Barbelith Underground > Temple > Stuck in a paradigm

my motivations to get more involved in trying Templey stuff tend to be either "there must be more to life than this" and "might be interesting giving this a go".

Which mindset is likely to be best for Tempular experimentation?

If it were a choice between these two options it should be the latter one I'd say, since the main goal in being able to shift paradigms is enabling an open-ness. The former notion - with it's 'must' - is another sort of desperate closed paradigm akin to the one that drives the religious the world over. 'Interesting' is the key word and should give you the clue perhaps, not to finding new beliefs but to finding less beliefs since an interesting issue is one that is always at least on the edge of what we believe and an interesting life depends not on belief but on interesting activity.

As a philosopher I find it strange trying to teach students - Nietzsche is a good example since I'm doing that at the moment - where what you're teaching them is not a fixed and determinable content but a methodology with content implications, particularly where that methodology is precisely one of using open systems. Most people are simply far too fixed in what they think they believe and yet in reality the practice of the vast majority of people is incredibly flexible. Given personal intimacy with an issue people can change very rapidly - abstractly thinking about an issue seems to require some need to fix things. Personally I think it's a result of a functional origin to consiousness and that, in essence, the need to fix things is a sign of the stupidity (in a kind of good sense) that underlies our nature (a word i hate of course but 'being' would just sound too poncey there).

I would try two different things if I were in your position.

(1) look out for interesting scientific community explorations of ASC's, of which there is a lot, and begin to engage with that literature - the Journal for Consciousness Studies for example is a good place to start, an open eclectic and at times downright funny (for an academic) journal which includes things like establishing working groups on meditation practices and effects. It's abit easier for me in a sense since I can look at the issue of ASC and schizophrenia as a philosopher (although I did work as a psych nurse before) and so am allowed to stand back a bit rather than having to engage in a daily practice. The object here is to break down the idea that the way you diagnose and treat is the best way you could possibly do so, it's in fact the best way you can do so within current accepted peer paradigms and involving yourself in investigating alternatives will bring to the fore the fact that practice is pragmatic (and a key aspect of the pragmatic use of a tool is that everyone thinks its' the best tool for the job at the point it's being used) and ideas (stop using the word belief maybe?) are always seperately developing (otherwise no new practices etc). Kuhn's notion of paradigm shifts, Bruno Latour's work on scientific practice etc all show the tension between practice and theory in changing a paradigm

(2) don't think temple work should be serious - when you do something, whether you think you believe is irrelevant as in a sense the body does it for you - by which I mean, establish habits - set up an altar, something simple, notice it every now and then (perhaps get a moon chart and put it next to the wall calendar and try to notice full or dark moons); try to meditate once a day for a week not for ever; practice a circle forming technique - and do it for a laugh, not because it's an answer - you're looking for something interesting not a bloody revelation (always bullshit); buy a random how-to book and follow it through if you feel like something a little more prolonged etc etc. By establishing an altar and then doing some practice intermittently over the course of two or three years you will begin to embed things as habits and then believing in them won't be important.

Using both these strategies might eventually minimise the tension that seems to exist for you between the two world views.

The big thing to remember (for me) is that belief is bullshit - you don't need it and generally you don't have it since all beliefs can be destroyed. It's just a temporary neurochemical state...

(sorry for the length...got on one a bit...I'm still going through one of those odd paradigm shifts as I only began teaching three years ago and after 11 years as a student I'm still grappling with the wierd change in power and time relations).