/wiz/ - Wizardry

Aaand a second one.

>>186982
Man, this needs to be shortened. Why is It so valuable?

>>186982
It would be better if we just knew which experience he is actlly talking about

TL;DR your interpretation of perception is made up in your mind, and you can control it

I remember this thread… Isn't this what so many traditions and philosophies were telling us though?

I mean like vedanta, sufism, mahayana and even christian mystics… Mainly that that reality is an illusion and stuff, you were already free and happy all along, etc

Oh hey, that's me and my brainfarts. Kind of you to call them "wisdom" but it's just me rambling about my own ideas and failing miserably to express myself and failing to offer any kind of practical solution.

I just tried to write something more clear but ended up rambling again. Here's an interesting article that I found recently that actually demonstrates practically what "changing your perception" actually means and how change on that level leads to effortless behavioral change.

Basically, this describes how you can change overeating habits by changing your perception. The guy realized that, with a little self-observation, what made eating so compelling, was the way he perceived food as rewarding. Any time a food-related perceptual cue came up, he would be automatically thrown into a perceptual frame that made it compelling to eat, usually experienced as images and sensations of food, together with a sense of anticipation for the pleasure that he would receive from it. This is what people refer to as "cravings" or "urges" and the way people deal with them is either by accepting them and indulging in them, actively fighting them or trying to distract themselves from it.

The technique he describes here is very similar to what I was talking about. "Intuitively trying to change the frame" but the way he describes it is much better and more common sense, and without all the baggage of my crackpot theory.

https://irp-cdn.multiscreensite.com/891f98f6/files/uploaded/Jager-5-1.pdf

I've actually tried this technique when it came to my own food urges and it worked. Something about my experience of food is no longer the same. I no longer have those daydreams about food and overeating just isn't compelling anymore. At some point my stomach just feels full and I'm satiated and it's no longer rewarding. Makes it really easy to lose weight because you just eat normally, probably for the first time in your life if you're used to stuffing your face.

>>186988
>overeating simply by avoided by thoughts
Some of you might be able to do so, some others would have to fight the craving all day long… since cravings are usually emotionally unmanaged issues at the mind's dark part and need to be brought up rather than manipulated once and again…
all of it related to "life does not motivate me anymore"

Dreaming with LEGO toys is associated with that.

>>186988
Thanks, man. It's really nice to see you here.
I'll dig into the article.

>>186988
>just overwrite your entire lifetime of learning that food is tasty with a simple visualization practice
I really wish things were that simple, but I seriously doubt you can overwrite your subconscious response like that without some serious trauma related to eating.
At best, the exercise teaches you to become more mindful once you get cravings which can be useful by itself.

>>186988
Have you any thoughts on "I really don't want anything" issue?
I have felt like that for ages. And I still do.
It's like besides some physiological needs I have no desires.

i wish i can talk like this not a idiot

>>186982
Seems like interesting thread.
Is there an archived copy anywhere I can find?

>>186994
It's OK to doubt it. You should always verify techniques by experimenting on yourself. Sometimes people placebo themselves or they misattribute where the change came from. The beauty of this particular article is that it doesn't attach a lot of bullshit to it, no theoretical baggage, it's just "this is what i did in my head" and it worked for some reason. That's also why it might be less convincing since it seems like magic.

The unfortunate thing about psychotherapy and trying to change habits is that we're used to the idea that it should take a long time and a lot of repetition until your mind finally gets it. The only reason why this is true in general is because the tools people use are ineffective and since everything is ineffective, slowness and frustration is expected.

There's only one psychotherapeutic modality (that I know of) that aims at this kind of swift change, a sudden radical shift in the way people see or experience things, called Coherence therapy. On the one hand, in terms of mechanics, it's very simple and straight-forward, on the other hand, the authors insist on attaching a lot of theoretical baggage to it. In my own correspondence with one of the authors, I had called their conceptualization of "emotional truth" something that obfuscates the real mechanism of change and something that added incredible complexity for the sake of seeming "deep" (the therapy was previously called Depth-Oriented Brief Therapy, so you can guess what they were aiming for). The author took quite a bit of offense to that and replied with some moralizing about devaluing people's emotional truths. I called it "fluff" precisely because it was something to be cut out and cleared out before the real truth and essence were to be found.

Anyway, I don't want to go into what Coherence Therapy is and it's particular brand of theoretical mumbo-jumbo, here's a video that goes through a case example of overeating, where the change also happens swiftly, with a radical shift in how the person experiences food. Once you strip out all the fluff that's added to explain the change, at the heart was just a perceptual shift from "food is rewarding" to "food is neutral".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIYK6taIek8

Try to find how this case example is similar to the article you just read. If you ignore the "explanation" given by the therapist, what is the essential thing that the client did in their head that resulted in change? It was a perceptual shift. CT might be better than most therapies in getting that to happen, but unfortunately it's still getting slowed down by unnecessary crap under the fear of "devaluing the client's emotional truth". If you just aim directly for a perceptual shift, I can guarantee you'll get there faster then by just talking about your feelings or "trauma" or tripping up on theoretical conceptualization that seem neat but really only obfuscate the real thing.

After that, you can read up on some more case examples of similar perceptual shifts. Whenever you read case examples, especially ones written by the authors of the therapy they are trying to sell, always read critically and think "what's actually going on here?", don't just take the author's word for it. Ecker et al. seem to find these "emotional truth" explanations very compelling, but as you'll probably realize, they seldom make any real sense and the client just blurts out something and attaches himself to it. It's completely unnecessary in my opinion.

https://www.coherencetherapy.org/discover/examples.htm

This is just to show you that radical perceptual shifts are not only possible, but they should be instant, if they happen. Things should immediately feel different, rather than being this gradual process that is a hallmark of ineffective approaches (unfortunately, all the evidence based psychotherapeutic modalities are like that, which is why they all have the exact same efficacy (Dodo bird verdict), but I digress).

>>186995
Perceptual frames can make certain behavior compelling or aversive. A psychological state of "I really don't want anything" is one where the person's perceptual gestalt, his current experience of the present moment, only compels demotivation and/or detachment. Phenomenologically, this could be described as not seeing any potential in anything, dismissing any and all opportunities because you don't see the point etc. In Gibson's terms, it's not perceiving any affordances in the environment, making inaction the only logical choice.

A person's perceptual gestalt is built from his habitual frames, learned and taken up through previous experience. Someone disappoints you or more horribly, betrays you in a very painful way. In order to deal with that pain, you might take up a frame where you can detach yourself from social interaction, bonds are no longer worth anything and you see no reason to be anything but alone. This helps you deal with the pain because in that frame, betrayal is not only meaningless but also expected. Of course, the short-term gain in emotional stability leads to a life where you no longer perceive any potential in human relationships. After a couple years, you just assume that this is what life is, because the perceptual shift you took up out of necessity is now habitual and stable, part of your present perceptual gestalt, the way it always was.

This is just an example of how perceptual shifts can be implicitly learned. Sometimes accidentally, sometimes compelled by necessity. I've found that people that deal with emotional pain internally, inevitably find themselves in perceptual frames that de-value a part of reality. Someone that continually fails, with no other way to deal with it, simply takes up a frame in which his endeavors are no longer worthwhile anyway. After you de-value everything, you are left in a bland, empty dessert, where no path is inviting. Perhaps you don't even remember a time when it was different.

Those situations are a bit more tricky because you can flip a particular frame, start to see potential in a certain part of reality and bring back some value, but then whatever you were trying to escape from initially is now back as well and requires you to deal with it in a different way, rather than come back to the old frame where you were comfortable but empty.

The complexity comes from needing to transform more than one frame and having enough patience to introspect and understand yourself. A common scenario is someone with a wizardly personality, flipping his perceptual frame on human relationships and starting to see the potential rewards in having friends or romantic relationships, getting excited about the prospect, only to get hurt emotionally by rejection or embarrassment or bullies and then re-treating back into his wizardly frame yet again, or if he's unlucky, not knowing how to come back and ending up having to deal with all that emotional pain. You can see how in that scenario, further work is required in order to find stability or to be able to develop enough in order to reap the rewards of the potential you see.

Funny enough, I spent an entire post ranting about Ecker and then start thinking how frames, especially negative ones that cause the person suffering, are in fact useful to the person in some way. The nihilistic point of view, while admittedly empty and meaningless, has the benefit of emotional stability, a convenient excuse to avoid responsibilities or painful emotions in general. Habitual frames can flip instantly, yet even when the person manages to do that, he quickly retreats back into a supposedly undesirable reality. Perhaps "wanting to do things" is not as great as you believe it is, potential carries with it it's own set of problems, you might have to start thinking about how to get from where you are to where you want to be and that might uncomfortable, anxiety-inducing, etc.

>>187026
>>187027
Thank you, man/
I'll dig in.

>>186988
>>187027
>>187026

I have a statement to offer to you. For a very long time, I have held back from revealing such statements to the general public at large, and still, I will yet still curtail a vista of general information, if not simply yet to make this statement, for your consideration.

…Nothing in this world works the way you/we think it does. Systems do not work the way we think they do. Ideologies are constructed upon flimsy, usually dualistic notions of generally cooked up notions of narrative functions…

History does not work the way we think it does. Time and Space do not work the way we think they do. The Mind or the "Concious Ego/Personality Shell" is actually a pittance compared to the true absolute nature of the "Self" which is, "All That Is"

All of your life, you are inundated and interacted upon by forces beyond your complete comprehension. Subconscious processes, The Shadow, The Anima/Animus, The Wise Old Man/succubus, of both the Personal and the Collective

The entire nature of Ones' personality, coming to recognition with their own living ignorance, is astounding

For many years, I have been an ardent, uncompromising truth seeker. I have seen things that many people will never believe and accept. I have become witness to forces, energies, truths, which in all seriousness, will become more and more recognized, and will carry relevance, millions of years into the future, this is said without desire for personal recognition, merely, recognition for the awesomeness of that sublime quintessence which is, "The Truth"…

…I have developed abilities, powers, capacities from observation of "Truth"

There is an ocean of unconscious phenomena which, essentially, due to its' veiled nature, directs and guides the flow of Ones' own life, perhaps being perpetually out of Ones' own reach, for the entirety of Ones' own life

…

…What do you have to say, about the alteration of Ones' own personality, coming from the distorted perception of The Personality Shell/Ego, towards the greater whole of reality/absolute unified self?

Humanity, possesses abilities. People have sought to kill others, ie The Salem Witch Trials, solely for the perception of the concept of humans possessing "spiritual abilities" to affect the fabric of reality, whether that be as an affect unto Ones' personal reality, or as something akin to the perception of "Witchcraft" which is, generally, an particular superstitious religious framework interpretation of natural abilities/capacities that a human has, which operates outside of the "good/evil" framework as dictated by the relative cultural framework interpretation, at the time

Tl;dr… The life of the individual is guided along/influenced by subconscious and unconscious energetic processes. What is the nature or the necessity of continuity of ignorance of these processes, and what is/are the consequences of "Bringing The Truth To Light" or "Illuminating The Darkness" as far performing "alterations" unto Ones' own mental processes? How far can this really go, attempting to "control" a much larger and perceptive part of Ones' Self, when One is operating from a framework of being guided along, by these very same forces, from a position of darkness/ignorance towards the nature of the Truth of Self, as far as an archetypal religious concernred?

Religious figures, perhaps a near universal maxim, profess an archetype which is much akin to what these posts are professing, "Look within, discover what is within, transform what is within"… Consider religious movements which contain a references to "Illumination"… Jesus Christ, Lucifer,Ahura Mazda, All Solar Deities… Consider that the Buddha teaches One to become "Enlightened" and hence, the "Knowledge Of The Truth" is the "Light" which "Illuminates/Enlightens" one from a state of "Ignorance/Darkness" towards Ones' True Nature

Peace and Blessings unto all who read, enjoy the rest of your day/night/life

>>187058
This reminds me of a thought I had: if you think of something, a branch of reality will be created and since karma is your making, you can take action towards that branch of reality to merge it into this reality. If the abstract tree of actions takes a shape that is in line with the laws of this reality and is in line with what can be done within the boundaries of this world and yours, it can materialize or manifest over time. If your actions keep reflecting it and you don't lose your way by someone else's will or idea, it becomes the memory of your body. At some point you act it out subconsciously and you have achieved a transformation of the "self". Reality, the world and it's interpretation starts existing right in your head through your sensors after all.

Since you are just a tiny actor inside a large system, you have centralization, society, social hierarchies, algorithms and other entities that push you back into your little box, because your thoughts are too dangerous and could affect the reality someone else is creating at the moment. It is then, where you are not in control of the input to your true "self" and you start acting predictable within someone's frame of reality. Just like one large hivemind operating on the deepest layer that connects it all, making sure to filter the input, so it's output remains deterministic, curated and pre-calculated.

"In the animal kingdom, the rule is, eat or be eaten; in the human kingdom, define or be defined." -psychiatrist Thomas Szasz

It's so interesting to read you guys.
Pity that I'm a stupid ass.

>>187191
Same also low iq wiz here

>>186988
Something that's peripherally related to what your talking about; I've found that I can make myself do things more easily if I perceive them as being agreeable to my own personal disposition. So I might not feel like working out for example, but if I imagine myself, or think of myself, as being a Shaolin monk or something all of the sudden I might actually want to do it (as retarded as that may sound).
But it only works if the activity coincides with my preconceived agreeable image -so this wouldn't inspire me to start benchpressing because that's not something Shaolin monks do, but I'll feel very inspired to start doing calisthenics.
I've even had periods where I imagine myself as simply being a self-controlled person (like a Batman type character) and this has a cascading effect onto everything, whereby I can make myself do anything at all. I can workout several times a day, I can read for hours at a time, I can easily refuse food and diet, etc. -and all of this become completely effortless.

The biggest problem with this is that the effects don't seem to be permanent, and I cannot consistently get this process to work. It's not verbal, or a matter of just visualizing. For this to work I have to convince myself on a very base conceptual level, which I can't necessarily consciously control.

>>187197
He's better than us

>>187077
your wicked smaht

>>187279
The more you observe yourself like this, the more you'll notice how your perception influences your motivation by making things seem appealing or the opposite. The perceptual frame itself is actually this "preconceived agreeable image" that you've observed that you have and you've noticed that aligning your current activities with that image makes them seem more appealing. Being conscious and aware of this will help you take advantage and help direct yourself more easily, but it's still something that operates inside of the frame, rather than changing it.

A perceptual shift is when that "preconceived agreeable image" shifts into something different and this can cause radical changes to your behavior. The way this is experienced is that old behavior will simply stop making sense to you, so you stop doing it, or new behavior suddenly becomes very natural and effortless. These shifts are possible, but I can't say what exactly causes it. Visualizations and mental imagery don't necessarily, otherwise you'd be having shifts any time a thought popped into your head which would be horrific in its own way (think of people with extreme "mood swings").

Visualizations and mental imagery are tools that can definitely cause a shift, but it's important what you imagine and visualize and it's important in very subtle ways that aren't very clear to me currently. From Bruce Ecker's work, you can force a shift to happen if you guide a person to experience two incompatible realities side by side and it will have to settle on one. For instance, a person might have this very rigid and unchangeable view of reality where people are dangerous no matter what and within that frame, anxiety and anxious behavior are compelling. If you can get the person to experience people as safe or call up a vivid memory of such an experience, then use a visualization technique where those two contradictory realities are set side by side, it's highly likely to cause a permanent shift. I guess perceptual frames have to make sense and be useful to the person, and a contradictory experience will likely dissolve even the most deeply held frames.

This could be generalized and simplified: perceptual frames have "features" or "expectations" that can be contradicted and violated experientially in order to cause them to dissolve or rapidly re-organize into something else.

Then it becomes somewhat more clear what happens when you utilize the technique from the article about overeating. First, he visualizes food in order to activate the frame and have it mind, he feels the urge to eat, then he contradicts the main "feature" i.e. food is no longer rewarding. He describes it as "moving away" until the food no longer feels enticing. A couple repetitions of this is enough to permanently remove the urge or significantly decrease it.

After I read his article, I had no problem replicating the result, probably due to extensive experience with my own mental playground and conjuring up experiences (intense daydreaming), but other people's mileage may vary. Like I said, it's subtle. It's not a visualization, only the initial movement is mental imagery i.e. an image, smell, taste of something enticing like a juicy burger, this is used to trigger the frame. The thing that dissolves it is contradicting the main expectation i.e. the food is rewarding and will make me feel good, not through rationalization or telling yourself verbally "it won't feel good" but actually conjuring an experience where it doesn't. You could imagine the burger tasting disgusting, but then, you might just develop an aversion or sick feeling around burgers (people that get food poisoning from certain food sometimes develop this). Or the frame might just account for this and have a small expectation that the food will taste bad, but not enough to make you stop eating. The best way to dissolve the urge is to violate the expectation that the food will be rewarding DESPITE it tasting good. Interestingly, food can taste good but not feel enticing, something I discovered in the aftermath, a lot "this burger is delicious, but i already feel full and satiated". So the sense of reward isn't necessarily tied to the taste. A lot of people assume that they are addicted to food because it just tastes too good, but everyone else has the same taste buds and doesn't overeat, how come?

Anyway, you should continue doing what you are doing if it works for you, keep observing what happens internally, sketching out the edges of the frame, this "preconceived agreeable image", and observe how it influences your behavior. Try experimenting with various visualization techniques, what kind of images, sensations, thoughts etc. activate it (something about seeing yourself as a shaolin monk fits a pattern or expectation). This sounds like a useful frame, if it makes you exercise, just learn what kind of pattern activates it, if you find something more general, you'll more easily take advantage of it.