Re: Andy's thoughts on death

[Guest guest]

--- In , " Gifford " <gifford@u...>

wrote:

> Hi Andy,

>

> If I might throw something into the mix (then back away quickly),

> I've been interested in a paradigm in cultural Psychology called

> Terror Management Theory. I've emailed Warren about this topic as

> of potential interest for a CR conference (through a documentary

> film about death that discusses it: www.flightfromdeath.com). I

> too have spent my time in the 'belly of the beast' and found Ernest

> Becker's _Denial of Death_ very insightful.

>

> My only direct comment on CR is to treat it realistically as a

> practical method of staying around longer, rather than placing it

> as some kind of immortality project that must be defended. This is

> one of the reasons I'm no longer on the other CR list -- too much

> anger over defending one ideology over another, attempting

> conversions, and other things that smell of something other than

> practical methods...

*****Ahhh . Thank you for your thoughts. I too have adopted

CRON as a way to remain healthy as long as I remain, rather than to

extend my life. But even THAT motivation has been called into

question lately (and yet I am still 'practicing' CRON...but without

the sense of urgency or neediness that used to fuel the diet).

What I have seen is that our experiences follow our beliefs like

night follows day. The life we " get " is the life we believe we will

get (sometimes the beliefs guiding such " getting " are not fully

conscious so they take us by surprise).

A brief example: a close friend of mine, an ardent (caffinated)

coffee drinker, stopped his habit cold turkey several years ago. I

don't recall the reasons why, but he did, nonetheless. Dropping from

5-6 large mugs of caffinated coffee/day to none, he did not

experience ANY of the typical withdrawal symptoms.

A few years later, after getting back on the caffine highway, he

decided to quit again. This time he was better educated, he " knew "

about all the symtpoms he was supposed to get (headache, lethargy, a

feeling of the 'flu') and, sure enough, he experienced ALL of them.

Now, one might argue that his physiology had changed, and that is why

he got those side effects the second time. But the understanding

here is that he experienced the side effects BECAUSE they were

expected to be there, he had " learned " a new set of behavior outcomes

and his experience was congruent to them.

To generalize, I am not sure that a particular diet is as critical as

a particular mind state. What are the belief systems which are

moving the person, out of which the person operates. It seems to me

that those are the mechanisms which create the reality that each

person " gets. " There doesn't seem to be One Single Abiding Reality )

a " real world " that is " out there " outside of us. Rather all there

is is a perception of reality, and that is the one each of us is

locked into, arising out of the belief systems that direct us.

If this is really gotten, deep down, then diet no longer becomes the

issue. Living does. And the diet evolves, arises, naturally out of

such living, living which is not fear based, which is not focused on

protecting the self, but on enjoying the game, taking pleasure in

each moment that appears. You know the saying: don't sweat the small

stuff....and....everything is small stuff! :-)))