A Nutritional Menu
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Excursion/ Task = See Below
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Diagram # 154 video grab
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Summary
Jan Cox Talk #327 ** Mar 24, 1988 ** – 1:53
All info is energy –but the quality of info/energy ingested is of importance to the Real Revolutionist. Compare with: you are what you eat –scientifically untrue vs. true for the Real Revolutionist. The info-food furnished by Life for the Yellow Circuit (YC) is never truly disruptive to the status quo of consciousness. YC food is uniquely determined by/for man vs. Red Circuit (RC) food furnished for all creatures by nature.
Man creates YC info. Whereas there is no ‘ambrosia’ (RC food) for evolution, there is an approach to this for the YC of the Real Revolutionist: never handle or eat what has been previously digested; never think the same thing twice. At least, consider anything said by another as ridiculous at best.
A Real Revolutionist would be ‘thoroughly sick of the past’ (as well as everybody’s future). Sick of memories: used info. There are no exceptions –it is poisonous, a chemical addiction.
People just love and dream of things afar. The Real Revolutionist loves things immediate; draws upper and lower circuits together thru info/energy. For the City, dreams, hopes, rewards must be of exotic nature, distant in time as well as space –but such is always old/used, i.e., what everybody else dreams of too. Dreams afar are based on Life energy in the genes of man knowing they won‘t die with the individual‘s death—that they are growing in spite of upper circuit reports to the contrary.
The Real Revolutionist should view ordinary human emotions as ‘junk food’ –eat-‗n-run food. They have the overriding potential and tendency to become their own opposite; they are unstable: problematic. The Real Revolutionist must allow everybody to live the life they believe they feel they must lead; he understands it’s all a drama no one understands. The Real Revolutionist would not even think of anything he finds even mildly annoying. Consider: what possible benefit could it ever hold for you to think of the irritating? The Real Revolutionist can’t be ‘touchy’, sensitive about anything. If forced to eat junk food, eat and run –then forget about it.
How defensive you are shows how conscious your perceptions are. Never be involved with anything you must defend. It shows your level of perception, your level in the food chain. ]
“If it can be believed—don’t!” because everybody’s handled it; it has ‘passed the test of time’ and worthless now for the Real Revolutionist. Notice that This Thing is barely believable.
Either act or stop thinking-about-acting (TOA) regarding any situation. But when the lower circuits finally arrive at acting–act!! regardless of YC belief that it will be futile or despicable. To act will at least terminate the TOA.
To do This Thing you have got to take over your ambiguous partnership –be the leader. The leader must distance himself from the people, from those who would negotiate, those who would equivocate. A leader cannot become too familiar with followers.
1:58 end.
Excursion
1:53 Excursion. Write a ‘love ode’ to yourself. Sing your own praises.
Observe the Rule: don’t do anything you don’t want to do.
Don’t think about anything you don’t like.
Transcript
“A NUTRITIONAL MENU”
Copyright (c) Jan M. Cox, 1988
Document: 327, March 24, 1988
I have pointed out that information is, quite literally, energy. A Revolutionist must then consider this: the quality of what you ingest is of some import. Some time ago, when I was talking on another level, I told you that a person is not, as it would first appear, what they eat. What they eat becomes them. So how can you reconcile that fact with what I just said about information?
“You are what you eat” was a catch phrase in the health field for awhile, and it is still generally accepted. It seems obviously true, but once I slap you around a little you have to realize it is not true. Assuming you’ve been “around the block,” you have tried all sorts of diets and drugs before you met me. Surely you had occasion to notice that no matter what you ate or drank, it made no real difference whatsoever? How then can I tell you that in the case of information/energy, it DOES make a difference?
Just something for you to think about. Or, if you’ve got real low level consciousness, something to worry about. That is, “What if he’s finally contradicted himself, and admitted it?” If you’re a Revolutionist, it does matter what information you take in. To everyone else, it does not matter at all. If it did, the writings of Marcus Aurelius would be in tabloid form in the grocery stores instead of the National Enquirer. There would be some sort of challenging intellectual food for even average people. But notice this: you cannot read anything that is unexpected. It has to do with the topography of human consciousness and its synonymy with reality. You do not even pick up anything unexpected in areas where you might expect it to be unexpected. One of the latest tabloids I saw contained a headline to the effect that a B-52 — a World War II airplane — had been found on the moon. Do you realize, that is not really unexpected? You don’t actually read anything that disturbs consciousness. Life does not produce information which, when ingested by ordinary people, causes indigestion.
When a tiger eats a gazelle, the gazelle becomes tiger. Life does not ordinarily furnish information for you to eat that is non-gazelle. There is no information available to upset you. On the surface, that fact is apparently open to absolute denial, because your consciousness will bring up war crimes, starvation, murders…but it does not disturb the status quo of consciousness to read about such things. You have never in your life received upsetting information until now, and even now it’s a running battle. I have to go through all this to even get through to some of you for a second, if at all. Life does not turn out information which will disturb parts of itself; it does not poke itself in the eye with a stick.
Once you see it, in the area of information there is not even the illusion of the existence of non-tiger food for tigers. If you are conscious of it, it is suitable food for you. Even if it is food that makes you cry and feel bad. That is not a disturbance of consciousness. That is the right food for you. I want you to hear this: if there WAS disturbing food laying around, you would have never found it. You’d be like a hungry tiger constantly stepping over avocados and peanut butter sandwiches: such food is not a part of his landscape. He is not conscious of it. I keep telling you there is no “hidden knowledge,” but I lied. It IS hidden. But you can travel all you want and you’ll never find it. Never. If I tried to show it to you, I’d be pointing out peanut butter sandwiches to a tiger: “You just passed it.” And the tiger would look around: “What?? Where??”
But back to what CAN be done. You have to first see that information wise, it does matter what you eat. You have to listen quick, now, because this is not true in the higher dimension of it, but, in a sense, there is no natural 3-D Yellow Circuit food. You cannot go out and shake bushes and have information fall down like berries. When I say something is true and then say it’s not true, I’m not trying to be funny. You can learn something from the fact that 3-D consciousness can go no further with this: that is, if Man did not have a Yellow Circuit, there would be no information on this planet; but if there were no information on this planet, Man would not have a Yellow Circuit. Apparently — this is not true, but within the confines of a 3-D discussion — APPARENTLY Man himself has had to invent information. You cannot mine information; it does not come on trees. The Yellow Circuit apparently had to invent information, which then feeds the Yellow Circuit. (Do you follow that? These kinds of examples should begin to show you the absolute physical limits of ordinary consciousness. You should be able to begin to see that just because two pieces do not seem to be compatible verbally does not mean they cannot both be true simultaneously.)
I say again: apparently Man is the source of information energy. Apparently he makes this food. And there is, to a Revolutionist, something approaching a right food for the upper circuits, whereas there is no particular right food for the lower ones. Let me see if I can give you some small hints. (I don’t know why I said that; I don’t deal in smallness, do I? Flamboyance, greatness, if not grossness, is the name.)
Let me start us here: don’t ever pick up something that somebody else has handled. And by all means, don’t ever eat it. Where would that leave one? Well, back to one of those annoying crossroads of mine. Namely, don’t ever think the same thing twice. That’s hard enough to take as a solo piece of information, but it absolutely precludes that you would think anything that somebody ELSE has thought. If they thought of it, fuck it. That’s a fact. You can’t ignore it immediately, because it’s everywhere: advertising, billboards, listening to me, and especially reading. It seems like, in the beginning, you almost HAVE to pick it up. But you have a few split seconds in which you can see or hear something and NOT pick it up. Don’t take my word for it, but you can count on this: if somebody else has thought it, and especially if it seems important, it’s ridiculous. I’m telling you, don’t bother yourself with it. Fuck it.
In the City you were taught just the opposite. There, “you should pay attention to that which is important.” That seems to wrap it up. But you should not even touch something that somebody else has handled. In the City it’s another matter.
More hints: a Revolutionist would be thoroughly sick of the past. As a matter of fact, he or she would be thoroughly sick of the past and pretty damn weary of everybody else’s future. That is, everybody’s conception of the future — all the futures he’s ever heard described and which everybody, along with him, has handled at least once.
When I say that he is thoroughly sick of the past, there are no exceptions. There is no holy ground. He or she would be thoroughly sick of old loves, missed opportunities, family problems, and past cuts and bruises whether they healed properly or not. There is nothing to be learned or gained from the past. That is just a fact. I know how this flies in the absolute face of not simply what you believe, but what your little genes in the lower circuits feel. They rebel against it; they deny it. When it gets into the Yellow Circuits they dismiss it out of hand. But that just shows how deranged you are already, or you would not even listen to me say that. To a Revolutionist, the past is worse than valueless, it has negative value. It is bad information. It has been handled, not only by somebody else, but by every fucking body else. That’s why it’s the past.
You may think you have your own private past…a special private love affair, maybe…but that affair was everybody’s affair, and everybody in the world knows about it. There is no out there; you do not have singular genes. Your personal memory of your private past is a public scandal. Of course, it’s not really a scandal because your friends and neighbors have about as much interest in your sad memories of past love affairs as they do over a B-52 supposedly discovered on the moon.
There do seem to be memories so basic to ordinary life as to appear almost sacred. I will reiterate, for those of you who haven’t heard it: your blood kin, especially your parents, in a certain way are deserving of absolutely singular attention. You cannot harbor ill will toward your family and go very far in This. That’s not because I say so; it just is. Internally you have got to put them in a particular place and keep your hands off of them. That goes also for those of you with children. You cannot wrestle with them; you cannot try and slap them around. Among everything else on this planet, you have to just leave them alone.
Having said that, I say again that a Revolutionist is thoroughly sick of the past. And that does not exclude his memories of the family. Not the family — the memories. He is sick of it; there is nothing else to think about it. Ordinary people go into psychoanalysis to “get over” what their parents “did to them.” There is nothing to “get over” where they are concerned. They weren’t bad people, they were your parents. It’s not a matter of “getting over;” it’s a matter of turning loose. A Revolutionist does not take life personally. You can’t understand anything if you take it personally.
I’m telling you to forget it. And it’s not some kind of dogma. I am telling you something that would be natural to you somewhere down the right angle road of time. So if you can take advantage of it now, why not? I mean, what in the hell do you want? You and I are both going to die so you ought to operate as fast as you can. Or, from your viewpoint, as fast as you want to.
I’ve used apparently negative examples, but what about “good” memories? It is not selective. A Revolutionist is thoroughly sick of the past: sick of hearing about it, sick of being involved with it, everywhere he looks — movies, songs, books — it’s the past, the past, the past… I guess I’ve made the point, at least verbally. Has any memory ever profited you one iota? You would suppose that after 5,000 years somebody would have realized the utter lack of benefit in rehashing memories over and over. But remember, I told you that if Life allows information, it has got to be meaningless. It cannot be disruptive to consciousness. If you reach that point, you will understand it yourself. The past is dangerous. No exceptions. It is poison. And it is useless. Somewhere in that spectrum try and find your way.
Consider a sub-paragraph. Do you realize that in the City, you and everyone else at that level, love and dream of things afar? Whatever you thought This was, you thought it was afar. Without necessarily thinking about it, people assume that whoever I am, I am probably from afar. If not Indian, at least French or Panamanian. The information is proving to some of you to be afar, but in a direction you never suspected. You are not even sure what the direction is. In other words, it’s weird, but it’s not weird weird. Ordinary consciousness dreams of things afar, whereas the Real Revolutionist is struggling to first grasp and then to control as much as possible things which are nearby and immediate.
The nearby and immediate to which I now direct your attention is in trying to pull together the upper and lower circuits. The lower circuits are older and nonverbal, and are growing directly out of the ancient genetics of Humanity. The newer, younger, verbal upper circuits do not need, in the same sense, mushroom soup and carrot juice. They need other food, and that food comes about in words. Information. You are trying, in This to pull those circuits together. The job at hand for a Real Revolutionist is exotic but it lies in a direction which no one ordinarily comprehends. It can’t even be seen. But it is always nearby, because it is in you.
It is in the genes of Humanity; it is the life energy in the genes of Man and it knows that it’s not going to die. No matter what the upper story thinks, your genes know nonverbally that they are immortal. They’ve been alive at least 5,000 years that they know about now — thanks to the verbal history of the upper circuits.
Ordinary people always see the possibility of change as being afar. Even if it’s to lose weight at a diet clinic, it’s afar. When I say “afar,” I do not necessarily mean “at a great distance.” Do you not get a glimpse now and then, between all my words, that as long as you believe change is out there, it can’t be done? But then ordinary consciousness will immediately say, “Well, wait a minute. That’s the only choice. If it were not that way then I could do anything I want to do, and I can’t do it, so change is always something I’ve got to do.” A Real Revolutionist understands that it’s right now. It’s immediate. And it is real nearby. Real, real nearby.
Here comes another hint. A Real Revolutionist would treat the routine human emotions like junk food. That is, eat and run. That’s the most attention the Revolutionist would give to ordinary emotion. But you can’t escape it. You cannot start off and immediately ignore it. The so-called ordinary emotions are serving a purpose back in the City, but you are mistaken to believe you must continually ingest such Blue Circuit food. As long as you are alive, though, to some degree you are going to be transforming and transmitting some of that energy. That is, if you’re alive people are going to throw emotions at you. Your parents, television, everybody is trying to put some on you. It is Life attempting to spread around this kind of emotion. It is junk food to someone doing This: guilt, what is called “love,” family responsibility, nationalistic feelings, cultural pride. Don’t make me give any more examples. That should have insulted enough of you. But I’m not insulting the reality of those feelings. They are necessary in the City.
A Real Revolutionist might be in a position of having a taco crammed in his mouth before he could side step it. But it would be strictly a case of “eat and run.” And, I suggest, “eat and run” to such a degree that he would probably have almost no time to thank or even acknowledge the person who was so kind as to feed him. Probably not enough time to say, “Hurry back, I hope I see you again.”
Emotions in the City — even apparent positive emotions — always end up as problems. You can count on it; it’s not a gamble. Positive emotion is nothing but the first stage of negative emotion. Let us say you’re in love. “Boy, I’m in love.” All right, you’re in love. How long are you going to be in love? How long before your little heart is broken? Before that terrible person has stepped on your pecker again? (If you’re a man. If you’re a woman, take that figuratively.) Surely you see this. Don’t say you don’t like it or that theoretically it shouldn’t be true. Just face up to it as best as you can.
Try this, then. What should be more positive than the relationship between you and your mother? The genes went directly from her into you, she dropped you out and raised you. But now, who makes you madder than anybody? Who do you believe is the closest thing to a demon on your back? Her. That is, your memory of her. Face it! All ordinary emotions at the very least have the strong inclination to eventually, if not sooner, turn on you. Some of you are parents. Look at your own feelings toward your children, if you need further proof.
The point is, to the Revolutionist all human emotions are junk. They simply are. This is no attack on love and charity and all that. But the City conception of it is flawed; it is lacking. It is lacking at least one dimension. For five thousand years men have been talking, writing, singing about love, charity, and compassion. You have got to see that the day has yet to come for it to be realized in the behavior and experience of ordinary people. It is someday coming, or man would not be talking about it, but at present there is something lacking. When you, much less other people, are ordinarily involved with a charitable relationship, you have just got to see that you are always one step away from killing the other person. When you are involved in a love affair, it is always one step away from the other person turning on you: “Hey, I am sick of you. Leave me alone.”
As long as you deal with ordinary people — and you must, to some degree — you are continually faced with ordinary emotions from them. But you have got to see such emotions for what they are. You have to understand that if someone expresses an apparent positive emotion toward you, the basis and the future of it is a problem. At the very least, the potential is there for it to BECOME a problem. When you understand that, you have a choice: you can act on the problem or you can think of acting on the problem. Since you cannot escape other people’s ordinary emotions, from the Revolutionary view you have either got to act on the realization that they are junk, or you have got to stop thinking of acting on them.
You have got to do one of the two. If you don’t you are not involved with whatever the hell This is. No change will take place. You are eating the same energy food over and over and over. It is Blue Circuit information that everybody has already handled. You are ingesting that which, at the very least, is sans nutrition, and at the most is likely spoiled and dangerous. When I say “act on it,” we are getting into an interesting area of semantics. Because I mean ACT on it and, quote, “act on it” unquote. You have to understand that this whole affair of life in the City is an act, and nobody knows it. Unless you get away from it: and then you understand that it’s all an “act” in quotation marks. Not because I say it is either. “Act” is just one description I could use, but I like it. Once you see it you will understand why I said it and you will wish I was there so you could…you will see what I meant. It is all an “act” but they don’t understand it; and the only way to deal with it, outside of simply stopping thinking of acting on it, is to “Act.”
You may find yourself waiting at the bus stop and somebody you can’t escape from tells you, “I just found out my son is addicted to cocaine.” If you’ve got nothing else to do and it has already splattered on you, you can say, “Oh, my god. That’s a shame.” But internally you are doing no such thing. It’s an “Act.” Somebody says, “My life is ruined.” You may say, “Mine is, too.” I know how hard and how silly and how strange a lot of this sounds, but listen right quick. Let’s say another person is talking to you about the decay of modern civilization…it’s all going to hell. And your whole system begins to sympathize with it: it just seems true. Listen to me, now: the old genetic part of you and everybody else knows that is not true, because that part has been alive longer than history. It has been in wars; it has been decapitated, shot at, miscarried — chances are everything has happened to it somewhere along your line, and it has yet to be destroyed. Down here in you there is at least 5,000 years that we know of. So it is not the part which is going to take these problems, these human emotions, as being anything real. And if the Yellow Circuit were operating on what it says should be its function — to make decisions based upon evidence — then it, too, would turn on someone talking about the sad shape of civilization: “That certainly is not true. Evidence is absolutely to the contrary.” Surely you hear that?
How is it then? What is the basis, where is the rationale, for you to take ordinary emotions as real, when without exception they all will become negative. Now I will do my little bit and speak for humanity: “There doesn’t have to be a basis for it, it just is.” Guess that about covered it. I should update Hamlet. I’m sure William won’t mind. At least part of the update should be: “To Act, or to Think of Acting, that is the question.”
While I’m in this area, let me point this out: a Real Revolutionist would let everybody else lead the lives they felt like they had to live. And that’s it. But he does it knowingly and consciously. He sees that everybody else but him and me — as far as you know — are going to lead the lives which they feel like they have to lead. That gets awfully close to a sentence with a period. Awfully close. Since I say that a Revolutionist does not put a period on things, how about this — let them lead the life they have got to lead, and then look the hell off.
How about something a little more personal and which might appear to be more positive and useful? A Real Revolutionist wouldn’t even speak of anything he finds even slightly annoying. Wouldn’t even speak of it. And he certainly would not harbor any feelings he found to be abrasive. Truly he would not even think of anything he found to be annoying. Why would he? Why? I told you once about that proverb I saw on a church marquee: “If you put yourself first in a relationship, it won’t last.” Tell that to the Red Circuit. Tell the Red Circuit, “Hey, let’s go dance with that person because they are going to step all over us. They may even stab or shoot us before it’s over.” Not the Red Circuit. Do I have to play the same game again and take that into the Yellow Circuit? Tell the Yellow Circuit, “Hey, you’ve got a lot of spare time. Why don’t we think about all of these things that annoy us?”
Of course, if the truth be known, your mind would say, “Are you being sarcastic? What’s my choice? What do you think I’ve been doing for forty years?” But why? If the Yellow Circuit should indeed be cold, calculating and rational — that is, looking after your best interest — to what avail would it think about anything annoying? I’ll pick an example that sounds extreme. Your oldest son is killing himself with drugs. “I tried to help him and I can’t, and I think about it all the time.” Why, why, why? Show me some evidence. Go all the way back to your immortal genes and see if anyone has ever derived benefit from thinking about annoying things. I’ll do my bit for humanity again: “There’s obviously got to be some purpose or humanity wouldn’t do it. We wouldn’t all sit around and cry and have wakes and sad poetry. It is probably good for us. That’s it…it’s good for us.”
All right, how about this? To be a Revolutionist you can’t be touchy. I guess I eventually had to get around to saying something like that, didn’t I? I don’t mean that you have got to be absolutely sans sensibilities. Of course, I’m not saying otherwise, either. You can’t be touchy. Let me give it to you worse: you can’t even be as touchy as Life is or you can’t make it. This gets into an area, verbally, that I’ve had the inclination once or twice to tell you people about. That is, there IS a single source of all the religions. I have translated some of the old records, and the best I can make out, it was originally called the Stupid Religion. And one aspect of it — a part of the trunk of the original tree — was to tell men stories about how creations could in some way turn around and attack the creator. That’s right at the heart of it.
So, if you didn’t lose your place, that almost sounds like what I just said about not being as touchy as Life. That is, the question becomes: if we are part of a living organism, how can you be in any way better than the total organism? Sounds impossible. How could one be smarter than Life itself? How could you be better than that which was apparently the source of your being? Be that as it may, you can’t even be as touchy as Life is, because Life is touchy in humanity. You don’t believe it? Why are people down on the floor fighting? Why are wars apparently fought? Somebody or some group got touchy. Life is touchy through humanity in a manner that has nothing to do with an individual’s own evolution. What is the source of your apparent problems? Why do your so-called potentially pleasant emotions always have the possibility, if not real inclination, to turn otherwise? You can describe some event or other which broke up your love affair, but I don’t care what it is — you got touchy. You are supposed to be touchy.
You are supposed to either slap or get slapped. You are supposed to push others around or be pushed around. First you are the insulter, then you are the insultee. You have to take turns. You cannot be touchy and do This; you cannot be touchy and change. Let me give you a maxim: how defensive you are is proof of how conscious you are. It is living proof of your perceptivity. A Real Revolutionist would never do, feel, think, or say anything he had to ever defend. You can’t do that immediately. But as soon as you realize how much of your life is taken up with defending, you will realize how perceptive you are. That includes your parents, children, a religion, your nationality, and your race. IT also includes This. If, after a certain length of time, you feel any need to defend This and your involvement with it, all you are doing is showing your level of perception.
How about humanity’s continual attack on Life itself, and the continuing floating crap game of apologists which Life has set up: poets, prophets, politicians, mothers…if you’re ordinary, you can’t escape defending things. But I am talking to you people. All the things you worry about, the job you have, the money you make, what you’ve done in the past — in other words, the very things of which you should be thoroughly sick. That is, the past. Your level of defense is living proof of your development in the food chain. And based upon the degree of defense in ordinary people (you’re welcome to observe it, too) I would have to put them somewhere between slugs and used car salesmen. That’s a joke for those of you who are slugs.
There is another way in which we could express some of this: if it can be believed, don’t. If something can be believed, it means everybody and their dirty brother has handled it. Or else it would not be believable. In the City they say that the proof of validity is that some information “Has stood the test of time.” Such things as “god is love.” There’s a great one. “You are what you eat.” Yeah, no doubt about it. “You can make it if you try”…okay…”There’s no stopping a good man”…okay… “Justice is its own reward”…okay. The only way it is believable is that it is dead. If it’s believable, it’s rooted in the past. If it’s believable, it’s flawed information. If it’s believable, Life has allowed large numbers of people to have the information, and therefore it is useless. Not because I say it is. You’ve got to begin to see that the information generally available has never satisfied you. So what do you call This song and dance? It’s just barely believable. If I may be so humble, what medium of talent is involved with This is in taking unbelievable, transonic information and making it ALMOST believable. Almost. Of course, almost believable only to those few who have almost the ability to hear it.
You can look up the “one hundred greatest ideas of all time.” And you can look at them and every damn one of them, without a doubt, is a great idea. One hundred ideas to live by, no doubt about it. Except for this: it’s a joke, it’s just ridiculous! If that’s too strong for you, consider this. Let’s say you’re a really sophisticated person and you believe in all one hundred of them. To what avail? “I don’t have time to go into that.” (Nobody does.) To NO avail! The only information of any validity to someone trying to do This is parallel data that is, in a true sense, transonic. It is faster than words. It is information more complex than can be described. There is nothing stable: all emotions and all beliefs, given enough time (a lot or a little), will turn into their own opposite. As long as you believe that there is a past, a present, and a future — as long as perception is episodic — then all information which comes in as food is lacking. No questions can be answered, and life seems more or less like a pain in the kazoo. And especially with people like you; there seems to be this great itch, this great hunger to know what’s going on: “Where can I turn to, where is it?”
And,of course, it’s everywhere, but you can’t see it. But you can try and remember what I just told you. Everything you have ever believed — what damn good has it done you? How has it changed you? If you had just the basic rudiments of reasonable thinking, as Man says he has, the answer is clearly that it has not changed you. It has not made one iota of difference. But that’s impossible. No one can see that; they are not supposed to. But if you begin to see it, you realize that such understanding is secret information. You get a glimpse of it and it is simply a fact. There is nothing to debate or defend, you just see it. But it cannot be seen ordinarily.
I want to wrap up something regarding acting as opposed to thinking of acting. I said that when you are faced with problems, either act or stop thinking about acting. If acting IS necessary, the belief that not knowing exactly what to DO is keeping you from acting is absolute misinformation for the Revolutionist. That is grid lock of the most mundane kind at City-level consciousness. It is simply unworkable, and so you have to ignore it. When it is necessary to act, you’ve got to go ahead and act even if the upper circuits are telling you it’s futile. If, for example, you’ve tried everything with your son and now have no recourse but to throw him out, what do all reasonable voices say? “That’s not going to accomplish anything!” But with the Revolutionist it is — because if he then acts he can stop thinking about acting. Now, you have to remember I am talking about what a non-ordinary person would do in a situation in which he has not been able to act and about which he cannot just look off and never look back. In this instance, your son is addicted to cocaine. He’s ruining your life, living with you, and to make it short, you cannot act on it to satisfy you — you’ve tried every approach — and you cannot just say, “To hell with it.” You can’t seem to do either one. And that’s when you have to act, in the face of all your voices which say, “This won’t accomplish anything.” Oh yeah? To a Revolutionist it would. Open the door, and out he goes.
A Revolutionist can solve any problem. But he can solve problems in ways that are considered to be…how shall I put it? Or have I already “put it” enough? Ways which are not just insane. Unspeakable. Definitely futile, but even if they do work, they’re despicable. Can you hear the Revolutionist whistling? He is not worrying.
If you are even going to satisfy the hunger that has dragged you here, then you have got to take over the leadership of the dance with your partner — this thing that seems to be the ambiguous nature of you. You can never seem to make a decision; you seem to be unable to ever absolutely step from here to there. As to WHICH “you” has got to lead, which “you” is listening to me and feeding your interest in This? You have got to lead the dance, period. No qualifications. If you’re going to be a good leader, keep in mind a couple of things which are true “out there” as well. A good leader has to be distant from the people. A tyrant cannot be too familiar with the people or he won’t be able to push ’em around. Another thing: it is only the weaker who want to negotiate. Out there, it is always the party with the least power who tries to negotiate, and it is true internally also.
When you say, “I’m going to lose weight,” who is it that wants to negotiate? That’s the one you have to lead. “Well, let’s buy a scale, and uh, some diet books…no need to be too hasty…,” he is stalling for time. He’s negotiating. Fuck ‘im! You cannot give that part of you the time of day. If a king is to stay a king and keep his head (literally and otherwise), he does not go hang around in the neighborhood pubs. A tyrant does not go out and shoot pool with the guys.
I want to finish by giving you something that you are safe doing. I can’t call these kind of things “rules,” but I want to speed things up. And it is: you should not do anything you don’t want to do, unless I tell you to or unless it will cost you your job. You have no business doing anything you don’t like. Why? Why would you want to? Why would you stand for it?
If I tell you to do something, it’s always temporary — plus you find out it wasn’t even what you thought anyway. And assuming you need to keep your job, you may have to do something you don’t like to do. But other than that, don’t do anything you don’t want to do. Fill in the blank. Whatever it is, just don’t do it.
Why SHOULD you? I’m not running a school for martyrs.