31 Matching Annotations
  1. Mar 2024
    1. Many of the commenters protested. As one reader asked: “Unless you’re actually having fun [with your work], why do it?” I think these commenters are worried about the conclusion that work should create suffering. Here’s the thing: I agree with their concerns, and this was not the point I was trying to make

      Newport his view that deliberate practice is hard cognitive work and that flow is not at the root of mastery can be perceived as "Why work when you have no enjoyment" Newport stated that this uncomfortable state was neither flow nor suffering.

  2. Feb 2024
    1. Only the largepelican, squatting in the trees, can break the connection, a symbol ofbad audience, staring insolently, resolutely offstage. But she is beinggradually struck out, her colours fading as the original red and giltborders reassert themselves reprimandingly from beneath, themanuscript exacting a slow punishment for the sin of inattention.

      Dennis Duncan completely misreads this image of Grosseteste and the Pelican which appears in the Lambeth Palace Library's MS 522 of The Castle of love. (for image see: https://hypothes.is/a/RzHLjsz8Ee6dZLOTV5h65Q)

      Duncan identifies Grosseteste's pose with his hand raised and his index finger extended as "the classic gesture of the storyteller." In fact, the bishop is pointing directly up at the pelican which sits just on top of the frame of the illuminated scene. This pelican is elevated above and just beyond the scene of the image because it represents, as was common in the time period, the suffering of Christ.

      Bestiaries of the age commonly depicted the "pelican in her piety" which was noted by Isidore of Seville in his Etymologies (Book 12, 7:26) from the 7th century, a text which heavily influenced many of these bestiaries. It was also thought at the time that the insatiable and rapacious pelican ate lizards and crocodiles (or lived off of them); as these were associated with snakes and by way of the story of the Garden of Eden the devil, they were also further associated with Christ and driving sin out of the world.

      Thus the image is more appropriately read in its original context as Grosseteste giving a sermon about the suffering of Christ who is represented by a pelican floating above the scene being depicted.

      see: https://hypothes.is/a/QAc8us24Ee6d1kPcrhQPyw

  3. Oct 2023
    1. 05:35 consciously pulling out darkness/fear/terror gives more control over it (before doing so, however, you need to be conscious and aware), surrendering to it (not fighting it)

      • see zk on bringing out darkness to shine light unto it (4 section)
  4. Sep 2023
    1. 21:00 joy and optimism in face of suffering

    2. 03:40 look through world at a story, maybe not looking through the right story (maybe all you see is suffering, bad lens to view world with)

      • see zk on being in darkness, seeing it in the wrong way
    1. 58:30 going to colosseum, suffering, as way to become baddest motherfucker

      59:30 suffering that brings out the best of people

    2. 57:00 accepting misery, pain, in hell week

      • see zk on letting emotions flow, etc.
    3. 37:00 going to war with self

      • see zk notes on self-discovery & finding meaning in darkness
    1. I’m 37 now and looking back, this disorder was a gift. The deep depression forced me to question life and consciousness. Being armed with a weapon like this really puts things into perspective when wielded properly. As they say, momento mori.

      meaningful suffering (if faced, and recovered, cam become an asset to ones life)

    1. Defined in this way, “stress” turns out to be a compelling translation of the Sanskrit term duḥkha (otherwise often rendered as “suffering”), which describes a treacherous world inhabited by restlessly craving beings.
      • for: bio-buddhism - stress, bio-buddhism, duhkha, question, question - enlightenment and stress, bio-buddhism - suffering, bio-buddhism - enlightenment
      • question
        • If enlightenment is defined as the ultimate awareness that penetrates the self-illusion, and therefore subject / object dualism is what brings peace, and the cessation of suffering due to the cessation of seeking, then how does this relate to the idea of goal-seeking, homeostatic efforts to attain a specific setpoint?
          • Do we attain the setpoint by awareness that stops the suffering in a unique way?
    1. The form of suffering that is meaningful comes when we stop repressing and take up our moral task as humans to deal consciously with our pain. In this process, we take up the pain that is endemic to living and work with it, in the knowledge that pain has a purpose.

      suffering as gift when we face it

    2. Carl Jung identified two forms of suffering: meaningless and meaningful. Meaningless suffering is everywhere, being part of the human condition, as the Buddha recognized. This existential suffering is the result of our trying to avoid pain, by denial and repression. None of us wants pain. We naturally shun it. But doing so is like the spleen refusing to do its job. It leads to big trouble, dis-ease, and real problems. In the realm of the psyche, these are called “neuroses.” Jung identified the long-term habit of repression (our “stuffing” unpleasant feelings, facts, etc. within) as the cause of neuroses.[2]

      meaningless suffering as suffering created by trying to avoid pain (which leads to repression, etc.)

    1. In one striking demonstration of the potency of the so-called "microbiome-gut-brain axis," published in Gastroenterology in 2011, Bercik and colleagues gave BALB/c mice, a strain of mice that are typically timid and shy, a cocktail of antibiotics, dramatically changing the composition of their gut bacteria. "Their behavior completely changed," Bercik says. "They became bold and adventurous."

      Gut bacteria composition as influencing mind state

      Also, causing to feel an inner flame, or feel suffering instead

  5. Aug 2023
  6. Jul 2023
      • knowing how to suffer, allows you to suffer less, having understanding and compassion (see my idea on madness, understanding it, knowing how to be mad)
      • we always run away from suffering (like avoiding to face the dragon)
      • using technology, like tv, to run away from suffering (see my idea on media controlling attention), also other coping like eating etc.
      • embrace and face suffering (facing the dragon), understanding will arise, you become compassionate (that will heal you), because you understand that other people suffer (see idea on not having enemies, understanding others, looking not only at yourself, but others)
      • (see above) now you want to help others
      • practice of looking into one owns suffering, and then looking at others suffering (thinking of self, then others, see idea)
  7. Oct 2020
  8. Sep 2020
    1. In a world where comfort is king, arduous physical activity provides a rare opportunity to practice suffering.

      This is actually a very good insight that can be applied to the spiritual life.

  9. May 2020
  10. Apr 2020
  11. Sep 2019
    1. Jordan Peterson on The Necessity of Virtue

      "When you limit yourself, sometimes arbitrarily, and play the game, whole new possibilities emerge."

      "Being is not possible without limitation. The price you pay for being is limitation and the price for limitation is suffering."

  12. May 2019
    1. Flora Hogman conducted a case study of Second and Third-Generation, and in her sample of the grandchildren of Holocaust survivors she noticed that they feel a sense of pride and awe of the survivors. This awareness of the suffering is part of the fabric of their lives, but is channeled into empathy, political activism, greater consciousness of others suffering, and a reluctance to intermarry.
    1. “We are able.”

      22: Of course, the disciples were not able to walk the way Jesus was heading to. He is confronted with ignorance, naiveness and lack of spiritual insight. What a suffering for him, especially in that critical and tense situation.

    2. “We are able.”

      22: Of course, the disciples were not able to walk the way Jesus was heading to. He is confronted with ignorance, naiveness and lack of spiritual insight. What a suffering for him.

  13. Jan 2019
    1. Calling upon media theory, which considers how mass media frames and focusesthekind ofattention an eventreceives,e.g., [4,8], social media can do the same.

      Evokes media framing and Chouliaraki's work on distant suffering

  14. Aug 2018
    1. The UNHCR has even called for the refugees themselves to also develop their own data solutions and ideas (see Palmer 2014) as a way to help build their ideologies into the data infrastructures and thus bring their prisms into view. This could create a richer situational awareness and a better ability to understand and deal with unfolding and future crises by supporting resilient communities through giving them the means of data producing and sharing

      Participatory-design and community-centered design could be very helpful in this regard but this argument seems overstated.

      Evokes concerns about "distant suffering" (see: Chouliaraki, 2008): Who gets to share? What community? Refugees are not homogeneous.

  15. Dec 2016
    1. he expectation of romance in relationship exacts an exorbitant price, both immediately in terms of time, energy and attention and in a long-range sense. People lose so much over this pursuit and how little is their reward--a few moments of self-inflated pleasure or self-abandonment or a few moments of physical sensation, none of which can be maintained for long. The reality of the relationship can seem very depressing in contrast to the thrill of romance. That is because people invest in the romance and not in the relationship.
    1. If you are with the world's evolution, you will comprehend what needs to be done by you individually, and you will not condemn the world for its inevitable course. There are many people who think, "I want the world to be fun for me, and I hate the world because it is not fun for me! I will not be happy until the world is fun for me!" So, you have another miserable person in the world, blaming the world for being itself. You are the architects of the next century. The results of your labors will be experienced by your offspring. That is how each generation builds for the next.
  16. Sep 2016
    1. While this false vision, inspired by Desire, caused many mis-steps and much trouble andsuffering, and you gradually lost confidence in your Self -- in Me, the Impersonal One within, --in fact, you forgot Me, so that you did not know where to turn in your helplessness; yet it wasonly through your thus losing the memory of your Divine estate, and centering all yourconsciousness in these Earthly conditions, that I could develop your human mind and will, andall your faculties, and provide your human body with the strength and powers that would enableMe to give perfect expression to My Divine Idea on Earth, which eventually must BE

      "While this false vision, inspired by Desire, caused many mis-steps and much trouble and suffering, and you gradually lost confidence in your Self -- in Me, the Impersonal One within, --in fact, you forgot Me, so that you did not know where to turn in your helplessness; yet it was only through your thus losing the memory of your Divine estate, and centering all your consciousness in these Earthly conditions, that I could develop your human mind and will, and all your faculties, and provide your human body with the strength and powers that would enable Me to give perfect expression to My Divine Idea on Earth, which eventually must BE"

  17. May 2016
    1. You may wrongly interpret My Desires, My Urges from within, and seek to use them for yourown selfish purpose, but even while permitting this they still fulfill My Purpose. For it is only byletting you misuse My Gifts and by the suffering such misuse brings, that I can make you intothe clean and selfless channel I require for the perfect expression of My Ideas.

      I can misperceive true inspirations..... yet even this is God supporting me to reach a point so that I am willing to go within and learn what is truly True.