@threadapalooza 2020
On Boxes
1/ I used to live at a monastery for a period of a few years. They always left out food for me so I guess they assumed I was a god or something. I'd never let anyone else have *my* food.
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3/ It's a very strange word. The only other word that seems to have such noise around it is "God". Though instead of inspiring holy wars (corrupted holiness), this word inspired a lot of "holiness" (fake holiness)
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4/ From what I can tell, there were two main flavours of enlightenment. A western kind, and an eastern kind. The only difference seemed to be the tribal affiliations. "Rats" would desire the former while "Post Rats" desired the latter.
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5/ (The naming is quite weird. I can only assume they were trying to make an offering to me, not knowing that I prefer sparrows and mice.)
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6/ Both kinds of rats desired "Full Understanding". The difference was whether or not they considered the "I" to be sacred or objectivity to be sacred.
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7/ Both sought the "End of Knowledge"https://twitter.com/a_yawning_cat/status/1336552708405260289?s=20 …
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8/ They were in agreement that knowledge was a burden.https://twitter.com/a_yawning_cat/status/1334050746887667713 …
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9/ Yet despite seemingly knowing that knowledge was the source of their suffering they sought to use knowledge as a means of lifting the burden. Perhaps given enough knowledge it collapses into a singularity?https://twitter.com/a_yawning_cat/status/1336552710254968837 …
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10/ Still... that's the same as not knowing something. I don't need or want to know how exactly my lungs work. Sure you can argue "but what if you need to perform surgery and save a life" and to that I'd say "fuck u, u know I have no thumbs."
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11/ This made enlightenment a goal for only a very specific subset of humans, those who did not have a reliable constant source of love/meaning and thus were forced to sharpen themselves into weapons/tools.
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12/ Without the ability to obliterate existential angst with unconditional love, questions led to more questions, snowballing into a convoluted tangle of mental models and Roam graphs. All seeking a feeling of "You are here because you belong here."https://twitter.com/a_yawning_cat/status/1333339180601020416 …
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13/ A quest to seek meaning is always self defeating. The resolution of the quest is the ending of the story(the source of meaning). Attainment of the goal destroys the very goal. It was like watching a dog chase its tail!
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14/ I can't tell you how many wannabe monks rolled up their yoga mats and drove back home in their Teslas' after they couldn't figure this out. They went about it by trying to bio-hack themselves to meditate 25hrs in a day via brute force instead of seeing the contradiction.
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15/ The ghosts of their parents always hung around them as a source of constant self-coercion. I tried to point this out but they just said "Shoo, go away, I'm busy doing Important Stuff." Dude, ur sitting on the ground literally trying to Do Nothing.
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16/ One day though it hit me, what they were actually trying to do. They were trying to find the Perfect Box. The sense of safety and contentment you can get by sitting in a box is unmatched. It makes perfect sense that one would want to have this feeling.
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17/ The trouble is humans are always trying to make a better box. Some humans are in steel boxes, eating the same meal 3 times a day with only 30minutes of outdoors time a day and complain about how horrible it is. I live like this and I'm perfectly fine and not insane!
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18/ There are so many free boxes in the word and new ones appear ALL the time.(delivered by Amazing Prime) What's the point of getting bigger and bigger boxes? At some point you're basically just buying a feeling of emptiness.
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19/ My best guess is that finding a box to squeeze yourself into takes too much effort. By living in a box, you can theoretically get the same feeling all the time. It obviously doesn't work, but even if it did, why would you want to spend your *whole* life in a box. 3hrs tops.
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20/ I'm reminded of this recurring visitor who came to the monastery over a period of many years. Each time he would come and humble brag about how great his new bigger box was.
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21/ One day though, he ingested some chemicals (I assume it was catnip) and after rolling on the ground for an hour, got up and yelled "FREEDOM IS THE GREATEST OF ALL BOXES." To this day, he is still looking for that box.
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22/ It's the same emptiness problem. The Universe is technically a box and this isn't an insight that unlocks anything particularly useful. People want freedom the same way they *think* they want a bigger box. It's something to do.
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23/ Small human children seem to understand the role of boxes better than adults. They'll hide in human sized boxes called "closets" when something scary happens like when their parent gods argue and fight.
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24/ One time a visitor came to the monastery. A mean looking fellow by the name of Jed McKenna. He took one look at all the adults and yelled at them "YOUR SPIRITUALITY IS THE CLOSET IN WHICH YOU HIDE FROM THE WORLD."https://twitter.com/a_yawning_cat/status/1328968595833987072 …
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25/ Not sure what he meant by that since they weren't even sitting in boxes. They were just sitting on the ground.
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26/ I got his point though. The Sky is big, but the feeling of Big Sky arises within a "something". Everyday experience is already a perfectly fitting box. Actively trying to make a better box is a never-ending story. A distraction.
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27/ Both trying to make the universe your box and trying to find a box to fit your uniquely special shape both are exercises in futility. The former seeks to conquer "other" while the latter attempts to excise it. Both assume perfect knowledge of where "I" end and "other" begins.
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28/ I was taught the golden rule by Grandpaw "If it fits, I sits." I was taught by the humans. "If I sits, it fits."
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29/ The monastery is many years behind me back in 2019. I've since given up the wild days of roaming freedom and sex, selling my hypoallergenic kittens for 1200 USD a pop. Still though I remember the essence of the light that is always with me in the Now.
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