Ultimate presence: meditation and illness (Sacks, 46)
Goggins, Tate among other red-pill activists discuss putting yourself through pain. The chronic struggler ought to not listen to this given their audience is the privileged who do not feel pain.
The approach taken by the red-pill community is to rescue masculinity. On a basic level it is to take responsibility and lead a resourceful life. The definition of the archetypical vision for Adam to develop the land and himself. Before the world can be conquered, the self has to be readied for it. A way to better oneself is to exercise. Not only does exercise bulk up physically but it also realises endorphins elevating one’s demeanour. Feeling good after a tough workout. The immediate results of satisfaction ought to overrule the muscle mass intended. It is to feel accomplished more than look charming. There is an additional layer which is to place oneself in pain. A simple action, easy to do for everyone that encounters an obstacle. Push-ups are not easy. Competing to outdo the previous day. The first day may be a fail only succeeding on the third day. The accomplishment takes a lot of energy yet rejoice in the accomplishment. The accomplishment comes from pain and grit. It was tough but it was overcome. Trying to beat a personal record will inevitably experience pain as muscles tighten and fatigue sets in. A challenge to be initiated and overcome.
There is much positive science in exercising. Whether one needs to attend a gym or hire a trainer is a different story. The obsession with body type and a fresh look on the beach is the cinematic lore yet unnecessary for proper health. Exercise is a personal commitment to bettering one’s health. Putting in the time to be active and accomplished. An easy thing to do but a hard thing to execute. The benefits are present. The accomplishment to a degree beats out any other order of morning routine. Overpowering the pain which holds back the capability is jarring. Making one’s bed is a goal to be achieved but except for the nuisance in OCD level perfection, there is little resistance or really just mental resistance. Exercise has physical resistance attached. Sweat and willpower try to pull the bodyweight off the floor numerous times. Breathing heavily and sweating extensively. It is a unique accomplishment that contrasts with the inactivity of office life. The routine cyclical to sitting and typing. Speaking to clients and watching the news. Exercise is a world alone. A world of body movement and physical growth. Giving the brain a boost in enjoyment. Signalling the mind to laugh and rejoice.
The motto holds to put yourself in pain. Pain will help you grow. Exercise is intentional pain. Harming oneself to grow. The harm is immediate and temporary. The pain goes away within a few moments. Recovery may be longer for some, simple workouts are for growth. It is strengthening muscles instead of cutting them open. The healing is done as the body grows. Exercise isn’t wounding the body it is healing it. Exercise can also harm if overtrained but it is the movement that facilitates the growth. Exercises target the body to develop their strength. It isn’t wounding in the same context. The pain is awakening their slumber. They were once dwarf and now they are volcanic. The pain is positive in the acceleration of bodily development. The beauty that is endowed from the engagement is truly inspiring. It is a good way to start the day or end the day. Feeling accomplished and wholesome. Able to overcome the bodily limitations for new aspirations.
These red-pillers do not focus on the accomplishment but the pain. Feeling pain is good. It is good to be in pain. The pain is a way of recognising growth. The motivation is that the mind adjusts to pain and suffering, the body can outlast. The body can continue as long as the mind doesn’t interfere. Whether or not this is scientifically proven is irrelevant. The idea is to induce pain to grow. Through pain you develop further. Embracing pain is the slogan of the red-pill art. Pain is a response that restricts development. It is a threshold that can be breeched. It is good to be in pain because that means you’ve descended into the darkness. That means you’ve opened yourself up to the challenge. A way into the abyss that threatens one’s comfort. Exercise is an easy step into discomfort and disgrace. Getting down on all fours and perpetually trying to lift yourself up is challenging. A solo obstacle that is completed by the self for the self. A welcoming introduction to personal transformation. A momentarily struggle for long term effects.
It is this idea that is then cemented as the lifestyle. The biblical Adam was punished to suffer and since then man has struggled to survive. Yet with technological advancements life has been made simpler. Less death and more prosperity. Imperfect but on an upwards incline despite the media panic to sensitise gullible viewers. Yet an unchallenged life is one un-lived. The challenges of modern life do not meet the medical and political obstacles of old. There are new difficulties that need to be overcome. A good start is with exercise. A personal investment in a simplistic obstacle. One that can be adapted and refined as the individual develops. Though the question is, less is life a struggle and more do we create struggle. Most obstacles are reactionary. They loom at you as a part of life whether that be school or work. Proactive challenge is another case. Exercising is one and reading is another. Comprehending complex ideas is a mental game that though does not build the physique does expand the mind. It does bring emotional positivity in the same manner. No blood or sweat but still growth and development. Mental aches from long reading and reconciling will occur. To some degree the onset of pain inducing is necessary even a required matter of man but there are of course limits.
Struggle will find you. It is only a matter of time. It is good to train to ready oneself for that moment. Exercise and reading may help deflect the challenge. It is akin to a vaccine. The vaccine poisons the body to strengthen itself to fend off the disease. Exercise and reading wound the self to strengthen itself to fend off obstacles. Yet their model of struggle is nuanced. People are to struggle but they are to induce it. Exercise or even work itself in may aspects is proactive punishment. Facing a challenge head on is many a time a consequence of one’s own initiative. Diseases are different. They plague the body with pain. This is not periodic pain but eternal damnation. For the red-pillers life may not be about happiness but there is a notion of recovery. Sleep or resting periods are allocated to prepare for the next obstacle or step in the obstacle. They embrace the pain each time by knowing they can stop it. They do not need to feel the pain but choose to do so. Pain may be inevitable but it is largely periodic. Unless the pain shouldered is ignored and perpetuated with passivity. The average person can choose to not feel pain. Live their comfort and their serenity. Pain may come for them in the long run but they can enjoy the current peace. Pain is periodic in both examples but it is better to ready oneself for the pain so the thunderbolt is thwarted instead of struck.
It is easy to embrace pain when the opposite is possible. When comfort is as easy as putting down the hammer. Coercion may be set but stopping can always be chosen. The pain may end in death but it is gone. It is a furnace that one puts their arm into. A choice to endure the trauma rather let it grow larger and terminate. Yet the chronic struggler does not have this possibility. He is eternally suffering. His life is suffering. He doesn’t choose to suffer but is imbued with a metaphysical punishment. His body is working the land hard without his permission. His body labours to destroy his mind. Embracing pain means nothing to him. He is in pain. It doesn’t empower him. Maybe when he recovers but if he doesn’t, the lingering pain will destroy him. He keeps his head above water treading to stay afloat. His pain is incalculable. Exercising is a tumultuous task. Pain is not something bestowed but something imposed. It is devilish and pernicious. Happiness doesn’t exist. He cannot choose to shed the yoke. It is implanted in his skin only disarming when his heart stops. Life is to suffer on personal ambition not on passive aspirations.
It is akin to meditators who seek to be present. Those who have struggled to free their minds of their lower halves. Freeing themselves of the emotional invasion. Faltering time and time again. Unable to hold the momentum for too long. Trying to hold one’s breath for an extended amount of time. Slowly he improves with each passing try. One minute turns into two minutes but there is a limit. He is a man without gills. He cannot survive for too long or he will undoubtably drown. As his breathing begins to perish, his body alerts him to rise for air. Any man eternally underwater will drown. Any man with desires cannot be present. He is distracted by the chaos of life. Just as he cannot breathe underwater before his lungs give so too his can concentrate until his mind gives. He can go so far but limited.
After failing he hears of a fellow who is eternally present. Curious of this fellow he travels to meet this guru. He visits him and asks of his teachings. His heart swells up, marvelled at this guru’s tenacity and stillness. He gathers himself and politely inquiries: What is the secret? How do you do it? The guru mocks him. Laughs in his face. The meditator cries out for some wisdom. The guru calms himself and provides a few words of advice. The meditator confused, thanks the guru and returns home to implement the advice. A week goes by and he gets nowhere. He returns to the guru and the asks what went wrong the guru perplexed at the meditator tells him an alternative measure. The same process occurs. Annoyed of his lies, the meditator asks an orderly the nature of this deceptive guru. The orderly answers that this is a part of his condition. His advice was shrewd because he is ill. His guru capabilities are due to an illness that also immobilises his awareness. He wasn’t lying he was replying to your dubious questions.
The meditator’s guru suffered a haemorrhage that damaged his frontal lobe. The guru’s ashram was his hospital bed in the local asylum. He had perfected the skill but that had left him stuck in the present. He didn’t know the past or the future. The mockery was from an instinctive partaking of reality. He didn’t comprehend the meditator’s goal only that he could trick and tease him. The ashamed illness took away everything from the guru. He is solely in the moment. There is no recollection of his past nor does he dream of the future. What he thinks about is rare. Only partially lobotomised. To many spiritual adherents he has reached the pinnacle of serenity. Such life is serene. Concerned with much to nothing. Calm and transparent with his life. He doesn’t think much nor do he endeavour in any means. Alone and content with his condition. Less chosen and more coercive. The patient is nearly a vegetable with neurotransmitters enhancing selective aspects of brain activity. His attitude reflects his illness. The illness has pathologically stolen much of who he is. His fearful nature and combative element. He exists in a higher sphere without animal instinct. Without strong emotional turmoil. It is all peaceful and yet horrifying for the onlooker. He resides in an asylum isolated from society. Unaware of his own decadence.
He was no guru just a broken man, though deeply unaware of his brokenness. A patient in a hospital and a subject to his illness. The meditator sought his wisdom to attain the perfection he had. Yet the perfection was itself an imperfection. It was a single skill without the other. Some autistic children are geniuses. Their genius is highly selective to a specific genre whether be facts or figures. While this isn’t common across the spectrum, there are seemingly savant characteristics that stem from their disability. Able to see things that others do not given their detraction. It is their illness that gives rise to this capability. By taking away social capability for some, they are rewarded with intellectual capability. In the same regard, his presence was at the expense of his recognition of all else. Time was monolithic to his conscious projection. Within minutes he would forget the prior moment. He could not break free of this curse. The meditator can choose to be present and then choose not to. He can temporarily tune down his frontal lobe and then turn it back on. While a challenge to overpower the frontal lobe and tune out the emotional pressure it can be achieved. Yet once he is ready to return to everyday life he can make out noises and recall the prior events. A choice to be present. The periodic inducing allows for presence while others would be a part of the world. The ill is stuck in an endless movement though aspired to is deadly.
Red-pill ideology fails to assist the ill in the same manner. The pained life is not something that can be shut off or ignored. It is ever present and ever deploring. While challenges can be too much and revisited, the pained cannot. Endurance is of the same regard throughout. Preoccupation with disease becomes a more challenging effort than other societal obstacles. The red-pill sufferer chooses to be pained yet for the moment. He finds different obstacles, confronted and powers through. Once the obstacle is overcome the pain withers. He can always neglect the project, stop midway. There is a way out of pain. Not for the ill. Embrace pain when it comes because it will go away. The ill know all too well this is flawed. The healthy can withstand but not the all day everyday pain. That doesn’t go away. When confronted with an obstacle the pain increases pain and when overcome the extra pain subsides. It is all relative.
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