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Fuck this self-love. For it is yet another fire extinguisher to extinguish guilt and pay no heed to the system at all. Fuck this self-love. For it distracts us from devotion to self, which above all starts with survival.
There *is* something profound to be discovered in that: even in those moments, you still truly are ok. A profound insight that will make you laugh, and absurd, and reprocess. If this is explicitly your practice, terrific.
@forshaper Guilt is an alarm system. I’ve begun to stop thinking of it as a problem. To focus on guilt is to focus on the alarms. Try and disable them. Not ask what is wrong in the system. Guilt is a load-bearing component. Eliminating it is reckless.
@forshaper You either die, or you push yourself close enough to the edge you allow it to come back again, just enough to survive. Take the load off the work guilt was doing another way first. https://t.co/DiuUGfrMt7
@forshaper It’s true that even after you’ve taken the load off, even after guilt serves not much of a purpose, even after you live in a physically and socially safe enough environment, the pernicious guilt remains. Stabbing you. Causing you suffering you do not need.
@forshaper Like middle managers, guilt is not very good at resigning once it’s no longer useful. But eliminating it is not antifragile. To have a suffering reduction strategy that involves not experiencing guilt is not antifragile.
@forshaper 1. Fuck them. 2. Raise our kid for 16 years. 3. Begin seeding an alcohol dependency. 4. Watch as they let their kid languish and lose some of the most pivotal years of their lives (college admissions) and know the difference they could have made if they tried a bit harder.
@AskYatharth https://t.co/VPB6CrMpUD
@forshaper When the guilt comes back, there is now a fire. When there exist fires the consciousness must put out, the ego is insta-recreated in all sorts of unhelpful ways. Instead, it is more anti-fragile to not eliminate guilt but strive to tolerate it and not mind it very much.
@forshaper Guilt vs shame in the Brené Brown sense? (Link for the uninitiated: https://t.co/m1USqMwo5H)
@forshaper If you were not you, you wouldn’t have done to behaviour, you would have done something a while ago to not have this behaviour, your priorities (“you”) are the problem, and that is ok, be ok with that being the case rather than being fed lies that crumble and hurt others.
@forshaper Transmute it, play with it, not doing anything to it, ignore it, experience it, validate it—at that point, do whatever, really. As I said, I’ve stopped thinking of guilt as the problem. As a problem at all. Just a happening. Eh. And sure, tools exist to work with it if I’d like
@forshaper In seriousness (I was mostly kidding above), I think being in a lot of pain can be helpful. Being “done” with the default upcoming life can be the base upon which to alter it. I deliberate inculcate this kind of experiencing of pain often.
@forshaper Nah. Personal responsibility can be a helpful frame (Landmark people elevate it to cult status), but isn’t to my personal taste. More like: ‘No “No guilt! in favour of self-love” in favour “huh, guilt, fascinating, i wanna feel it fully and fuller and fullerestevener”’
@AskYatharth Dr. K's types of procrastination:1. Idealizing performance2. Emotional avoidance3. Operational uncertaintyType 2 reaches for self-soothing techniques in meta-avoidance of itself.Related: We sustain exposure to familiar sources and levels of discomfort to avoid deeper ones.
@AbhayPrasanna Familiar vs unfamiliar forms of discomfort — that’s what I was missing! Thank you. Reminds me of what my teachers would say: Our Box of Self does not try to make us happy, nor does it try to make us sad—its job is just to keep us in the predictable.