Are you beside yourself with distractions? Is your focus split? Do you really want your mind occupied with all the clutter? No? Then why all the self-imposed distractions? You have radio, TV, all sorts of electronic communication and game devices, digitized music—Oh! You’re way beyond a mouth harp and a phonograph. Then you have the cultural distractions of your own choosing: Be concerned about this. Be concerned about that. Never mind this or that. Speak this way or that. And the social stuff, the incessant balancing of people in constantly changing settings that you choose to enter, places, in a sense, of your making. Are you “beside yourself with distractions”?
You need some time alone. But then, how do you forget all those distractions? Aren’t they already in your mind? How do you focus a distracted mind? Yoga? Meditation? Quiet music? Babbling brook or ocean waves? Watching clouds in a bright blue sky? What can I do to help save you from all the distractions?
Give you a meaningless line? ___________________________________
A dimensionless meaningless point? .
The emptiness of ellipsis? …
Speak of wholeness holistically?
Hum ‘omm’?
Breathe slowly? A few slow, very slow—innnnn, outttt, innnnn, outttt—deep, deep deep breaths?
Para (beside) nous (mind)! Interesting that those two Greek words combine to make paranoia. Interesting also is the way we use that word. It seems to have no isolated, official meaning, even for psychologists, except as an abbreviation. Professionals associate the word with some other word, as in paranoid schizophrenic. In everyday language, we laity just say “paranoid.” Mostly, we mean a person believes that others are personal antagonists who observe and judge. But in the sense of all the distractions, in the sense of “being beside oneself,” many of us are “paranoid,” self-judging, distracted.
The Beach Hole Approach: Imagine filling a hole in beach sand with ocean water. As the water drains through the sand, you go back to the ocean to get more. You repeat the process only to find the hole empty upon each return. As you run to the next distraction, picture yourself on that beach, making repeated trips to fill an unfillable hole. The distractions, the seas, if not endless in supply, are seemingly indefinite as is the permeability of the sand. No matter how many distractions, no matter how much water you think you need to fill the hole, you will never succeed in the task.
It’s all right for you to pause for a while by the empty hole just to appreciate its ever-renewing capacity. In that sense you can quietly contemplate nous as you sit beside it. “Being beside oneself” or “being paranoid” will take on a new meaning.
You need some time alone. But then, how do you forget all those distractions? Aren’t they already in your mind? How do you focus a distracted mind? Yoga? Meditation? Quiet music? Babbling brook or ocean waves? Watching clouds in a bright blue sky? What can I do to help save you from all the distractions?
Give you a meaningless line? ___________________________________
A dimensionless meaningless point? .
The emptiness of ellipsis? …
Speak of wholeness holistically?
Hum ‘omm’?
Breathe slowly? A few slow, very slow—innnnn, outttt, innnnn, outttt—deep, deep deep breaths?
Para (beside) nous (mind)! Interesting that those two Greek words combine to make paranoia. Interesting also is the way we use that word. It seems to have no isolated, official meaning, even for psychologists, except as an abbreviation. Professionals associate the word with some other word, as in paranoid schizophrenic. In everyday language, we laity just say “paranoid.” Mostly, we mean a person believes that others are personal antagonists who observe and judge. But in the sense of all the distractions, in the sense of “being beside oneself,” many of us are “paranoid,” self-judging, distracted.
The Beach Hole Approach: Imagine filling a hole in beach sand with ocean water. As the water drains through the sand, you go back to the ocean to get more. You repeat the process only to find the hole empty upon each return. As you run to the next distraction, picture yourself on that beach, making repeated trips to fill an unfillable hole. The distractions, the seas, if not endless in supply, are seemingly indefinite as is the permeability of the sand. No matter how many distractions, no matter how much water you think you need to fill the hole, you will never succeed in the task.
It’s all right for you to pause for a while by the empty hole just to appreciate its ever-renewing capacity. In that sense you can quietly contemplate nous as you sit beside it. “Being beside oneself” or “being paranoid” will take on a new meaning.
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