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This is an excellent exploration of non-doing in the context of modern culture. The only thing I'll add is that it is possible (desirable, even) to have goals and pursue them in a non-doing way. Here's an extract from "Freedom to Change", a well-known AT book: (and thread👇) https://t.co/nVXo42SHpj https://t.co/pEUqGuoDtK
A problem with modern culture is that we are strongly conditioned by unconscious responses that are given to us—and we don't know it. The way out of this is to 'expand our awareness' to include knowledge of all the things we're doing such that we can make new conscious choices. https://t.co/ZMCbdYofw8
But that 'make new conscious choices' is important. You begin to notice: "I am doing X. I never knew I was doing X. I can't seem to stop doing X" Then you gain greater control: "I am doing X. I can now choose not to do X, or I can choose to do Y instead." https://t.co/f1Yq0xMjMu
And there's a potential trap here. Not-doing X or doing Y instead must not be of the same 'forced' kind as doing X in the first place. That is just the same process, where most of our doings are of an unconscious, self-damaging kind. That is was we need to learn not to do. https://t.co/cGdLjoYZUx
That this is a societal level problem is pretty much self-evident—once you've learned to see it. We are all constantly being unconsciously conditioned. It is important that we learn to recognise this conditioning and learn how to step out from it — that is true agency. https://t.co/l4THL4PBN7
Or as John Stuart Mill said: "No great improvements in the lot of mankind are possible until a great change takes place in the fundamental constitution of their modes of thought." I think these are the modes of thought that he meant.
This unintentionally turned into an Alexander Technique thread, so if you're interested in this then you might like to read some of these as well. https://t.co/pppidMHSzH
And here's an Alexander Technique newsletter you can subscribe to, where you'll also get updates on the course I'm building. https://t.co/Iol9o85q7O
Meta] Also, if you want to dive much deeper into this stuff, I have built what I believe is the only asynchronous online course that explores Alexander Technique from a first principles perspective. You can find out more and stay up to date by going here: https://t.co/GHzsyr4ILq