Ecstasy of Gold Journal: Kether to Malkuth

Journals - Major Programs
#82

Frame.

Having the strength to hold your frame.

Choosing and clarifying your values so that you are holding a good frame, and not just being a dickhead who holds his frame for the sake of being masculine.

Linking the small day-to-day moments with the big picture–that big frame that is always good.

Forces from within and from without, people, desires, powers, ideas–these are like the winds always blowing, this way and that. A skillful sailor can tack–using wind from any direction to push him in the direction that he has chosen.

I feel a slight strength increase as the Emperor energy is slightly internalized in my being, and now here I go feeling myself. The road ahead is long. But here’s the thing, it is important to reinforce and remember that frame. That desired state to which this is all directed.

So that’s what I’m doing.

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#83

Victim

I remember that one day, about 12 years ago, I was walking down a street to go handle some tasks. I was in a reflective state of mind, and suddenly the following thought came to me: ‘The most dangerous person in this world is the person who believes s/he is a victim. S/he is so focused on the harm being done to her/him, that s/he will not be able to perceive the harm that s/he is causing.’

I’d felt weak, and weaker than others, throughout life. I saw myself as fighting and working to overcome this. Where possible I tried to do so through creating external changes, and where I couldn’t, I worked to increase my internal flexibility, acceptance, and resilience. But there was an identity of victimhood associated with that feeling of weakness; there was a sense of working to overcome obstacles that I’d been born with, or that I had acquired without my conscious choice.

If you want to be a person who is not abusing and harming others, it is important that you not overly identify as a victim, and that you own and recognize the power that you already do have. (Ethics, at root, is the intentional governance of power). That was an important insight for me. It occurred to me that many of the harms that I had done (and still do) to others, were done without my intention or awareness; and that that does not lessen their causal impact one bit. Identifying as a victim increases the chances that you’ll cause even more harm without realizing it.

Somehow this comes back to me today. I work to upgrade my perceptual software so that no matter my circumstances, I do not accept this primitive framework of victim vs. oppressor, loser vs. winner. I aspire to be larger-minded than such simplistic, dichotomous views. I want grain, nuance, detail.

Egoic orientation itself is a necessary convention, but one to ultimately outgrow. To use ‘me vs. not-me’ as the overarching framework for contextualizing phenomena (as we all do) is as ludicrous as dividing up the world and deciding that all people live in either ‘Brooklyn’ or ‘the non-Brooklyn’. Silly. But, oh so human a thing to do.

The fact that I experienced a painful limitation, and through healing, fortune, and effort am now able to work through that limitation, does not mean that anyone necessarily owes me anything. Others are going through their own processes of growth, suffering, and learning.

Neither nature nor people ‘owe me’ care and compassion. On the other hand, it is wise to offer care because it leads to a better outcome for everyone. It’s not owed, but it is warranted. For me and from me.

Thoughts today.

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#84

Now, on Emperor, I’m having experiences that seem possibly to be reconciliation. Maybe also from Ecstasy of Gold stage 3.

This makes sense to me since both of these subs carry me into new areas. The previous stages of EoG were more familiar territory. I can see how Emperor would present a challenging workout to my mind and nervous system.

One thing that arose was Doubt. Thoughts and feelings of doubt. Peaked last night. I’ve had such feelings before, so it’s tricky to know if it’s really reconciliation or not. But I’m thinking it probably is. Also as mentioned, I got sick, sore throat and lethargy. Couple of days ago, I felt pretty irritable. I usually feel irritable when my immune system is under attack, but this had more spikes of anger in it.

Thinking about actions to take on the conscious side. Emperor to me is about focused pursuit of goals and vision. About making the moves to establish what you’ve dreamed.

So, for action, I think I can just keep following through on this life plan that I’ve been creating. And also when a new idea comes to me I’ll take action on it, if it’s a good one. My children are on winter break from school. This morning as I meditated, it came to me to bring my son with me to my office. It’s an isolated office, a small room of my own. So, I did. He stayed with me for a few hours, and now he’s off to his next place.

vision. personal ambition. determination. piercing like the eyes of an eagle. these feel like the energy I’m picking up from Emperor.

I’m glad that I’m combining Ecstasy of Gold stage 3 with Emperor. It feels like a powerful combination. I’m about 3 weeks in and, according to my plan, I have 10 more weeks to go. At that point, the plan is to switch to EoG stage 4 and maintain Emperor. From March until the end of August.

So now, back to work.

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#85

At the same time, since starting this stage I also get these periods of pleasant stimulation and euphoria.

(am in one right now, actually.)

The daoist in me knows that these periods are organically connected to the challenge and doubt. They feel like the crests and troughs of ocean waves.

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#86

i literally just watched over the last day or two as my mind got hit with a challenge, a question it could not answer, manifested doubt and uncertainty, and then by today adapted a response to that challenge.

It’s like watching what happens to a muscle during a workout and recovery cycle.

That’s really amazing.

Something tells me that this cycle will be repeated over and over again.

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#87

In thought and in action,

Replace the conditions you don’t want with the conditions that you do want.

Stop talking about and focusing on the things you want to get rid of or want to avoid;

Start talking about and focusing on the things that you want to introduce and want to increase or maintain.

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#88

“What am I actually going to accomplish this year?”

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#89

Building mind architecture

Building mental architecture

The structures of perception that will enable you to engage the world in beneficial, desired ways

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#90

Kind of wild to be ‘layering in’ or stacking a program as major as Emperor. A complete subliminal in its own right. But that’s what I’m doing.

An average listening day includes 6 hours. And the idea is to do this over the next 9 months to a year.

Just realized that something that’s been happening lately could be part of my reaction to the Emperor subliminal. I started finding certain information being drawn to me. Teachers or speakers about being comfortable interacting in your body as a man. Was subtle enough that I didn’t really notice. I just found myself faced with this kind of material, mostly in Youtube videos. And just letting it play. I also found msyelf drawn to watch the kinds of videos that involve ‘real conversations’ between people who had broken up or another one which will have three exes answering questions about their ex-partner.

It’s like my mind is being drawn to understand relationships and social dynamics more. After a while, it got to the point where it was so noticeable that I, well, noticed it. So, I’m typing the observation here. It occurred to me that this might have been influenced by the Emperor listening.

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Early Emperor v4 Impressions Thread
#91

Sometimes, you’re in a transitional place; evolving between more stable configurations.

And there’s a way to do that impeccably as well. Messy AND impeccable.

#92

Find your own strengths and capitalize on them.

Obsessing over the strengths of others is a waste of time; a distraction.

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#93

That’s an encouraging word. Simple, but oh, so true.

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#94

I noticed, today, that Ecstasy of Gold impacted my thinking.

Not to be too terse about it, but it was just noticing a subtle shift in my thinking. Subtle, but clearly noticeable. I expected that stage 3 might be the first one where I really started to notice something; and this suggests that things are moving in that direction. That’s just over 30 days. So, I’ll see where I am at 90 days.

To be less vague, it was as if I noticed an increase in my focus and intention with regard to wealth building.

#95

Good reminder:

Decide what you want and build it

#96

Use your ingenuity to convert every obstacle into a means.

Discipline your imagination to find the opportunity WITHIN the intractable difficulty.

This is Alchemy.

And it’s a practice.

The obstacle’s there anyway, right? So why not try it?

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#97

(almost without exception my journal entries are directed toward myself. They are written from one part of myself to another part of myself.)

At this moment, I am more aware of obstacle than I am of opportunity. I see the irony. The so-called ‘obstacle’ that I perceive today is precisely the ‘opportunity’ of yesterday. My job.

I feel that I need more time if I am to build what I wish to build. But I have allowed my job to take up too much of my time and energy.

I am aware that taking a step deeper (when I am able to manage it) reveals that my circumstances are neither obstacles nor opportunities. Rather, how I perceive my circumstances is connected to my mental and energetic strength. Invisibly, behind the scenes, it’s that energy that confers the sense that I can or cannot make something happen.

Part of this phase is about ‘making time’. One way to do this is to ‘use the present’.

We’ll see.

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#98

Interesting.

Definite frustration spike right now as listening to Emperor. Under tight deadline so would have been frustrated anyway possibly. But it feels distinctive.

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#99

PERSONAL GOLD STANDARDS

  • Meta-awareness

  • The capacity to accommodate more of phenomena

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#100

Ecstasy of Gold stage 3 played during this morning’s meditation :woman_in_lotus_position:

The direction of my thought activity indicated some degree of reconciliation. My attention inclined to past failures and missings of the mark.

Strangely for the first time, though I’ve been listening for over a month, I’m hearing a kind of chiming 5-note musical sequence behind/within the masked soundtrack. It’s F A-flat B-flat C B-flat.

It sounded far away, so at first I thought it was from somewhere in the room. Then I realized it was from within the track itself. Interesting.

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#101

Something is definitely happening.

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