Perfection vs good

[Calandale]

I can put on masks if I need to. I just fundementaly (damnit!) don't change the
indolence that I tend to exhibit. As to getting help with suicide, that's not something
that I expect. My wife offered to off me, and I refused. It has to be my own act
of pure will to count.

[Pyraxis]

Ah - indolence, I don't know how to fix, except maybe by getting better at synchonizing oneself with one's natural desires instead of trying to do everything by force of pure will.

What if you don't manage suicide before you die by natural causes, would you consider your life a failure?

[Calandale]

Eh, depends on my spirtual state. Right now, my life IS a failure.
I can't imagine that I'm going to reach the type of mystical state
that I need. I think that I was given one pure option at death, and
turned away from it, gasping for life. Pity, would have saved the
unpleasantness that's followed.

[Nomaken]

In my experience, exceptional spiritual states only come when you aren't specifically looking for them.  They come coincidentally while you are just living.

[Calandale]

I've had a mix of the two. They tend to be sparked by great pain/pleasure,
which one can induce, if one tries hard enough. It certainly doesn't happen
when I'm just sitting on my ass posting on forums though; and this is about
all that I can manage right now.

[Pyraxis]

In my experience, exceptional spiritual states only come when you aren't specifically looking for them.  They come coincidentally while you are just living.

In my experience, it's hard to time them precisely, but you can very well set yourself on a path which increases the incidence of them greatly.

[McGiver]

In my experience, exceptional spiritual states only come when you aren't specifically looking for them.  They come coincidentally while you are just living.

In my experience, it's hard to time them precisely, but you can very well set yourself on a path which increases the incidence of them greatly.

chance favors the prepared mind.

[Pyraxis]

Yikes - in retrospect that's the most awkward sentence I've written in a long time.

[McGiver]

Yikes - in retrospect that's the most awkward sentence I've written in a long time.

ok then, bring it.  it's on.

[Pyraxis]

Bring what? What's on what? My dinner's on the stove getting cold, but somehow I doubt that's what you're on about. Go on.

[McGiver]

just bring it, baby.

[Calandale]

Yikes - in retrospect that's the most awkward sentence I've written in a long time.

Keep practicing, and you can get to the ultimately convoluted sentence with a meaning
so obscure that we shall implode just by reading it.

[El]

Since spirituality has been broached, I thought I'd mention the idea posed by Aquinas that existence itself is a form of perfection.  He held that God is the only truly perfect/truly good being, and that we cannot be completely perfect because if we were, we would be God, and God could not create another God.  Thus, humans have imperfect/evil by necessity, but our very existence is a form of perfection or of good.  We are imperfect of necessity and cannot have all perfections; for example, we are finite, and therefore imperfect in a way because being eternal is a form of perfection.  A more accessible example (from my phil prof):  You can't be perfectly kind and perfectly honest, both at once, all the time.  There will come a time when someone asks your opinion on something that matters to them and you'll have to either bend the truth and be nice, or be honest and mean.  (Ex.:  "Does this shirt make me look fat?"  The moderate answer:  "It's not your best look."  The kind answer:  "No, honey, you look wonderful."  The most honest answer:  "It's not the shirt.  You really ARE fat.")

I hope that came out coherent.  I'm not advocating the viewpoint but presenting it as it was the first thing that popped into my mind on reading the subject here.

As to the actual relevence here:  Cal, I won't advocate suicide.  I WILL advocate seeking out help.  From what you've posted here, I'm guessing you would benefit from professional help, but you haven't presented yourself as someone whose life should be chucked in the wastebin.

[Pyraxis]

To keep going with that: to attempt to be perfect, one first has to define perfect.

Calandale - what's your definition of perfect?

[Calandale]

Since spirituality has been broached, I thought I'd mention the idea posed by Aquinas that existence itself is a form of perfection.  He held that God is the only truly perfect/truly good being, and that we cannot be completely perfect because if we were, we would be God, and God could not create another God. 

Replace Good with Evil, and I agree entirely. Perfection is a form of ascendence out of the realm of this evil creation.

As to the actual relevence here:  Cal, I won't advocate suicide.  I WILL advocate seeking out help.  From what you've posted here, I'm guessing you would benefit from professional help, but you haven't presented yourself as someone whose life should be chucked in the wastebin.

Might have failed in my only chance to get help. I'm too lame to seek it out usually, and I got turned away effectively.
Shit, suicide is impossible for me. I well know that. There were two times that I had a fair option:

        on top of Mt Ranier, I had an asthma attack, and was clearly told that I could go in perfection

        At the end of my last fast, I felt no need to start eating again. It was really hard to want to, but there were some things that I needed  to do.

But, my life is in the wastebin. Not that I think other people's lives are worth crap either; I just don't see the point.

To keep going with that: to attempt to be perfect, one first has to define perfect.

Calandale - what's your definition of perfect?

Right now, perfection is nothingness.