July 4, 2024
Lightly edited transcript:
The gaming industry videos and gambling and the like are fueled by getting people into a state of flow and holding them there.
Mountain climbing does that for some people. Painting a canvas, creating a picture does that for some people. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi coined the term flow and it has been the core concept behind the movement of the world.
These horrible industries, certainly gaming, but it's a psychological state of ultimate gratification, peace, other worldliness that occurs when one is engaged in a state of flow. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi coined the term flow and it has been the core concept behind the movement of the world. These horrible industries, certainly gaming, but it's a psychological state of ultimate
and these are the pieces growing out of James' thousands of hours of study now of Jesus' words and example.
* Do your best....
* To sow humanity in the world as fast as you can....
* Every breath, James. James.
* Number one, do your best. The most joyful time in my life may have been the freshman year in college when circumstances caused me to realize that that was my only option, to do my best. I couldn't hold on to anything. That wasn't an option because I didn't have anything to hold on to. My life had been pretty much not worth living. I didn't have friendships to hold on to. I didn't have success to hold on to. That's just the way of it. But I was placed in an incredible opportunity to write my own college curriculum select the courses that I wanted and to learn.
I couldn't hold on to not losing because I didn't know what it meant to win. I had never been a student. I had never made of myself a student. So my only option was, James, do your best. Every breath, make every second count, make every breath count.
And only in the last day or so has it occurred to me that that is why that time was so joyful.
And circumstances the following summer wiped me away from that, and I've never gotten fully back, although partly back, and I've never had the conscious competence that I've just tried to articulate here.
Do your best is important. A crucial part of what Jesus exhorts us to. Only once does he tell us, be perfect as your Father and heaven is perfect. And often tells us, just keep trying. As long as you keep trying, you'll be forgiven.
* The best at what? He talks so much about sowing seeds. He talks so much about having the seed land on good soil. He did not use the following words, but after thousands of hours of study, they are what James understands is a synthesis of what Jesus was saying and doing. Sow the seeds of humanity again in whatever individuals you can.
And humanity can only be sown in another when it is in that moment being generated, being lived out of, being exercised in the individual trying to sow it.
The seed is our humanity and it is only present when it is being exercised in that moment.
And preparation counts, so the time spent in the process of sowing the seed is not wasted. Preparing for those encounters is also the generation of humanity, it also qualified if one realizes what they're doing, qualifies for the ultimate gratification. That is, part of sowing is preparing to sow as long as the mind keeps that in perspective.
* And the third part, every breath with appropriate reminders as many times during the day as necessary, probably, hopefully triggered by a feeling that gratification, the ultimate gratification, is slipping away. Why is it slipping away? Oh yes, I have lost attention, on sowing humanity as quickly, sowing humanity as quickly as possible in the world, every breath as I can, doing my best at that.
Paying attention to decreasing gratification, exploring why that's happening along the lines just described, can provide the prompt necessary to stay in the zone, as I recall it's called in the realm of flow.
How is this the optimally gratified life?
* It is not dependent upon external circumstances. Trying your best, every breath, to sow humanity in the world. In no way is dependent upon circumstances, not from instant to instant, should they change.
* It is inherently the exercise of humanity, and exercising our humanity is what produces the feeling of joy, a superior experience to exercising our head and flesh, which is the experience of pleasure, happiness.
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