Jan Cox Talk 0299

Problems

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Summary by TK

#299 Nov 30, 1987 - 1:26

[Kyroot reading to :07. ]
[Kyroot addendum: New religion--"That's Entertainment" to :13.]
[Something very removed from ordinary consciousness: "difficulties", "problems" looked on as separate from the sufferer; the description of the problem is the unseen description of oneself. Analysis offered where none is necessary. Human wiring cannot hold on to such information. "There is no me outside of we". The opposite of anything 3-D is also true --can be used as equally valuable. Consider the opposite of Neuralize: usefulness of the non-observed/remembered --that which is not an attracting problem. Can you be conscious of what is not a problem to you? Fact: any Real Revolutionist info is as good backward as forward. Opposite, reverse is equally true. Real Revolution is the private attempt to redefine the people's public utterance of the word "complete"; becoming more complete. Redefinition: lacking contrast; no contrast = no problem, no lack. Conscious awareness vs. consciousness of. Everybody knows themselves...they just don't like it. The Few of "That's Entertainment" church have no problems! After the ignition of a third order sentient system there would be no "proper" way to view anything except for the continuing refusal to see things within the ordinary binary sampling of contrast. Neuralizing is being aware with no contrast—i.e., with no problem. ]
[The art of the Real Revolutionist is the attempt to make the useful, beautiful (and vice versa). Consider non-physical possessions in this. To do this is to become a man without a trait. The Real Revolutionist has got to be his own hero (impossible when you know yourself to be flawed by your problems). You are your only possible hero (after all, you're your only possible villain as well). What if you could fool yourself into believing you don't have any problems--and thus be your own hero? ]
[More on a critic who can review w/o reference: a Real Revolutionist critical insight. What if you could critique yourself w/o reference to that extrinsic to yourself? But how can you measure up with no measure? That's Entertainment!!

Transcript

PROBLEMS

There is an area so far removed from ordinary human consciousness that it is almost impossible to talk about. This has to do with the fact that it's a part of what man is, and that no dimension can see a dimension higher and more complex than it is.

What I am going to tell you is impossible to fit into ordinary three-dimensional consciousness, but here it is: when people talk about their problems, they are doing one thing. They're not describing a problem -- they are describing themselves.

A person thinks, "There's me, and then there's this problem." He tells a friend, "I'm in the midst of an impossible love affair," or, "Last night I went on a drinking binge again." And this has occurred time and time again -- "It's not a one-shot deal, but a continuing problem I have." The friend listens to the story, and offers some psychological analyzation. But none is needed. The statement of the so-called problem is a specific, precise, detailed analyzation and description of what the person is, not what problems they have.

This sounds simple enough. Yet, you cannot hold an awareness of it by any ordinary Yellow circuit means. You see it, turn your head, and lose it. Because everything in the structure of human consciousness is arranged in such a way that this cannot be comprehended. To binary consciousness, there is me, I, myself -- and then there are the problems that me, I and myself have. What cannot be seen, through ordinary means, is there is no me. And there is no problem outside of me.

Stretch this a bit further and you'll glimpse the sensation you have that there is something other than me -- that is, the me talking now. Maybe it seems to be the weak side of me -- the me that falls into these ill-fated affairs or goes on drinking binges. Maybe you think it's the scared me -- the one that was frightened by my mother's promiscuity as a child -- or the dumb side of me, or the more mechanical part of me. You can fill in the blank: the "subjective me versus the objective me," the "conscious versus the subconscious." The sensation that there is "me" and "my problem" is related to this, whatever you may call it.

"Problem" is just a term that must be used for contrast in binary sampling. In everybody there must be the feeling that I have problems. But to state a problem, think about a problem, accept the fact that you personally have certain problems, is the height of speciousness. Because then you are running off the fuel that makes you talk about problems, and you cannot see what I'm talking about. You're not describing some problem that you have acquired. You are specifically, clinically describing, .padetailing, outlining, specifying what you in truth are. You're saying, "Here I am." So what else is new?

There is no answer to a "problem" because there's no question. There's no solution, since whatever it seems to be, it's not a problem. You're not dealing with some "thing" you have acquired, but are simply describing "you" as a person. Notice again how simple, how reasonable this all sounds -- and that you cannot hold it, even in theory, for very long. The reality of this goes against the nature of being alive; I'm attempting to convey four dimensional information within the confines of 3-D terminology, and you can't make four dimensions fit into a 3-D world.

Someone asked me a question last week: "If Neuralizing is remembering and observing something without thinking about it, then in some curious way could the opposite be true?" The answer is yes, yes, yes! Because in the describable, 3-D world, the so-called opposite of anything can always be seen and used by the Few. The apparent opposite is the same thing.

This is not unrelated to the subject of "problems." A possible useful opposite would be: "Those things which are not a problem to me are a detailing, a description, of what I actually am." Consider whether you can get an outline of what "you" are by looking at what you find praiseworthy in yourself. Is that correct? In regard to Neuralizing, how about an inquiry into all which is not observed and not remembered? How could that be of any value? If there is something you never notice -- something you are not noticing now and not remembering -- how could that come into play?

Well, I have to admit, I've almost talked myself out of what I originally said. I've twisted it around so even I can see the sophistry. But what if you could put together that which you observe and that which you do not; what you remember and what you don't? Would you not have something astounding?

Whatever you'd have, I suggest what you would not have would be a feeling of conscious separation. You would no longer feel there is such a thing as your problem. "Problem" would be just a word. You'd have taken what appeared to be your problems, your shortcomings, and made them complete on the 3-D level by combining everything that seems to be a problem with everything that is not. Consider how often you think about things that don't seem to be problems? If you can ride a bicycle, do you worry about it? But if you can't, and everyone else is going on a bike ride, how often do you think of it? How often do you think about all the things that you can do, all the areas wherein you have no complaints? Can you be conscious of those things that are not problems to you?

If you're sitting there thinking, "Sure, sure. I can do that," Consider that the question is just a basis to work from. Go from there to begin to whittle away and manipulate those "problem" areas. If this doesn't seem reasonable to you, let me give you a fact: Real Revolutionary information is as true backwards as it is forwards. Now that is a 3-D fact; as much as 3-D facts exist, that is one. Remember that information is not really revolutionary -- not really fresh data -- if it's .pareasonable and easily adoptable by City people. Anything that's blatantly reasonable at first hearing is not useful.

What could be more irrational than saying that data is not useful unless it's as true backwards as forwards. Yet that's a fact, if you have revolutionary sight. The "opposite" of really new information is just as true, if you know how to reverse and use it; whatever can be linearly pointed out can also be run backwards and used. (In case you think you missed something, I'll grant you there's hardly anybody in Life who can do that.)

The Revolution is a private attempt to personally redefine the people's public word "complete." That will be tonight's definition of what the Revolution is about -- a private attempt to redefine the word city people utter and use to mean "complete." Consider what is the purpose of people doing anything -- taking up aerobics, going on a diet, joining a church, going back to school -- what is the point of all that? The person is attempting to become what? More "complete." All religions, regardless of their terminology, are likewise addressing ordinary people's attempts to become more complete.

Let me give you one possible redefining of the word: to be "complete" would be to lack contrast. What would it mean to "lack contrast"? Take as an example, a person trying to lose weight who starts an aerobics class or buys a tape to work out at home. Obviously, they've got a problem, right? In the city, that goes without saying. They've got a problem; they're overweight, out of shape, and trying to take off fat. Let's face it, if they didn't feel something was lacking, if they didn't feel they had a problem, they wouldn't be doing this: "I'm lacking an attractive body. If I lost weight and got in better shape, I'd be more complete."

If there were no contrast, there would be no problem. If you had no contrast, that would absolutely redefine the concept of complete: completeness would be no contrast; "complete" would mean having no problem. Being complete would be having nothing to do, nowhere to go.

Revolutionary consciousness would be simple, direct consciousness -- being conscious, as opposed to being conscious of something. Ordinarily, you are conscious of your problems, your overweightness, your underweightness. You're conscious of the injustices in the world, your bad temper, and the fact that someone just made a sarcastic remark. All of that fits into city consciousness. That's not revolutionary consciousness, because it is based on binary sampling and is dependent upon contrast. It is not complete.

Ordinary consciousness thinks that to bring about a state of completeness would mean to take me and my problem and somehow merge the two. But things are arranged in the city so that either they never merge, or if they do merge, you immediately forget all about them and never learn from the merger. Once there is no contrast, there's no feeling that I ever had a problem. Without the continuing availability of contrast, there's not even the awareness that I, to quote a city dweller, "overcame the problem," or "did anything." For example, the only person who can be a reformed drunk is someone who can't forget about drinking. Which is why everyone in the city loves a reformed alcoholic, a reformed smoker, a reformed fill in the blank. Because the ex-smoker gets a whiff of nicotine and starts talking about how they quit; the reformed drunk immediately wants to go distribute leaflets for Alcoholics Anonymous. Everyone loves a reformed whatever, because at the ordinary level, you don't know anything has changed or any progress has been made unless you can remember the original problem. Unless your past is always with you, how do you know where you are now? How can a man know what he is without being fully cognizant of his problems, his shortcomings -- "Let's face up to it, city people. We've got to know ourselves."

I repeat to you: Everybody knows themselves; they just don't like what they know. As far back as man has been talking and remembering, there has existed the feeling that you must know yourself. I'm telling you they know; but they don't like it. This is getting close to big-time reality, to Broadway reality. Each time a person talks about their problems, their shortcomings, their failures -- each time they admit, "I don't know why I do like I do," they have described themselves perfectly. In terms of self-knowledge, they make Socrates look like he's taking a nap. Everybody knows themselves, but they don't like it. They're not supposed to like it.

I will grant that from a 4-D perspective, people do not know themselves in the sense that they do not know everything they have said and felt about themselves is them. That's the truth, from soup to omega, from alpha to nuts. But do you understand, if that were an enforceable truth you could impose on people in the city, everything would come to a screeching halt.

No contrast, no conflict. No conflict, and you would not even have the motivation, the energy, to breathe in and out. If a person had no "problems", they wouldn't be conscious of themselves as a this or a that. Ask an ordinary person what Socrates and others meant when they said, "Know thyself." He might say, "I do know myself. I know I've got a terrible temper and that's something I need to overcome. I'm conscious of the fact that I have...blah, blah, blah..."

If you forced an erstwhile Revolutionist -- I don't know what would happen to him after this but -- he might say, "I am conscious, if you insist. I am conscious of what I am." That's as far as he would go, and an ordinary person would think, "This man's crazy." Of course, a Revolutionist would be crazy to even go that far, but I'm trying to drag your verbal attention to that strange point where things turn into another dimension. With a different kind of continuing consciousness, you could say, "Yeah, I finally know myself." The Revolutionist could say, "I'm conscious of what I am -- period." An ordinary person would be more forthright; he'd put a comma there and detail some of his warts and problems. Everyone starts out describing themselves and they end up describing their problems, their warts, which can be removed. "I can lose them. I'll pray them away. I'll diet. They're something I'll get rid of."

When a man talks about his problems, he's talking about himself. A man is describing himself, because he knows himself, but he doesn't like what he is and calls it other things. And as long as you take this "problem" as being something you have acquired, it keeps you what? Busy! It keeps you active and off the street. Problems keep the blood circulating and the enzymes zyming.

As long as you have problems, you'll never be a member in good standing of the Church of "That's Entertainment." If there is one absolute description of what all members of that congregation have in common it would be: not a single one of them have a problem. I'm talking about a Problem. I'm not talking about cancer, bad colds, lost your car or stubbed your toe.

If you have a problem, you're back in the city with the nonbelievers and tourists. You're back with people who pay full price for a show panned by every decent critic in town. You've paid scalp prices for tickets that they're just giving away. You've been had, but look at it this way: You've been had by a champ. Because nobody believes in the seriousness, the severity of your problems but who? You. And believe it or not, you're the only person who really gives a rat's ass.

Part of the social fabric of the city is that some people apparently listen to your problems and you apparently listen to theirs. But everybody knows -- they just don't like knowing -- that nobody gives a damn about your problems. Everybody knows -- and they don't like it -- that when somebody says, "I've got this problem," they don't have a problem. Everybody knows it can't be cured. They might say, "Listen, old buddy, I'm going to point out to you for the seventh time what you can do about this problem of yours, and I'm sure you'll be able to solve it," but they know that's not true. They know their buddy, they know themselves, and they know everybody else. So they know no one is going to change. They just don't like that, so they can't be conscious of it.

Whenever you describe a problem, you're just being redundant. You're simply describing you, for the god-knows-how-many-millionth time since you've been alive. "Stop the presses! There's a news flash! Hey, I'm me!" Talk about a major breakthrough. But you'll walk right out of here tonight and talk to yourself or somebody else about the problems you have, and the problems will be all you're seeing. You'll forget that you've heard them all. You know them all but, "This time is kind of different -- this situation's just not as cut and dried as it appears."

What you're saying is, "Yeah, I know it looks like me and smells like me, but this time -- this particular one -- is not exactly me." Stop the presses again. We could be crude and ask, "If it ain't you, who is it?" Didn't know you had a twin brother or sister or some special power to be in two places at once. "Well, sure. I can be here and be my problem. I can be that of which I approve and that which I disapprove." And heaven forbid if the two ever got together. That would spell your demise as an ordinary man or woman. You would no longer be fit for civilized company in the city. You'd be fit -- but nobody would ever invite you anywhere. Not that you'd be dangerous. You'd be, I fear, three-dimensionally boring.

Next paragraph. Once you have ignited a third order sentient system -- something outside what I described last week as the Yellow and Red brains -- an irreversible process has been set in motion. Once that happens, there would be no proper way of thinking about or looking at life, other than the continual refusal to see anything within the limits of binary sampling. Other than that, there is no theoretical or philosophical background to This. You may still believe otherwise; you may believe if you could tie together all the great religious teachings to create some gigantic verbal nexus, it would have some meaning, and give you a proper way to think about things. That is only true in the city, within the confines of binary consciousness. That's only true as long as there is something within a person's consciousness they believe is outside of We. "There is some information, some theories, some ultimate rules to live by, outside of me. I can spend the rest of my days learning them, meditating on them, applying them to myself, and I'll get better."

Once you've had a sufficient molecular jolt, you realize there is no proper way of looking at, thinking about, pondering, investigating anything. Seeing something does not entail simply its opposite. Sure it does, in the 3-D world, but when you reach the point where you have at least one toenail hanging over the edge -- going off around the corner -- you understand that if you could refuse to see anything within the limits of binary sampling, you would then be seeing no contrast. And in the city you can't do that. 3-D consciousness cannot do that. If Neuralizing sounds complex and vague, try this: be conscious of anything -- process, person, occurrence -- with no contrast. .paWell, before you try I'll go ahead and tell you how foolish that is...

Let's go on to something more direct. How about another possible definition of This? The art of Revolution could be temporarily defined as the attempt to make the useful beautiful. I once asked you why a civilized, sequentially logical person would keep any possession that was neither useful nor beautiful. If you can see how the art of Revolution could be described as attempting to turn the useful into the beautiful, how about vice versa? And what if we are not talking about possession, possessions? What if we're not discussing Hoover uprights, Picasso prints, CD versions of Beethoven's symphonies, or a new Corvette -- but something else?

Try to picture another kind of possession you might have. Not simply stuff you own, but apparently stuff you are -- your problems, your good points. Consider your own characteristics as possessions, then ask yourself: which ones fit neither the category of useful nor the category of beautiful? Once you've identified those, the big question is why do you still possess them? Of course, you know the answer is, "I don't know."

If you look upon possessions not simply as physical objects you've acquired, but as what appear to be aspects of yourself, you can see that some of them are apparently useful. Others, you may find attractive -- ordinary people might call those mannerisms. "When I was a child, I always loved Marlon Brando and I used to practice walking like him, and now sometimes I just walk that way." Or a woman says, "Everyone always told me I looked like Joan Crawford and I cultivated that." So you can have little personal apparent characteristics that you feel, "Well, I don't see that they're useful, but I've got to tell you, I find them beautiful."

Go back to Neuralizing the Revolution as attempting to turn the useful into the beautiful, and vice versa. Then you would be dealing with something and what appears to be its opposite. How could you turn the useful into the beautiful without doing away with all contrast in that particular area? How could you take what is apparently attractive in you and turn it into something useful without it being merged with its anti-self? Would you be left with the hole without the doughnut? Your traits -- your characteristics that seem to be either positive or approaching neutral -- would then be as moot as your problems would be if you understood that by describing problems you're just describing you. You would become -- if I may retitle an American novel -- A Man Without A Country -- The Man Without A Trait. Of course, you could still fake it and appear interested if you wanted to.

Something else I pointed out recently is that if you are going to be a Revolutionist, you have to be your own hero. That is a fact. But I ask you, who else could be? Who else could be your hero? Ordinary people would say, "Well, almost anybody else. I wouldn't be trying to change and better myself if that weren't so. A man has to have heroes." But how can anyone be your hero? Listen up! You are your one sole enemy -- the real villain in your life. No one can compete with you as your villain. And, that being true in the great 3-D city of logic, don't you see that you are also your own possible hero, your only salvation? If you're going to be your own hero, you can have no problem. Remember you and your problems are not separate things; if you saw you, sans contrast, in toto, you'd know this.

Consider: What if, to yourself, you could fake it? What if there's no difference between convincing others -- or yourself -- that you have an ability and having the ability? What if you could somehow fool yourself into thinking you were an invincible hero, that you had no problems, no shortcomings; that you were the living epitome of an epic poem? What if you could do that? Then I ask you, what's the damn difference, even if you were faking, once you made yourself believe?

Who else can be your hero; who are you going to turn to? I'm talking to you. Back in the city, they've always got heroes. All you have to do is kill somebody and you've got a hero. Anybody who died a long time ago can be heroic -- but you have to deal with this right now. There's no way out.

Since we're having so much fun, I'll do one more. Do you recall I recently discussed the fact that it would take a really intelligent, perceptive, smart, astounding critic to review the subject at hand and not refer to anything else? Most of what passes for criticism of any art form consists of comparing the artwork to previous forms. "I hear certain Beatle's influences in this piece, and of course, the rather archaic cries of the vocalist show without a doubt his early intrigue with Lou Reed." Ordinarily, you read such as that and you are impressed with the reviewer himself. You think, that man is well read, well listened, insightful, has been around, etc., etc. But a Real Critic would not have to fall back on reference. From one view, references show that the critic doesn't know what he's listening to, what he's looking at, or what he's reading if he's reviewing a book. All he can do is listen and think, "This sounds a little like something Thelonius Monk played one time, so it must have Monkish influences." Why can't the critic just look and say what he sees? Why does he have to go, "Well, it reminds me of the post-Picasso pink period."

Back in the city, that's the way things should be. But a Real Revolutionary reviewer would always deal with the subject at hand and would not fall back on comparing it to anything. Now, what if you were personally attempting to be this Revolutionary Critic? You would never refer to anything extrinsic to the subject under review -- that is, you, yourself. There would be the only allowable critique of oneself, the only intelligent review of you. You'd be a Revolutionary Critic -- your views and opinions would mean something. Of course, if you were good, you'd never express those views, but you'd be the world's greatest reviewer.

Just so we don't leave on a note which has any apparent stability or logic, I ask you: If you had the ability to review you, that is, survey the object you -- without reference to any extrinsic values, words, ideas of you -- how could you win a battle with no foe? How could you achieve a victory with no opposition? How could you measure up, if you made no comparison?

Now, as we fade out, the music rises up from the choir, and if you listen you can hear them all humming -- "That's Entertainment."