Posts Tagged ‘curiosity’

Taking an argument through the eye of the needle

December 12, 2014

HJ wrote: Those who have arguments with my words can argue with themselves.

My energy of attention is being moved toward those whose approach is childlike curiosity and willingness to see through the appearance of separate identities.

RRF replied: That sounds like a statement of separation to me.

HJ: Everything sounds like a statement of wholeness to me…living proof that separation never was!

JR writes:

“Separation never was” could be a statement of denial. It could be argumentative. “Now, let me explain why when I am argumentative, that is not actually argumentative….”

There is a spectrum of precision- from more to less. There are many spectrums.

Childlike curiosity may be very valuable for those who are “closed” in that regard. Beyond mere curiosity is focus, intensity, and courage.

Why is a child’s lack of perception of danger called naive? Because they lack perceptiveness. Only when one is perceptive and open to fear is courage possible. Curiosity leads so perceptiveness, which can be useful. However, I had a childlike curiosity as a child. There is a totally distinct context beyond “mere curiosity.”

Curiosity helps you to find the eye of the needle. To pass through it, curiosity is not enough.

creating freedom (through courage and curiosity)

April 14, 2012

Curiosity brings clarity, then courage, then creation, which is freedom.

Freedom is something to exercise from within, not something to eventually get from without. Freedom is fundamentally not something to be delivered by another- not by a release from confinement, debt, or other obligation, not by the acknowledgment and protections of a social authority, and not by collaborating with others to establish a revolution or new order. All of those are secondary and may or may not arise from the exercising of freedom. Freedom is already present and available to be practiced and developed- always.

The essential freedom is what is traditionally called freedom of thought. Ultimately, freedom of action is a conceptual impossibility. One may be free to do some specific action, but one is not free to do all actions. One might be able to go either east or west, but can one go in both directions at once?

In contrast to action, which is fundamentally limited by circumstance, one is free to explore any thought whatsoever. Through exploring freedom of thought, practicing this freedom and developing this freedom, then certain actions may be recognized as relevant, including actions that one may have never considered before.

This stage of freedom of thought is the stage of the transition from curiosity to clarity. When a particular action is clearly relevant, then courage is possible. We could also use the word commitment rather than courage, for no fear is required. However, when fear is present along with clarity, we can call that courage. So, courage is just one form of commitment. However, be clear that fear in no way cancels commitment.

In contrast, fear focuses attention toward a particular value or commitment. Fear is the same energy that, in the presence of clarity, manifests as courage.

Thus, when there is fear without the commitment of courage, that is a sign of a lack of clarity. Further, when there is a lack of clarity, that is a sign of a lack of curiosity. There is never an absence of curiosity, just a relative degree of curiosity for various possible priorities. When curiosity is concentrated and refined to the point of clarity, only then is commitment or courage possible.

Finally, in the presence of courage (or any other form of commitment), action arises. The activity that arises is a creative action. In fact, all action is creative, from every word to every movement. Actions that may be called destructive, such as dis-assembling some composite into pieces, are not literally destructive.

What is sometimes called destruction is actually conversion. For instance, the burning of wood does not destroy the wood so much as convert it into heat and light and smoke and ashes. However, it is also valid to use the term destruction when referencing an instance of converting something from one thing into another.

Just be clear that all forms are temporary. Change is the way of life. Be curious about change and soon change will manifest through you in harmony both with circumstances (which is the outward manifestation nature) and with your inner nature- a harmonizing or partnering of outer circumstances and one’s inner condition.

Your inner nature is creation, which arises naturally from curiosity, then clarity, and then courage. Circumstances develop in consequence of the manifesting of your inner nature, which is creation (creativity). Rather than focus on changing outward circumstances, also called reform as in reacting against circumstances, like in opposition or protest to one or more emerging circumstances, one may be curious as to the manifesting of one’s inner nature outward, that is, creating. The eternal process of creating, which has already been and which continues always, is the way of freedom, the tao of freedom, the expression of freedom, the development of freedom, the creating of freedom.

J.R. Fibonacci is a specialist in freedom of thought and the booming practical issue of financial freedom.

Published on: May 26, 2010

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The magic of inquiry

August 9, 2010

or, the magic of curiosity… and inquiry!

Responding with a curious courage… to recent financial developments

April 5, 2009

Responding with a curious courage… to recent financial developments

Quickly, let’s be clear what it does and does not mean to respond with a curious courage. I wonder if you can recall a time when you were not just already curious, but when your curiosity then led you to perceive a risk or danger that you only could have directly recognized through your own exploring, and then, after this discovery that you just made, you courageously redirected your behavior away from the perceived risk and toward a valuable opportunity that, again, you only discovered through the practice of curiosity. Let’s call that time now.

In contrast, what a curious courage does not mean is this: to identify how reality should have been, whether or not it was, then, when some pattern of reality did not fit with how it allegedly should have been, then to identify that pattern of reality as having been a problem, and then choose not to take any new initiative toward personal responsibility for one’s own future, but instead focus anger on whoever was convenient to blame for that problematic reality, and finally, identify whoever first provided you someone to blame for that problematic reality as the one to blindly rely on to almost fix that problematic reality next, since reality may persistently thwart reactive efforts to fix it by first blaming someone else for why it was not how it should have been (according to whoever denied that reality should be however reality actually already is).

Now, with a curious courage, we could be asking how did this particular apparent reality develop- yet with a specific concern for one’s own prior practices and the resulting effects produced from one’s own prior practices. That personal identification of one’s own prior practices as the primary issue related to the results produced by those practices is what may take courage.

So, let’s imagine that someone went to a casino and did very well for quite a while. They soon developed confidence and came back to the casino again and again. They made consistent unearned gains by using a certain method that worked for them over and over.

However, yesterday, they used that same old method but got a different result, that one which they do not value. Then, they kept trying that same method again and continued to get the result that they do not value. Soon, they lost quite a bit of their prior unearned gains- or even all of those gains as well as all of their original investment or even more.

Maybe they were afraid to even think about or look at their recent results. They may have been focusing on how much they used to have as if that was somehow more relevant than what they have left.

What would it mean to respond to this situation with a curious courage? Would it be courageous to look for someone else to blame for the recent results? Maybe you blamed the casino itself, or the government regulators, or a certain current or former employee of the casino, or perhaps your neighbor or even your neighbor’s dog.

Now, I might suggest that the particular investing method that you used is what produced the unfavorable result. Of course, it could be possible that the casino or government regulators did change some relevant rule, yet even if that were true, identifying such a change would not make your old method back into one that produces favorable results. If some rule had been changed and that is the single reason why your old method was no longer valuable, then knowing what rule has been changed might provide some insight into what other method might be valuable now, but you may not be interested in that yet.

After all, if the reason the rule was changed is because of your neighbor’s dog, then you could continue to use the method that stopped working but just get really angry at the dog. Or, while you continue to use the method that stopped working, maybe you could kill the dog, and then maybe someone would change the rule back so that your old method that stopped working might work again one day eventually, and you could just keep using it for as long as it takes, even though until that might happen you may be producing results with that method that you definitely may not value, because one day it could work again- you know, hypothetically.

That all could be true. One other thing though that someone with a curious courage might wonder is this: what about discontinuing the use of whatever prior method already stopped working to produced unearned capital gains? Sure, maybe the dog can be killed and the rule can be changed back to how it was and so one day possibly in the not-too-distant future the old method that stopped working may work again, but how about now? Sure, maybe someone can identify the neighbor that might have been in some way responsible for preventing you from continuing to multiply the unearned capital gains that you used to compound, and then maybe someone can get that neighbor to remedy the situation by paying to bail out the casinos that have suffered incredibly all because of that one dog. However, what about reconsidering the investing method which however long ago stopped working to produce the results you value?

Even if you advocate for a possible return back towards the prior situation, another possibility is that you explore modifying your investing method, at least until all dogs are killed so that you can know that no other dogs will ever prevent you from multiplying unearned capital gains with the single method that is most familiar to you, which is probably borrowing money to invest in real estate, but it could also be dumping money into various stocks and hoping that those stocks go up in value at least enough to balance any inflation and taxes.

I know a lot of people who I warned many years ago about the specific market developments that have since rendered their previously valuable methods worthless, resulting in losses of some or all of their unearned gains in real estate equity (or in US tech stocks or UK financial stocks and so on). Some of them even owe more on their mortgage than the collateral property is worth.

I also know a lot of people who have watched me make consistently accurately predictions of a variety of ups and downs in a variety of markets. Some of them may never give up the methods that they previously used to produce consistent unearned gains for them but that recently stopped working. Some of them may not ever explore a principle that works in all market conditions: partnering with the reality of market conditions and even partnering with someone who knows how to find opportunity in all market conditions now.

That might require a curious courage. Not everyone has that. For those of us who do have it, the fact that not everyone else has it is related to what distinguishes our results from their results, which includes the curiosity to be honest about the reality of market conditions, rather than defining some patterns of reality as “problems” to be automatically reacted to with personal blaming and blind devotion in the latest emergency rescue fix proposed, whether that is a political “solution” or some other silver bullet, like, whenever one has been confused, just investing in silver (or real estate etc) as the one magic solution to the persisting problem of reality not being the same as someone told you it should be.

Consider that reality is only a problem for those who insist on investing in opposition to it. For those with a curious courage, reality is an opportunity to partner. Now, with me and the investing methods that fit with partnering with the reality of market conditions, certain people get consistently favorable results in all market conditions. Not everyone will contact someone committed to partnering with reality to let me know that they are interested in consistently favorable results, but what about you?




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