Weekly Webinar #37: “Discussing ‘Zen In The Art of Archery’”
Added 2020-12-13 19:06:18 +0000 UTC
Comments
Great discussion coach would love to see you do a discussion about Meditations by MA in the future
2020-12-25 07:21:22 +0000 UTC
Talk about lessons from the Founding Fathers.
2020-12-19 10:21:16 +0000 UTC
The way you described the book reminds me of how I learned Game. I did countless amounts of research, found what I liked, then ground it out. I gamed with the sole purpose of getting better at game and not for the sake of getting any specific girl. That's the best advice I can give for someone learning it.
2020-12-18 07:44:36 +0000 UTC
Fantastic webinar! I'm now very interested in reading the book. I'd like request one of these for The Art of War and would love to hear your thoughts on how the book can be applied in the life of a western man.
2020-12-18 07:23:39 +0000 UTC
This is one of the best episodes you have done, CRP. Thank you
2020-12-16 02:30:38 +0000 UTC
Great point about emotions being chemicals. It can be helpful to view them as such. I think it’s also important to keep in mind that, being chemicals, emotions are also outside our rational/cognitive control. All we can do is give them meaning (or remove meaning from them), and, by doing so, perpetuate their loop (or break it).
One can fall into the trap of being upset with the emotion of anger that just got ignited. It’s a lie! It’s just a chemical! It’s not supposed to be there!
I like to compare emotions to the wind and myself to the sailboat. The sailboat cannot sail anywhere without the wind, just like I cannot decide and act without the drive of emotions. The wind has no meaning, and its direction is irrelevant to the direction of the desired destination. One can use the wind to sail into practically any direction. One can also assign special meaning to the wind and always sail with the wind, succumbing to its whim and never getting anywhere.
Sometimes, the wind can be too strong, which can break the mast, just like strong emotions can overwhelm the brain, rendering it ineffective. At that point, lowering the sails to weather the storm may be the best course of action, as letting one’s emotions “be,” run their course, and flush themselves out. This is where meditation or journaling can be highly effective.
2020-12-16 00:46:51 +0000 UTC
Nice webinar, too bad I couldn't be there, because I disagree with this book and think that it's nonsense and I'm zen master apparently :D Or at least very close.
2020-12-15 21:52:32 +0000 UTC
I read this twice actually. I couldnt make it to the livestream but I am watching it now. This was a great read. This is a very important book for westerners. In the west people tend to live in this state of hyper-awareness in the big cities. Adam actually brought up something similar.
2020-12-15 06:25:02 +0000 UTC
Hi coach, just finished listening to the recording. I want to join live one day, but Sunday mornings I have booked with clients, I know it's a weird time, but for now it's something I can't change. Eventually though I want to hop on. I wish I could have chimed in during the last part of it.
Especially when the philosophy was spoken about, I have given these ideas a great deal of thought too. Something that helped me substantially, when I was trying to figure out how to be a rock, a mountain of a man, rather than getting stirred up by emotions, was studying tons of philosophy and science.
What I ultimately arrived at, a conclusion that actually helped me, was understanding the science of anger, specifically the biologic factors, which create anger.
I read as much as I could to understand why we get emotional, especially angry at things. I stared at a microscopic picture of the hormone chemical which creates anger, traveling through a brain synapse impulse.
What creates the chemical reaction, is when we have an internal expectation of something, and when it is not fulfilled, the anger chemical is sent from our endocrine system.
This helped me so much, I realized nothing should be anyway I think it is. I can't control anyone outside of me- at all. I can't control how people were raised, their lack of education, their lack of common sense, and so forth.
To put it simply, I can't control external circumstances. So getting angry at a light not changing, or someone disappointing us, is silly of me because I have no control over what anyone else or anything does.
Once you realize getting angry is silly, or getting shocked at people when they have bad behavior, you realize you just have a lie inside your head.
You are believing an absurdity. An inaccurate ideal, which unconsciously says you have the power to control what other people do, and or the ability to dictate outside influences like the weather, politics, and so on.
We are holding an insensibly, wrongly held assumption, that people should do what we feel or think, while the truth is, we have absolutely no power to change or control what they do.
Even if you influence someone, you have no power to force them to do anything- ethically speaking.
By accepting this mental truth, it brings clarity, by reminding yourself not to believe a lie because it's not fun, profitable, or practical, to continue to accept unconscious deception.
It's easy not to get upset about things because you realize you just had a mistaken expectation of what something should be.
When in reality it shouldn't be like anything. Unless you are the creator of the universe, you don't have any power to change something, except the decisions you make.
It's telling yourself, 'I shouldn't be upset or excited about anything or any behavior outside of my control, and if I do it's silly of me'.
Hope this helps someone, it helped me a lot once I realized it's comical to get upset at something, you have no power to change.
By doing this, you can literally sidestep anger. There's no more reason to have it because you understand you were only getting upset, at a false belief you were holding on to.
People will do what they do, no reason to get upset about it. Some people are idiots, a few of them are smart.
2020-12-15 02:38:54 +0000 UTC
Couldn't make it to the livestream, but I love this book. Just watched the recording.
2020-12-14 22:44:34 +0000 UTC
This notion of ZenMode is similar to what you said about wanting to get rich. About framing your goal in life as How to become a millioner. It's impossible, instead one should focus on maximizing one's potential.
2020-12-14 17:37:45 +0000 UTC
That was excellent ! I love these time where you talk about an interesting book because it feels like 1. That's one of the things you really like to talk about 2. It's always very interesting on an intellectual/knowledge level (wich can be lifechanging )
