxy which did not fit that very rigid orthodoxy was judged heretical.
>why do you fight - to win
Yeah, I call that the Ideology of Victory.
Nothing illustrates this concept in times of peace like heavy lifting. There is always a weight that will defeat us. Just short of that weight, the magic happens. The more closely we search for that limit, the more it recedes.
The special significance of lifting heavy is that success never depends on the fickleness of a competitor or judge.
200 pounds is always 200 pounds, and when our relationship with it changes, it is not the weight that has changed.
"Point being: the only true religion of the wise man is the cult of the best practice." My question is to what purpose is this "best practice" to be applied? To kill well? To live well? To live morally? To live for others? To accumulate wealth? To lie best? Technique is important but the motivation and end are also crucial? Best practice in and for itself does not amount to much good.
define "good"
hard mode: define good without falling back on religious or political dogma
I really appreciate your writing Rolo and am glad that you approached metaphysics through its proper starting point: near-death experiences and mysticism.
Some critique. First, for one Ernst Junger that managed to reach the higher spiritual meaning of war, there were tens of thousands of men with shell-shock; these subsequently lived in alcoholism. Ernst Junger was a true warrior and war revealed him but how many people are there like him ?
Second, in the same vein, not everyone has the innate ability for mysticism. Learning the right techniques is not enough to make everyone reach higher states of conscience or develop new mind states. I often run into women into mindfulness yet the actual outcome of their exercises is pitiful and seems designed to impress their circle rather than to develop their conscience.
Third you cannot put near-death experiences on the same level as mysticism. In a near-death experience, the person usually meets parents or ancestors, angels, and formless creatures. They are given some explanation and they have to make the choice of dying or of returning to terrestrial life. Thus the person that undergo such an experience are those who came close to death but did not die outright, were given the choice, and came back. A very small subset of people with a deep interaction with the supernatural. They are at the origin of ancestor worship and the belief in angels. Mysticism has a wide variety of effects including the flow state, mind-to-mind communication, sight beyond walls, dowsing, etc. However interaction with supernatural beings is mostly absent. This leaves the men with creating their own interpretation rather being given one, which has resulted in the variety of religions humanity experienced in the past.
Fourth point, spiritual orthopraxy reveals actual powers of the human mind, powers that I believe our tribal ancestors used extensively but have been left undeveloped since the agricultural revolution. The increased size of human communities increased the need for interaction which resulted in the development of speech. It also increased specialisation in manual work and the necessity of acquiring skill. The time allotted to spiritual training diminished until most people with limited innate abilities could not gain much out of it. The priests and monks are those that could afford the leisure to develop spiritually. The trend continues. Today social networks destroy whatever inner life was left in most youngsters reducing them to mere corporeal nodes in a human mesh. A true tragedy for the common man.
>Some critique. First, for one Ernst Junger that managed to reach the higher spiritual meaning of war, there were tens of thousands of men with shell-shock; these subsequently lived in alcoholism. Ernst Junger was a true warrior and war revealed him but how many people are there like him ?
I'm not writing in defense of mechanized mass-war. I'm saying that war used to be a spiritual exercise for an elite class of specialists who went into war seeking a NDE and a brush with the divine.
>Second, in the same vein, not everyone has the innate ability for mysticism. Learning the right techniques is not enough to make everyone reach higher states of conscience or develop new mind states.
That's very likely. Which is why I posited in the previous essay that not all people are equal on a spiritual level.
>Mysticism has a wide variety of effects including the flow state, mind-to-mind communication, sight beyond walls, dowsing, etc
Yeah, I know. This isn't an extensive in-depth analysis of mysticism.
>Fourth point, spiritual orthopraxy reveals actual powers of the human mind, powers that I believe our tribal ancestors used extensively but have been left undeveloped since the agricultural revolution. The increased size of human communities increased the need for interaction which resulted in the development of speech. It also increased specialisation in manual work and the necessity of acquiring skill. The time allotted to spiritual training diminished until most people with limited innate abilities could not gain much out of it. The priests and monks are those that could afford the leisure to develop spiritually.
Either that or this sort of thing was condemned as heresy and shut down violently and systematically.
Rollo, did the conquistadors have guns, steel, and horses because they were Catholic and the Aztecs weren't? Etcetera.
That's an interesting claim.
So you're saying that transubstantiation led to Catholics created cutting-edge weapons of war?
Nothing that elevated. Just suggesting that the elements (organization, disciple, hierarchy, and any number of intangibles) of an organized religion could have been factors conducive to the development of superior weapons of war.
Put in other words, "the best practices (organization, discipline, hierarchy) of ____ could have been factors conducive to the development of _____"
Yes, and fill in the variables, test, rinse, and repeat.
The Catholic church re-instituted the old indo-european tripartition of society into priests, warriors, and workers. It also placed a high value on human life. The secular organisation/hierarchy followed those principles, which resulted in the joint development of human and horse armour and better weaponry to overcome those. Catholic Europe was ahead of nearly everyone else in this area from the around the year 1000. So Rexford Gibbs is right.
>The Catholic church re-instituted the old indo-european tripartition of society into priests, warriors, and workers.
Nope. That preceded the Church.
>It also placed a high value on human life
Only if you obeyed the dogma of the Church.
>The secular organisation/hierarchy followed those principles, which resulted in the joint development of human and horse armour and better weaponry to overcome those
Steel and horses were used in Europe before the Church and not only in Europe.
>Catholic Europe was ahead of nearly everyone else in this area
Europe had a powerful warrior culture that Catholicism wasn't able to subdue immediately.
I must admit, that some exceptions intruded when I was reading your general points.
1. Weber's "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" directly attribute behavior to spiritual belief.
2. The tenets of Islam do enjoin the Jihadi warrior to embrace fighting to the death.
3, The role of celebrity (rather than pure spirituality) in conferring status described in Veblen's "The Theory of the Leisure Class", only recognizes spirituality as only one possible characteristic of the high-status "drone" caste.
What does seem to be a common thread in this article is that spirituality raises industrial or productive activity to a higher plane, and once this is realized, 2 things may happen. a) Spirituality takes on meaning above and independent of the activity that engendered it. b) Ideology comes about when someone tries to articulate, or worse, assert, what that spirituality means in words.
In short, what's toxic about ideology is that it presumes to intrude verbally on spiritual matters , brushing aside the warning, "The Tao that can be spoken is not the true Tao."
Unfortunately, the pack tendency to make cult leaders over those who make outlandish claims overrides this wisdom that we should know in our more thoughtful moments.
>1. Weber's "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" directly attribute behavior to spiritual belief.
Literally Judaism for goys. Protestantism is Old Testamentarianism. Yahweh rewards Jews in the OT with material gifts as proof of his love. This is the origin of the prosperity gospel. Get rich or go to Hell.
Seems to prove my point not disprove it.
Point is, Protestants get rich doing business because of their belief. Their work flows from from their ideology. According to Weber, get religion, live as it says, get rich. As if Catholics made steel because of some sort of Cult of the Holy Spear Tip, and then took their show on the road.
Ideologies can cause mass action when whole societies act ritualistically, like drinking Kool Aid. With strongly embedded ideologies, rites have more significance to society than reality. I think that's the situation in the West today, which is why it appears to be governed by madmen by Russians and other outsiders. That's because it is.
>Point is, Protestants get rich doing business because of their belief. Their work flows from from their ideology. According to Weber, get religion, live as it says, get rich. As if Catholics made steel because of some sort of Cult of the Holy Spear Tip, and then took their show on the road.
Right.
Spiritualism refers to 19th century practice of seance experiments, most of which were fraudulent. It's a more limited case than a philosophy of spirit (metaphysics)