QC

I've been thinking about emotional "power sources" for behavior. Lots of it is powered by fear these days, which has predictable unfortunate effects. Last year I did a lot of stuff powered by hope, which I eventually learned isn't that great either. That shook me, to learn.

The problem with being powered by hope is that you can't look at things that you sense would cause you to lose hope. The hope becomes intertwined with a fear of losing hope. You get addicted to it and it distorts your behavior. I hurt someone I cared deeply about this way.

(Similarly fear becomes intertwined with a hope of losing fear. They're non-dual or something, I guess.)

Spectrum of Ecstasy talks about a place beyond hope and fear. I haven't been able to stabilize this at all but I think I've seen tiny glimpses of it. Sometimes I'm powered by something that doesn't feel like hope or fear, but like... "rightness"?

Jōshin from the Monastic Academy talks a lot about "giving up completely" and that feels like the move I need to make, but I don't know how really. Reminds me of @Meaningness's take on charnel ground practice.

I think of hope vs. fear or despair as similar to the eternalism/nihilism dichotomy. On the note of Spectrum of Ecstasy, it mentions that samsara always feels like it’s going to work right until you reach the finish line—and there it absolutely fails you.

This applied to experiences trying to stabilize hope / despair. “It was 99% effective until the moment it wasn’t, so it’s my fault and I need to try harder.” No, it’s not you: it’s failure by design. It seems like a path to existential / ontological certainty until it isn’t.

My first experience with giving up completely was trying to embody a personal sense of hope / meaning through existentialism, a flawed stance. Then I swapped to trying to embody nihilism, also a flawed stance. In both cases I honestly thought the stances would work for me.