Excerpts - 2 Feelings About Everything
People experience conflict by being pulled in different directions by the A and B side beliefs, opinions and conclusions.
So a person has two or more feelings about everything. You love the kids, but you wish you didn’t have them.
You like your job, but it’s too demanding
So you have two different feelings about things.
I’m glad I’m married, but sometimes I wish I was single again.
And this is very frequent of what people go through because they are conditioned by decision #4
[ Decision #4 - Believing and Doing What Authorities Say
The fourth idea of self-improvement develops when the child is brought into contact with people other than his family members. These people teach him that he cannot gain the non-disturbed state unless he believes and does the things he is told. Thus he decides it is important for him to believe and do what his authorities tell him.
He does what his authorities request because he desires their praise and wants to escape the punishment they inflict for disobedience. The rights of others have now become supreme and he is denying his own rights. This action is in direct conflict with the second decision which stated that his rights were supreme. His inner conflict has now increased to a much higher intensity because of these opposing ideas.]
that they should always be consistent.
And then they can see that this is one of the first places they can put an end to the resistance of “what is” because you’re free to experience both of these feelings.
So if you’re free to have both feelings, then you have started on the road to freedom—I’m doing this and I’m free to do it.
Choicelessness [Tape 7 DL]
Question
(We talked about having double feelings.)
We have more than one feeling about almost anything, ok?
(The question I have is related to being a single-minded person and having double feelings about everything.)
Ok, as long as you have two feelings about everything, obviously you’re not a single-minded person—you’re in a state of conflict and disintegrating.
So we come down the street and we see a beautiful XKE Jaguar sitting in the window, and we touch it and it feels so slick, and the color a pretty yellow and it has a black leather interior in it. So I perceive it and then I sense it by the feeling of it. Maybe I sit down it that lush seat—and I WANT it. Ok? I do want it. But I look at the little sticker on the side and says $7,286. plus. I do a quick little analysis and I say to myself, “If I get that on a three-year payment it’ll still be $280 a month—I DON’T WANT it. But I do WANT it and I DON’T WANT it. So now we’re in a struggle.
Another one—a person says he wants to do a certain thing, but sometimes that certain thing may be disapproved of by certain people. So he wants to do it and he doesn’t want to do it.
We “want and don’t want” on many many things—not everything by any means. So that is a double-minded person. This brings up the agony of choice. Just about anywhere you go you’ll see people with the agony of choice.
You even go in a restaurant and somebody hands out a menu and everybody sits and stares at it—and they look and they look and they look and think I want this one, but it is $6.95; and this one’s so and so, and this one has too much fat in it and this has too many carbs. So, here they sit—they do and they don’t. Finally the waitress comes up and stands on one foot and holds her little pad and then she stands on the other foot and she sqirms a little bit and then she clears her throat and says, “What are you gonna have?”
So we always want somebody else to make the choice—and if you will watch husbands and wives—each one wants the other to make a choice, BUT they want the other to make the choice that they wanted. You see. She says, “You think we should take this refrigerator?” and he says, “Well, whatever you think, honey. What do you think?” She says, “Well, I want to know what you think.” He says, “Well, you know what we need.” And she says, “Yes, and you know how much money we got.” And each is wanting the other one to say what we want them too. He’s wanting her to say, “Let’s don’t take it.” And she’s wanting him to say, “Let’s go ahead and take it.”
(This is where a salesman comes in.)
He walks in between them and says, “Well, you wanted the green one, didn’t you, ma'am?
(Do you like the Avocado or the brown?)
No, you don’t ask that, you say you like the brown better, do you not? Then she says yes and so now your off. The old man will “gritch” the rest of the week about we got all these payments to make and she’ll say I wish I’d taken the green one, but that salesman pushed it down my throat.
So nobody wants to make a choice, you see. They’re double-minded and they can’t even pray reasonably and the scripture says a double minded man need expect nothing from the Lord. So as long as you’re disintegrating, it’s useless to pray—except for one thing—wisdom to get your head straight so you can be single-minded.
(Sometimes we have more than one alternative and we have talked about degrees of things and there’s no right or wrong but different choices?)
If something is seen as a choice, there’s still somewhat of a double-mindedness. When an integrated person sees one thing as a direction and does that, it is still an experiment that remains to be found out--I have observed that such is the case. There really isn’t any choice to make. There it is, and so they do.
As you perceive more clearly and more completely without the first decision (seeking non-disturbance which includes the four dual basic urges), you will experience chicelessness. if you try to decide with the unconscious first decision you have the double—you have all these other little ones sitting around here as slaves trying to supply both the A and B sides of that decision, and so there’s conflict. So as long as the first decision is in there unrecognized, there will be choices.
When once it is understood about the conflict coming from the unrecognized double-mindedness as a result of the first decision, then you can begin to see a thing more clearly and there really isn’t a choice. Believe it or not—wait and see. There really isn’t a choice.
(So the fact that we see double indicates that we haven’t……….)
Yes, a pretty good indication that we’re still disintegrating because we’re still anxiously wanting to be sure we do the “RIGHT THING” and pick which side seems right? So as we look more clearly and completely, I would say, instead of carefully, we see there is only one thing to do and there it is, do it! We don’t draw up these two long sheets like old Ben Franklin suggested and put all the “pros” here and the “cons” here. Then, further, we wonder if we forgot some of the pros. If I really want to do it the “pro” way, I will dream up more “pros”. We’re kidding ourselves, but don’t know that. That’s a cute game to play on yourself.
(I don’t understand the illustration you gave of the pretty car. I can understand the one side saying “I do want it”.)
Yes, it will give me pleasure. But on the other side is #4 says, “Well, let’s be prudent and not go in debt beyond our capacity.” And a whole lot more that will pop up under decision #4.
(It could also be the decision about the “authority”.)
Yes, some little “authority” not ‘I’ tells you not to get into that. Experience may tell you that you could lose your down payment—and besides, you don’t know where the next 36 payments are coming from.
(What does that experience come under?)
Sometimes the man says he learns from experience, so he uses his “interpretation” of experience as an “authority”, and he says the same thing is going to happen over and over and over. Of course to learn from an experience is sometimes get stuck with a bunch of conclusions, opinions or a bunch of set ideas other than what is easily recognizable in the technical world. Now in the technical world certainly our experience is very very useful.
(In other words, it’s not what happens that’s important, it’s the decision we made about it. So we might have similar experiences, but maybe entirely different outcomes. Someone might have bought that Jaguar and he got much pleasure and attention and approval from it and it was worth it for the 36 payments; while for another guy ………….)
Yes, I’ve watched that happen--after thirty minutes, it’s just a vehicle with four wheels on it. Then he begins saying to himself, “Why did I jump off into this game”.
So it’s what you decide about it. So some people make their past experience into an “authority”; but other people don’t.
(It’s hard to understand.)
Why?
(I can’t understand arriving at a position where there’s no choice.)
Well, why couldn’t you?
(I don’t know—I”ve never experienced it.)
Ok, then if you haven’t experienced it; then, obviously, it’s not possible to you.
(No, no, I don’t say that. I’m not an “authority”; but I just can’t conceive of it right now.)
Ok if you have choices then it must be because you have two different motivations, is that right?
(I guess so, and you would say they’re in conflict?)
Ok so I have this motivations to gain pleasure and I also have it to escape—I want to be non-disturbed. And this one is to have my way, this one is to do whatever somebody has told me they want which is in opposition to me having my way. Obviously there is a choice—you’re going to do it this way or this way, huh?
(Perhaps I could put it in the form of a question. I’ve heard many people say they want to appeal to a higher power or get advice or go through some rigmarole or routine and get guidance—well, so called guidance.)
So that they won’t have to make up their mind. Let’s call it by it’s proper name.
(We put a nice label on it.)
We’re not interested in labels. Let’s look at it as what it is. It is so I won’t have to make a choice, and so I won’t be responsible for what happens.
start here
Now instead of understanding…………..alright I’ve got double motivation in me from infancy and understand that first, huh? Then there would be no choices to make because you spontaneous respond to what is out there—there it is. It’s what’s in front of you to do.
(Let me pursue this………..)
He wants to pursue over here, ok?
(So you see this Chrysler that you like—you really want this and in this integrative state, if you wanted it and you thought………..would you stop?)
Maybe you wouldn’t even want it, maybe you’d just admire it---because you see the wanting is for what purpose, to gain something to make me non-disturbed.
(And when you get to where you don’t have motive……….)
That you’re not trying to be comfortable and escape pain, it would only be--would you have a use for it. If you have a use for it, you’d go to town and get it, but you probably wouldn’t have a use for a Chrysler Imperial with two fifth wheels on it because in a way they’re too big. But you see, we have a motive for all our desires is to gain and escape and as long as you have that you’re going to be double minded, aren’t you. And when you see that you’re not interested in gaining and escaping and what a tremendous trick you played on yourself and how you’ve made one part of yourself into the slave and the other part into the master and they’re in constant conflict. So you’re both the master and the slave, you quit that foolishness.
We said yesterday, “When you see something dangerous, what do you do about it?”
(Quit!)
Then there would be no struggle or choices, you see whether you have a use for something. If you have a use for it……..
(So you’d select things on the basis of utility.)
I didn’t say that because you’re going to twist that into being a way to be comfortable—‘cause if you chose everything on the basis of utility then you won’t be disturbed. I heard you. Guess again. A good try, but it didn’t work.
(What about buying a car?)
He’s clear on what his purposes are—that’s there’s only one vehicle fits it and goes and gets it—he doesn’t need it, ok, and it suits his purposes, that’s it. He’s may contend with with the salesman for a while, but that’s fun—not conflict.
(What are his purposes?)
His purposes can be whatever his needs are in transportation. What is his personal taste, though it can be conditioned by the first decision. If it’s not conditioned then it doesn’t matter. So he would not buy from the standpoint of utility or anything else, but there wouldn’t be any choice for this individual. He knows what he wants. The other one, he got to do what he wants and then he’s got to do what he thinks the neighbors will want, and what the boss will want—how many people people do you know drive an old clunker to work then when they got home got in their big car and went to the country club. You show the boys in the factory that you’re just one of the kids—all of this is motive.
(Part of the game.)
Right! So there is no choice when you do not have the first decision motivating you. When you do things without a motive, there is no choice.
(Are you defining choice as choosing between alternatives.)
Isn’t that what it usually is? The way we use decision is that you formed a belief and choice is that you done something for now—you choose to buy a red shirt instead of a green one, you decided the whole purpose of life was to be non-disturbed. So a decision is to establish a belief, a choice is to take a course of action between two or more alternatives—under our particular definition.
The choice hold in that “I fear to make it because I will be responsible for the outcome.” It doesn’t mean that you don’t look down the menu and you don’t pick the one on top. You look to what fits your purpose. But there’s no agony, “Well I wish I’da bought this.”
Did you ever go to dinner with somebody and they ordered the sauerbraten, and then while they were eating it, they wished they had taken the pineapple chicken? Huh? Did you ever go shopping with somebody or by yourself and the lady bought a pair of shoes and then wished she’da bought that other pair that she didn’t take? Did you ever go shopping and she bought a dress and she said, “Well I wish I’da taken the green one?”
(There was this couple that ordered the opposite of what they wanted. So, he ordered what he thought she wanted and she ordered what she thought he wanted. Then when it came, they switched.)
That’s one way of stumbling out of it.
(The implication I received before is that because of the nature of the decision, that we all experience double feelings—and that it’s all right to experience double feelings as long as we’re consciously aware that they’re there because of the first decision of wanting non-disturbance.)
So when you begin to get that, you begin to get rid of the decision. Most people have struggled with their choices all their life. “Did I do the right thing?” “Will I be doing the right thing if I do so and so?” and “Did I do the right thing?” when I did so and so. They struggle, struggle, struggle. Constant turmoil and agitation. Once we start working with a person, the technique is………All right, you have more than one feeling about it—go ahead and have it—you’re free to have two feelings about everything. So you like your wife and you don’t like your wife—so what? Do you like that shirt and you don’t like that shirt? So you like that pair of shoes, and you don’t like ‘em because they get scuffed up? So you like the Volkswagen because it’s inexpensive, but you don’t like it because it’s not big enough to give you much prestige. So you can have two feelings.
So as you’re not in a thither to get rid of these two feelings, you can see more clearly to see that it all comes from the first decision anyway and you might have an opportunity to get rid of it. So the point of being free to have two feelings is a technique that you work with to start on the approach to have no choices to make, ok?
This is the way it works, so you start of with the agony of choice, and then you bring it to the awareness that there are two feelings about everything—been doing it for years. Pretty soon one sees it. So the point is not to try to break your whole being to coming to one conclusion and then wish you hadn’t. The point is to see that you have two feelings and then get to the point where there is no choice and then you know what to do. Only the person who is free enough of conflict, struggle and resistance can see one thing to do and do it. The person that’s in conflict, struggle and resistance—disintegrating—is going to have two feelings and the agony of choice about almost everything. Ok?
It’s a technique. If you can see that you’re in this turmoil and that you’re going to have two feelings and always have about everything that comes along. So when you can freely have the two feelings, you’ve taken a big lot of the pressure off, and then begin to look at next can be done, instead of looking for the solution. We’re prone to look to others for the choice that would be right.
How many people come to you and ask, “What do you think I should do about so and so?” So, let’s say you give them advice and it works out well. Then they come back to you and say, “What do I do now?” They go back and do that and then come back again—pretty soon they’re saying, “Are you sure you said so and so?” and you are now a slave to the unending choices whether they’re in your head or from someone you know.
(Have you met a personality that absolutely cannot make a decision?)
Right? That’s when they’re really highly conditioned to be sure and “Do The Right Thing” and it’s also very important for them to “Have Their Way” and they get hung. When you carry it to it’s ultimate, you have a catatonic. They can’t move. You speak to them, they want to say something, but they must not say something because they might say the wrong thing, so they sit there. They don’t move. If you stand them up and pick up one foot and come back two hours later they’re still there in the same position because they’re afraid to move. Everybody is somewhat catatonic, they just haven’t carried it to it’s rigorous conclusion.
When you get where there are no choices to make, you are truly living.
(That sounds like real freedom.)
It is freedom. So you get rid of the first decision as a motivator. You know it’s there, but it’s no longer the motive. When once you are not struggling for assurance of future pleasure on any level or the assurance of escape on any level, then there are no choices to make because all of your choices and agony is about the first decision. When you’re not trying to gain pleasure or escape pain and be assured that you are going to be in the future, there isn’t any choices to make. There is a course of action laying in front of you. In the scripture it says when you do, your path will be made plain.
(I get caught up in What would I do if?)
Yes.
(In reality, that is not my decision to make or how to do it.)
There is no possibility for the question of, “What would I do if?” to be answered. It makes an infinite loop in the brain because it cannot be answered. It’ll burn the brain out. The point is, a much better questions is…………What Am I Doing? This one you can answer.
We approach everything with a type of question. When we use an “improperly put question”, we are going to come up with all sorts of improper situations. So rather than try to find solutions, let’s look at the questions. If you are working with an individual or yourself and you put the proper question, you or the person will end their own conflict. It may take ten of the questions, but you can keep putting those questions properly. Any question that has an “if” in it starts you hypothecating.
(It starts me predicting the future which I’m not equipped to do.)
Right.
(With the fully integrated person, he’s aware of what’s out there and it’s kind of automatically inside, so that when something is to his advantage, he decides on the inside what he needs.)
He really doesn’t decide. When you’re in present time, there are no choices. It’s only when you are trying to anticipate the future—future pleasure. This is when you come up with a choice. Or you want to avoid the possibility of future pain. This is a choice. But when you’re in the present moment, there is not a choice to a one of us in this room, right now, at this second. You’re doing exactly what’s in front of you to do, and you’re having no struggle of choice, are you?
But the minute you begin to think, “Well, should I do so and so,”-- for future pleasure or escaping pain later—now you have a conflict—you’re out of time, in other words.