I’m a paid blogger now.
Of course I started out from $0 on WordPress, pennies, on Publish0x, but the humble $1 a month on my Ko-fi page has now jumped up to $6. I’m very thankful for my subscribers. I’ve also been getting more purchases here and there for my book The 13 Chambers of Monk Mode. Thus, every purchase, I will pay-it-forward by releasing some of my favorite paywall-posts to the public blogs.
Thank you Steve, for purchasing a copy of 13 Chambers. I have made this update available to all past supporters because of your patronage.
Grind – To shape, sharpen, or refine with friction.
Friction causes pain or is caused by resistance against something.
Dissatisfaction is pain from circumstance, and is only overcome through a willing plunge against the resistant force.
Sex exemplifies this; arousal is a dissatisfaction of sorts (desire), pleasure is derived through fiction of the genitals, finally resolved through orgasm.
The pursuit of food and sex, aided by the dopamine process, is one of the most pleasurable pursuits in life. It sustains life and fulfills the biological objective, respectively, therefore it’s rewards are among the most easily attained, and likewise easily abused.
When the procurement of passions is proliferous, it may signal the brain to remain in comfort. Therefore, the retreat of these passions is theorized to conserve dopamine so that mental resources may be redirected to higher psychological purposes, AKA transmutation/sublimation.
The delight of a daydream of one’s ideal being realized is pleasing, but not as immediately stimulating as the acquisition of food or sexual passion. One’s dream-realization requires far more effort (friction) to incite ecstasy.
Ecstasy (from Ancient Greek ἔκστασις ékstasis, meaning ‘outside of oneself’) is a subjective experience of total involvement of the subject, with an object of their awareness. In classical Greek literature it refers to removal of the mind or body “from its normal place of function.” – Wikipedia
The caterpillar in chrysalis, becoming a butterfly, may be classified as an ecstatic state, for its body is removed from normality. But the chrysalis is external. For man, he must evolve in mind alone. He may struggle against his physical environment, but most others silently accept their suffering, whereas he strives to overcome. It’s a difference within the mind.
A commitment to grind. To be refined through friction.
But the caterpillar’s quest is curiously significant for separate reasons. Like the snake, they both crawl against the ground. However, the snake develops through friction; rubbing its’ tattered hide against rocks to release its new skin.
The caterpillar instead climbs to a high point and suspends itself in silk and/or old skin, and stations itself for rapid biological restructuring to emerge in a completely new form. Violence is only needed to break free from its shell, but even so, enzymes are often employed to soften it prior.
The snake sports a new shine, but the caterpillar is completely unrecognizable post-metamorphosis. It is a new being.
Grinding, therefore, must only be a short-term, limited form of development at our disposal.
Chrysalis then, can be likened to a form of deep meditation, perhaps. Replete psychological reprogramming.
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Once the butterfly emerges, it stands under its old shell while hardening its wings before taking flight for the first time. Instead of straining itself, it positions itself in favor of gravity to pump this hardening matter into its wings.
The lesson gleamed from this observation is that far more development is achieved through internal and stationary states rather than external and frictional processes.
This advice almost seems antithetical and illogical. The mind itself is immaterial in nature. To achieve ecstasy, we must be removed from “normal places of function.”
Pain, in a subtle form, is perhaps a signal of the mind or body’s desire for growth. Grinding will result in us shedding our own skin. But growing wings? That requires a far greater commitment.
In a world based on desire, action, and gratification, standing still might be a painful process within itself. But rapid changes are occurring internally, away from view, for the caterpillar. Likewise, its old self is being repurposed as a protective shell to encourage this development.
Instead of struggling against the environment, our circumstances, the key is letting go of our former self that belonged to this environment, these circumstances. Allow oneself to be rendered unrecognizable. Allow the mind to be thoroughly elsewhere as it’s former shell remains only as a convenient casing later serving as a platform for one’s eventual flight.
The struggle, the process, is completely internal. Resistance is not applied, but one instead flows along with nature to achieve his goals.
This is utterly fascinating, if at all true and possible.
Also fascinating is the name for the final stage of development of metamorphosis: egg, larva, pupa, and imago (also called the imaginal stage).
In order to emerge, we must train our minds on a consistent image.
See You on the Far (more evolved) Side… – Monk Moon Base (XXII)
And Thank you “Dr. Jekkyl” for your purchase of The 13 Chambers.
I’ve made OFF//WORLD 009 available for free on my Ko-fi page, and 010 is open to all past contributors.
011 is drafted and being revised.
See You,
MMB, LXXXIII
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