Enlightenment: Shoot yourself in the goddamn face

[The Wizard]

Since I was eight years old, I've been seeking enlightenment. It started with Terry Pratchett, whose stealth philosophy was the first real eye opener I ever had. It forced my idiot monkey brain to actually do something. I didn't realize I wanted to be enlightened, until about now, about eight years later. I eventually moved away from Pratchett, who is still my favorite author but no longer my teacher. Then came Alan Moore from age ten to eleven. V for Vendetta, Watchmen, Promethea, it gave me my next push. So it went on, Moore was followed by Anton Wilson, who was followed by Malaclypse the Younger, who was followed by Hunter S. Thompson etcetera, etcetera.

I've been mindfucking myself and my fellow adolescents for years now, pushing my boundaries farther and farther. I've forced myself to see my death over and over again, in ways ranging from heroic to depressingly meaningless. I've screwed myself up royally. And it's hilarious. I can't understand my fellow human beings that well anymore. My mind moves back and forth between insanity and self discipline and some fusion of the two.

I still need caffeine to induce a truly ecstatic state, so that's something to do. I've developed a basic phrase to symbolize enlightenment. "Shoot yourself in the face and come out the other side laughing your ass off."

Now here's the question: Have I spent my life up to now actually going somewhere, or am I just another prick fucking myself into oblivion? And is their really a difference between the two?

What I'm looking for is feedback. Whether my methods, my teachers, my efforts are actually on to something.

Or Kill Me

[The Wizard]

Hmm. In reading this over, this is either one of my best rants or my worst. Fair enough.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Do you mind if I yoink this and edit out the last two lines for intermittens #6?

And if you really are that desperate you actually want my idiotic feedback I'd say you've arrived, where you usually arrive, somewhere around the middle of your journey, and you might be starting to realise that the journey itself is much more interesting than any fucking plaque or medal you might get for whatever accomplishment you've set out to achieve. They're not medals like at the end of a race, they're just awards you get for completing levels in a game that would soon get fucking boring if you got to the end and had to figure out what to do next.

Enjoy the ride. Shoot some zombies and enjoy the promise of even more weird awaiting.

[The Wizard]

Fair enough. Thanks for the feedback, and by all means yoink away.

I think next I'll see whether I can force myself to develop an alternate personality. Probably not, but it could be fun.

Anyone else what to say something?

[P3nT4gR4m]

Careful with alternate personalities. They get frighteningly effective, dangerously quickly once you get the hang of it. And it really aint as difficult as it might sound to pull off. Handy exercise tho - made me the men I am today.

[The Wizard]

I despise Communism, so I'll make him a commie. I'll try and put in a kill-switch for it. That's if I can control the result. Ha. We'll see.

Come on folks, don't be shy. Say something!

[Captain Utopia]

"The faster you rush towards enlightenment, the quicker it runs away"

I dunno. Take a deep breath, relax, and remember that you have plenty of time to figure this shit out. But the clock is tick tock ticking and if you don't find all of your answers before the alarm goes off then we're all going to die.

Somewhere between those two extremes, I guess. But try to remember that you are the only judge which matters... spend less time thinking about what you should be doing in life, and what you want to get away with.

[The Wizard]

What I want to get away with? I want to get rid of the bullshit for one. All the crap that's been pushed onto my personality like a leech by authority, friends, whatever. I'd like to find out what aspects of my personality are actually mine and not something I was brainwashed into being. I mean, am I actually  polite, or am I a rude bastard whose been trained to act polite? Shave off all of that shit and take a look a pure undiluted me.

Also good advice. Thanks. Anyone else?

[P3nT4gR4m]

I despise Communism, so I'll make him a commie. I'll try and put in a kill-switch for it. That's if I can control the result. Ha. We'll see.

Come on folks, don't be shy. Say something!

Make sure you do. Check out some voodoo shit like demonic invocation. Look at how they suggest you do it. Try to think of it, not as supernatural but psychological. Sure it's imaginary - that's a given but then so is your 'actual' personality. Fuck all but a little piece of nonsense your head made up, bound by some biologically instigated imperative or other. Sure there's a real world, sure theres a barstool but you? You my friend are a figment of your own imagination and if you don't keep that in mind another figment will come charging out of that subconscious mess of tangled scaffolding you call a mind and take over the whole goddamn shooting match.

At this stage, if you end up like me, your head will do a really messy and downright hilarious reboot. Expect people with nametags and security swipecards to supply you with plenty headfucking chemicals to assist in the process. If you don't end up rebooting then good luck - I'd imagine it can get messy  

[The Wizard]

Well, then that goes back to my phrase "Shoot yourself in the face and laugh about it." So I'll be going somewhere regardless. I love it.

[Captain Utopia]

I'd like to find out what aspects of my personality are actually mine and not something I was brainwashed into being. I mean, am I actually  polite, or am I a rude bastard whose been trained to act polite? Shave off all of that shit and take a look a pure undiluted me.

Most people are who they want to be, though you rarely win friends by pointing this out.

On the plus side, this also means you can be whoever you want to be.. though more effort than shaving is required, of course.

[The Wizard]

A good point. But still, it would be nice to pick and choose personality traits to ditch.

[Captain Utopia]

You can. Just decide what you want, click your fingers and you're done. Remembering that clicking your fingers is an unnecessary theatrical flourish.

I'm not saying that you can suddenly become funny if you don't have a sense of humour, or you can suddenly become smart if you are dense. But for all types of personality traits modification of the form "more of this" or "less of that", then the longer you pontificate instead of just going ahead and doing it, the more reasons you'll find to maintain status quo.

Of course, there are consequences. Which is why it comes down to how much you want it. Then your sneaky mind will invariably make you slip up, which gives you a choice - admit you were wrong and keep moving forward, or make yourself feel better, rationalise, and stay pretty much unchanged.

[The Wizard]

Fair enough. I'll take it under advisement. Thanks for the advice.

Okay, I've got two people who've been nice enough to post. How about some other folks?

[Cramulus]

enlightenment is a good goal to shoot for, but as I understand it, you'll never know if you get there or not.

Yes, it's very useful to know how your mind works, dismantle it, examine it, reassemble it

but generally, pricks who think they are "enlightened" are some of the worst spags on the planet. Thinking you're in-the-right all the time is a sort of stubborn inflexibility. I say: Don't just defend the right to be wrong - exercise it!


anyway, your version of enlightenment will change a bit with experience. I first found the principia and wilson and all at age 16 or 17, and it totally blew my world open. Propelled me into a lot of really exciting places. Taught me a lot of great life skills, such as bouncing back, embracing novelty rather than being afraid of it, and laughing your fucking balls off.

Ten or eleven years later, at age 27, I'm still in love with Eris Discordia, but I'm definitely more grounded.. I still think it's a good "path", or "philosophy" or "reach around" as far as things are concerned. It's a great energy current. However, it is a sort of form, a trap that I will escape from
                                 one day.