I have indeed enjoyed this conversation on the phenomenology of awareness! I love how with seasoned AT practictioners non-doing is about literally not doing the Alexander Technique. I think we could get a lot clearer about what we mean by "agency" and "freedom", I think it's related to what I once wrote about lookahead. It's literally resources in the mind being freed, allowing more space, more possibility. It's like closing a window in the mind and now having more RAM which you are free to use on other things or just allow to make everything remaining better.
Awesome stuff. Thank you both. First time I hear your description of AT as of non-fixation of what you think AT is. This really unlocked something for me.
As I’m listening I think of the wonderful depth some people are willing to go to with regards to experience; thank you! If the response to snappy and volatile news feeds is this kind of conversation, then I am willing to get my hands dirty. This brings me to the point of interest which AT has not solved for me recently: “the act of courage”. What is courage in an AT context? To give an example, a fresh one from my personal life, I recently found myself conflicted as I “wanted” to do something (let’s call it “ask a girl out”) and, as I wanted to do this, I kept incurring in all my usual stumbling blocks for why I never possibly could do this. “Why?” I kept asking, raging ultimately against myself “because I’m full of excuses!” only to then throw myself in a state of excitement to go and “do” the thing I so much wanted to do. It didn’t go well. My “doing” the thing, my “forcing” this resolution, pressured by time, made me act, but I was acting under the spell of the same neurosis which didn’t like me doing that thing. I “remembered” that I can be brave and do things that are uncomfortable (is how I think of this experience now) yet none of the experience seemed to be non-doing; it seemed more in line with having Jocko Willinks whispering in my ear “do it, pussy!” Which is… great. I did it. That “felt” great. And yet I am still stuck on the same problem; if I think of “ask this girl out”, the neurosis emerge just as devilishly as before. This makes sense to me: I am still fixated on a limited, attention driven, old man looking at his belly button, set of solutions; I am not (moment by moment) “aware” that I *can* “just” let my desire to “ask this girl out” drive me effortlessly towards a resolution. But then what the hell is courage?! It seems to vanish as a concept once you think of doing as “non-doing”. I have some ideas but I will leave this as an open question to see if any fish bites. Thanks again. Ciao!
Great conversation--thank you. I really liked how you brought Iain McGilchrist's work into view. His distinction of attention and awareness and how they reflect two modes of being in/with/the world is very helpful imo not only for contemplative practice (e.g., as overtly taught in TMI) but also for re-evaluating what we value in ourselves and other people. Perhaps one value is the skill of effortlessly switching between fixation (attention) and unfixation (awareness) and ultimately merging them (e.g., practicing both or neither, according to the perspectives made possible by the tetralemma).
Really enjoyed this one, would love to hear both Jake’s and your thoughts on Ido Portal and his movement philosophy. I sense he is referring to the same non-conceptual aliveness through an entirely physical frame. His latest conversation with Huberman shows off what I’m talking about. The middle way shows up all over the place, apparently. Also would be keen to hear you compare AT with Zen / Daoism, which is my preferred flavour. The shouting seems like a fun overlap between them lol Global Consciousness is a good label for what I was referring to in my last email, maybe it should be the name of the podcast ;)
I want to do a bit of a deep dive on Ido's stuff actually - I listened to a podcast with him recently and thought "wow, he sounds exactly like one of my favourite AT reachers". I've seen one of his ideas articulated as "good movement is such that someone could yell CUT at any moment and you could change direction" - from my perspective this is also non-fixation and very AT.
Might have been mentioned but do you have an opinion on how AT compares with stream entry? (First path of enlightenment in Theravada) does a similar map exist for AT?
I have indeed enjoyed this conversation on the phenomenology of awareness!
I love how with seasoned AT practictioners non-doing is about literally not doing the Alexander Technique.
I think we could get a lot clearer about what we mean by "agency" and "freedom", I think it's related to what I once wrote about lookahead. It's literally resources in the mind being freed, allowing more space, more possibility. It's like closing a window in the mind and now having more RAM which you are free to use on other things or just allow to make everything remaining better.
Awesome stuff. Thank you both. First time I hear your description of AT as of non-fixation of what you think AT is. This really unlocked something for me.
great conversation
As I’m listening I think of the wonderful depth some people are willing to go to with regards to experience; thank you! If the response to snappy and volatile news feeds is this kind of conversation, then I am willing to get my hands dirty.
This brings me to the point of interest which AT has not solved for me recently: “the act of courage”.
What is courage in an AT context? To give an example, a fresh one from my personal life, I recently found myself conflicted as I “wanted” to do something (let’s call it “ask a girl out”) and, as I wanted to do this, I kept incurring in all my usual stumbling blocks for why I never possibly could do this. “Why?” I kept asking, raging ultimately against myself “because I’m full of excuses!” only to then throw myself in a state of excitement to go and “do” the thing I so much wanted to do.
It didn’t go well. My “doing” the thing, my “forcing” this resolution, pressured by time, made me act, but I was acting under the spell of the same neurosis which didn’t like me doing that thing.
I “remembered” that I can be brave and do things that are uncomfortable (is how I think of this experience now) yet none of the experience seemed to be non-doing; it seemed more in line with having Jocko Willinks whispering in my ear “do it, pussy!”
Which is… great. I did it. That “felt” great. And yet I am still stuck on the same problem; if I think of “ask this girl out”, the neurosis emerge just as devilishly as before.
This makes sense to me: I am still fixated on a limited, attention driven, old man looking at his belly button, set of solutions; I am not (moment by moment) “aware” that I *can* “just” let my desire to “ask this girl out” drive me effortlessly towards a resolution.
But then what the hell is courage?! It seems to vanish as a concept once you think of doing as “non-doing”. I have some ideas but I will leave this as an open question to see if any fish bites.
Thanks again. Ciao!
Great stuff guys. Loving the overall question of like "are these the same? maybe. what would it mean if they were? unclear! let's explore"
Great conversation--thank you. I really liked how you brought Iain McGilchrist's work into view. His distinction of attention and awareness and how they reflect two modes of being in/with/the world is very helpful imo not only for contemplative practice (e.g., as overtly taught in TMI) but also for re-evaluating what we value in ourselves and other people. Perhaps one value is the skill of effortlessly switching between fixation (attention) and unfixation (awareness) and ultimately merging them (e.g., practicing both or neither, according to the perspectives made possible by the tetralemma).
Yeah Iain McGilchrist's work has been very influential for me and I like how you summarized it here and how it came up in this conversation.
Really enjoyed this one, would love to hear both Jake’s and your thoughts on Ido Portal and his movement philosophy.
I sense he is referring to the same non-conceptual aliveness through an entirely physical frame. His latest conversation with Huberman shows off what I’m talking about. The middle way shows up all over the place, apparently.
Also would be keen to hear you compare AT with Zen / Daoism, which is my preferred flavour. The shouting seems like a fun overlap between them lol
Global Consciousness is a good label for what I was referring to in my last email, maybe it should be the name of the podcast ;)
I want to do a bit of a deep dive on Ido's stuff actually - I listened to a podcast with him recently and thought "wow, he sounds exactly like one of my favourite AT reachers". I've seen one of his ideas articulated as "good movement is such that someone could yell CUT at any moment and you could change direction" - from my perspective this is also non-fixation and very AT.
You a podcaster now?
i am large, i contain multitudes
Might have been mentioned but do you have an opinion on how AT compares with stream entry? (First path of enlightenment in Theravada) does a similar map exist for AT?
I’m afraid I know very little about stream entry! Can’t really comment
"#7 will permanently awaken you from the illusion of samsara"
lmao, love this