Kissed by Shiva
Matters of the Mundane
Topic: Matters of the Mundane (1 of 6), Read 119 times
Conf: Bibliotheca Aquilus
From: Dark Council
Date: Wednesday, August 30, 2006 01:51 PM
Writing this essay, i am sitting on a train, which is vibrating. I am tapping a keyboard, and the pressure of the keys is registering in the neural centres within my fingertips, these are travelling via electricity to my brain, which in turn processes the signal and allows me to interact. The train vibrates, i can feel this, i can account for it. My fingers will generally find the right keys. And now the train has started to move, so as i look out the window, my eyes have to adjust.
Change.
Everything is changing, and ones attunement with the change, and ability to readjust within this changing world is highly important on the successful road. In the realms of the mundane, which are so often spoken to us as the realms of illusion rather than truth, everything is constantly in change. Plato told us that is was decaying and untrue; indeed there are very few universal principles, the laws of ethics, the processes of politics, even the healthy individual. All that is seems to change. The old berate the young, and the young berate the old. Do they not remember what it was like to be young? Say the in betweens, but then maybe they have forgotten the mistakes they made and learnt from, and maybe they do and it was simply a different reality.
The ability to surf this fluidly changing ocean, to kayak down the turbulent stream of life requires the ability to balance, to stay afloat, to steer to where we want to go. To reach the higher realms, or calmer seas we need to stay aflaot long enough. To build a pyramid to the stars we first need to set our foundations in stone on the ground, indeed we need to dig deep, below the ground we currently see to lay firm foundations. The priestly class simply cannot be supported without the yeomans below him farming and creating produce to sustain him.
In the world of magic, for a conjuror to understand another trick, it is highly important that he first knows what he is 'seeing', what is the supposed 'truth', what is the opinion being forced into other peoples minds. Unless he knows this, then there is no way he can work out what feints are being employed on the way to this event.
The dark adept needs a firm grounding in the mundane realm, he must learnt he currents and eddies, and how to navigate them, how to steer, how to balance, and ultimately as he challenges himself, he will need to learn how to swim, and how to get out and push when there is no other option. He needs to become a master of his territory, and until this is achieved there is no hope of surviving long enough to reach richer waters of higher produce and resources.
The dark adept have a fundamental requirement to cater for his mundane needs. He must be healthy, he must be financially stable enough to invest in his projects, he must be supported in that human desire of company that hangs around the necks of the large majority of us.
Due to this, skills and talents suited to the mundane world, and its navigation and success within are of much importance.
The mundane supplies the support infrastructure through which we can weave the essense of higher forces, greater powers, from the cool whisps of logic, through the sometimes seismic waves of philosophy, to the deepest darkest esoterica.
So allow yourself the time and endulgence to pour yourself and your abilities into the skills of the mundane world. It is highly important to become fluent within the realm of academia, highly important to become an adamant persuader, highly important to be of healthy mind and body.
Topic: Matters of the Mundane (2 of 6), Read 120 times
The mind is arguably mankinds greatest tool; the evolution of its cognitive abilities being the justification behind the statement that mankind is the most advanced species on the planet. Its development has led to breakthroughs and inspiration that have taken mankind from the hunter gatherers of the river valleys, to the highest peaks of the Andes, the most faraway islands in the Pacific and the cold polar domains of within the artic circle. The greatest minds in history have yet led our civilisation further, be it the discoverers of electricity, the creators of psycology or the inventors of sliced bread. The mind is the power progressing mankind to greater heights and further depths, and as such its development is of greatest importance.
All this emphasis on the mind, and some theories suggest that the average human uses only 10% of his mental potential. The dark student should see the great potential he can tap into, and its highest importance and value. The soldier who can use 10 weapons simultaneously will have the distinct advantage over the person who can use a mere one weapon. Tapping into our extra potential can smooth our path through life, through the materialistic world to success, as well as helping you develop a great and potent tool for later studies in other areas such as esoterica.
There are various ways to improve your mental ability. You can expand your capacity, you can expand your efficiency. You can also improve your temperament, which can have knock on effects on your ability. In the same way the stressful athlete wil not perform to his full potential, neither will a stressful scholar.
Your mental capacity, the amount you can learn, the amount you can take in in one go, the complexity of the mindmap your neural network can make on a subject. The greater this is, obviously the better your understanding. Knowledge is power, and if you can quite simply store more of it, you have the advantage. Not only this, but the me information you have to spot patterns in, the mre likelly you will be to spot the pattern.
The efficiency is also important. An office stored in a well filed manner, will obviously work much more efficiently than an office which is just a mass of paper, in no particular order, even if each piece of paper has a more informed and detailed piece of information than in the well ordered office.
On top of this other factors exist. As well as the physical, as discussed in an earlier lecture, and basic mental skills as described above, there is the system of operations of the mind. The protocal and language of the mind, such as logic, can be highly improved, and many different games exist to do this, from chess through to sudoko.
The increased strength in ones logic has numerous knock on effects, from becoming a step closer to the mastery of friendships, to the well recognised dark skill of tactics and stratergy. Always remember that logic and rationale is a superb tool, but also remember that it is not a system of truth in itself, and that you should back up as much as possible your rational thinking with empirical understanding. Rationality only ever comes second to experiance.
Topic: Matters of the Mundane (3 of 6), Read 120 times
Unless you are a hermit, interaction with other people will take up a large proportion of your daily life. Anything you want to gain in life, will no doubt at some point revolve around interacting with other people. As a pack animal, we are all interdependant upon each other and interaction is highly important. Even the hunter cannot live without the herd and must know how to interact with it; he must also know how to act within the pack, and maybe even have to know how to interact with the alpha male of the pack. Interaction occurs on all levels, with inferiors, with superiors and with equals. The more efficient your method of interaction, the more you can hope to gain.
Language is the word used to describe the interaction between humans on a mutually understandable basis, be it on a concious or subconcious level. With the most mutually understandable to the concious mind being the verbal language, many different forms have developed dependant on the geographical independance of civilisations, and the ongoing conquest of civilisations over one another. As it is the most mutually understandable way to interact with a persons concious self, the art of verbal language is a highly useful skill in negotiating with people what you want done.
Rhetoric is the term given to the art of oral persuasion, the skill of using language to make sentences and speeches that are aesthetically pleasing to listen to, that help persuade and argue cases through means of twisting and bending the rules of logic existing in a persons neural network, so that the end outcome is a justification that appears logical and right, whilst on closer examination it has failed on both these counts and has generally only created an unjustified statement.
Humans however overlook this, distracted by the smooth flow of the words and being tacken along by the current. They are soothed to a smooth ectasy as they are internally happy that they feel they understand something, and this is the weakness to play with. As such the understanding and use of rhetoric is highly valuable on many counts, in attack and in defence. You should come to learn the art of rhetoric, so that it cannot be used against you to entice you down paths youd rather not travel, and so that you can use it to persuade your life to be that which you wish it to be.
Once the skill of rhetoric has been learnt, it can be used in many situations from the blagging of undone homework if you are at school, to the very same thing in front of your boss. It is the gift of the gab, and it is valued by many people, indeed people are superstituous enough to kiss a little stone in Ireland as it is said to begift the power of the gab upon the kisser. You can persuade people that what you want to do, is really what they want to do, that what you think is right, is whats right. Maybe your you want to persuade your friend to drive you to the chippy, maybe you want to persuade your friends to go out, maybe you want to persuade your opponent hes worse than you, maybe you want to persuade a friend to come to a class with you. Rhetoric will help in all of these.
Topic: Matters of the Mundane (4 of 6), Read 120 times
Good plans in life are made on good research. No matter how good you are, good research will always help you be better. The top football teams in the world still send scouts to research their opponents before a match, to be able to create a good strategy towards dealing with the opponent. As such, research skills are highly important things to learn about as a dark student and initiate, to allow you to focus learn and train to a better level of efficiency in your studies.
The world is full of so very much bullshit information. Many peoples main research tool is the internet, again filed with so much crap and nonsense spouted as if it is the law from many stupid people. A small delicate section of truth exists within the source. Without the relevant skills, you could be learning and taking your information from something incredibly useless. Indeed you could be following instructions turning you into a human slave, or doing someone elses work for them. You could be turning yourself into a good worker for a company, or any other number of things which are not in correlation with the striving for self perfection that being a student of the dark entails.
Good research, leads to good understand. Let us recount for a second the age old adage knowledge is power. There are other forms of power, sure, but knowledge is supreme to many of them, and to have the power of knowledge can never be seen as a disadvantage, but can only help to booster your chances, whoever you are, fromt he most basic neophyte, to the season weathered veteran.
Learning how to research requires good skills, cross checking, finding many different sources, knowing how to use each medium you research within efficiently. Knowing how to use search engines well, how to use encyclopedias, how to use your local library system, how to skim read, how to use an index. All basic skills, but when refined can be used to a standard that will gain the user much much more.
In conclusion, the learning of good research skills rather than the basic intuitive ones a human naturally possesses is of great importance to the dark initiate.
Topic: Matters of the Mundane (5 of 6), Read 120 times
The jaguar is a skilled beast. Nocturnal by nature, it prowls the Amazon rainforest for its prey. Prey that can be a significant proportion of its body mass. It then kills the prey, and carries it to a safe place so that it is not mugged of the prey. This can involve climbing trees with the prey clamped within its mouth. I doubt anyone here can climb a tree with something equaling its mass clamped within its mouth.
In essence, it is an extraordinary creature, with extraordinary attributes.
But it will still die rapidly if placed within the polar habitats, and will fail to be skilled, and maybe die at varying speeds in any other habitat it is not suited too, however amazing its skills are. The dark student is much the same; you cannot cope to achieve certain things in certain environments, and as such, it is important you place yourself in an environment to suit your abilities.
Humans live in many environments, and a very very limited number of these are beneficial. Imagine the ghetto. It has its occupiers, and it suits certain people. But i personaly know so many people within it, chained to it, desperate to get out, yet without the power to get out. As dark students you have already awakened to an understanding giving you an extra tool to get yourself out of unsuitable environments.
You also need the ability to create the environment to suit you, rather than be peasant of someone elses environment. Be king of yours!
Your social environment; friends, family, associates, enemies. Which are actually beneficial to you? and which are merely a source of cheap fun? If a source of cheap fun, is this fun beneficial, and what is a suitable dose to take. How can you create this dose and make sure you dont become addicted to it or overdose upon it?
Your day to day environment; do you go to the library? do you hang around at the mall? Do you spend your time in your bedroom? in the pub? at the skatepark? in galleries? You need to assess everywhere, and see how and where you are spending your time, and if you are doing so in the right places.
Without the correct working environment, a plant will not grow from its seed into a tree. It needs many things, and so does the dark student. You can have the potential in seed form, but you need to give yourself the right habitat to work in. Once this is achieved, only then will you grow into the huge oak.
Topic: Matters of the Mundane (6 of 6), Read 121 times
We all act differently around people than we do when on our own, and we all act differently depending on what people we are around. Very few people would act the same around their mother as they would around their partner, who again gets a different act to their enemy. Humans utilize different facades to interact with different people, to put across in a more eloquent form what that relationship needs, rather than throwing at it your whole personality. It is a matter of priority; those things needed in a singular interaction are put across in your mask, whereas those things that would harm it are held back.
Unfortunately, this method isnt perfect, and our inner nature often slips out, so things that are irrelevant, or things that arent advantageous to the interaction can often appear and we do not gain a perfect interaction. The less you know a person, the less you you know what is beneficial and what isnt, so again, the greater chance you will not complete the smoothest possible interaction.
Masking is the act by which we place a metaphorical mask upon ourselves, our personality, our persona. We then use this to interact fluently and efficiently with that which we wish to gain something from. It has the added benefit that we can gain something from those we would not otherwise want to interact with, or be able to interact with, because the other person does not see the real you, the thing that would contrast and clash and make interaction impossible or laboured, but instead it sees something that appeals to its senses.
Another benefit of masking, is that it allows us to bury deep our deepest darkest truths and secrets within ourselves, that would otherwise, if leaked, cause a friction in the smooth running of our lives. You can also bury things that have connotations and bias' that other people will misunderstand and inadequately judge and label you upon. For you are starting upon a dark path, and the dark does have many many misguided connotations within the fearful halls of humanities sheep.