Not Doing-what does it mean?

[Nagual LoneWolf]

Not Doing is a technique used to catch the attention of power and make one aware of the benefits of stalking. This is what I believe it means. What does it
mean to you? -The Wolfenstalker

[El Espiritu del Foro]

I tend to think that not-doing are actions that tends to dislodge our tonal grip-for-control in order to make us fluent. Moments of abandon that tend to
accumulate.




If natural, aware, action is a river our tonal "normal" actions are a dam. In a not-doing, we open the gates for a moment and let the river flow.




The more we do it, the less we close the dam.




Ideally... the dam should dissapear, leaving us in a permanent state of flow, called by taoists we-wu-wei (action-from-no-action).




Meditation is fundamentally a not-doing... that's what makes it so evasive for so many: they have open or subtle aims.




Instead of opening the dam they tight it up a nodge. lol

[bluedreamer]

As I have experienced it the most powerful not doings are the ones that wash me along with them because they are so irresistible--not always pleasant:
dismantled by fire, or--blissful: that opening of faith not belief where the judgment steps back and wonders happen. These have gained me more fluidity than
anything I have deliberated myself. Dancing or stick spinning are good techniques for me to enter another mode of perception that is more body centered and I
find my body connected to something else...but hey this is just my brain rattling out of memory and something else is a way to describe my experience of it




Stalking is finding out how the ego clutch is put together to aid in dismantling it






and there is much more to learn

[Blue totem]

For me, not-doing is an exercise in silencing the mind. When ever you make a conscious decision to let your body express it self without interference from your
normal consciousness, you are not-doing. Meditation is a not-doing, martial arts at higher levels are also a not-doing. But I beleive that art can be a
not-doing also.




I could also see not-doing as a higher form of will power. As we have our self and higher self, we have a lower and higher will.

[El Espiritu del Foro]

Action with no expectation is the first approach to not-doing.




Naguals give to their apprentices pointless, useless tasks in order to beget this attitude of action with no expectation.

[Lea]

The most interesting thing for me about not doing is the feeling that anything is possible.  This for me has become a feeling I have gotten lost in because anything is possible does not go with the part of who I am that is anchored in the past.  I realized for example that I don't even believe any of the sorcerers story's.  I realized that if I did believe them I would already know how to be Don Juan or who ever.  I would already know how to invert my assemblage point and become a women or a crow, if I believed it to be possible I would have to know how to do it.  In my book a nice idea is not a belief.  I think that believing is a necessary act of survival.  I think that the real mystery and work comes with the inheritance of being human.  Being born in the town I was born, raised by the parents I was raised.  For me my past is my doing and true learning is the undoing and intelligent reconditioning of my feelings.  We are here now and to me that is a mystery.
.

[Wei Shan Yang]

I saw this documentary a while back, maybe some here have heard of this...it featured a man who, by some rare amnesia, can only retain memory of his past for 3 minutes. They said 1 minute but I think 3 is the max. So truly for him all his doings are let go of. So much so that if someone tells him that an hour ago he had a cup of coffee and chatted, he'd say "did I, I didn't know that." Everytime he sees his wife he greets her like she'd been away for years. It was really weird. The wife was taking him on a walk in the documentary and as they approached his home she asked him if he knew where they were and he said somethign like "somebody's cottage" or else he just said he didn't know. In other words, he had no idea it was his house.



Watching that got me to thinking that we hold onto our past for functional purposes. Here was this guy living truly in the moment, but he needed constant care because he could not take care of himself. He was not practicing not-doing in the warrior sense, and it does show how we need a personal history to a degree. One thing I noticed though is he did remember his history in a way. Like he recognized his wife, apparently his kids, he knew what his career was.



Did this guy seem happier this way? Yes, I must say he was always smiling, lol. Everything was fresh and new. But again he really could not function much. Lucky for him his wife seemed to love him dearly. She served as the surrogate past he could not have.



So anyway, we don't have the benefit of, nor do we want, his total forgetfulness, but seems we all seek that freshness for living in each moment. Perhaps one reason not-doing appeals. So not-doing perhaps means excitement of something new. Like when a movie begins (if you like movies), or you embark on a vacation, new relationship or venture...that feeling. You are open and filled with wonder rather then saying "been there, done that".

[Lea]

There is a film about that amnesia called memento. The guy has tattoos all over his body, key points to remember. He is tracking the man who killed his wife and has a strange time in the process. In the end he has a big moment where he remembers what is really going on which he knows he will forget. I liked it!



One of my most successful not doings is smoking. I quit smoking but I still smoke. Its not even that I cut down. I just choose when to smoke and because I am worried about my health I know that a sane person can only afford to make that choice wisely

[Wei Shan Yang]

Yes, saw that movie memento a while back. I sorta of forgot about it though, lol. In fact reading about it from you it almost sounds like a movie I have not seen. Memory is weird. I know it's connected to objects though. We associate thoughts and emotions with objects and then seeing the object triggers that recall, and even can cause an experience for someone viewing the object the first time. A lady I knew here, an American, lived in South America for a while and she talked about the shamans there who put their thoughts and feeling into personal objects and then used them to influence other people. It sounded like a lot of unpleasant witchcraft, minor stuff, but she saw how their objects influenced her and when she told them about it, they laughed and kept shoving the object in her face, taunting her with it.



This guy with amnesia, objects lost that effect on him. He only remembered people from his past, things about his past, before his illness. With most of us, objects carry intent, memories and emotions. The doings. Not-doing is to see this occurring perhaps (seeing what objects carry), rather then the outcome produced (the object affecting you without being aware of it).



Not sure what you mean about smoking and yet quit smoking. Either you smoke or you don't. So please explain, if you don't mind, how that's a not doing.

[Lea]

lol, I think the quitting smoking thing makes no sense for two reasons. I think that not doing as a concept is left side awareness and therefore not rational. The other reason is that personally I still have a hard time explaining myself. For many years I had smoked heavily and consistently. This was obviously habitual behavior but what is quite reasonable is that the act of smoking a cigarette is not habitual. A habit is all its parts, and smoking a cigarette funnily enough is only one part of the greater scheme of the habitual behavior. See? grin. The pressure on me is to say yes I am still a smoker because I still smoke but for the last three years I have done a not-doing. This is a real Headfuck excuse my french. I cant quite explain the fact that I stopped smoking for a month, started for an afternoon, stopped for a week, started again for an evening, stopped for three weeks, started for three days, stopped for a month.... etc sometimes I walk around as though nothing has changed, it is not odd or an issue that I smoke but it is not a big deal or an issue that I do not smoke. MY choice is to smoke less and enjoy smoking when I do. a habit is something that you always do and I defiantly do not always do. I not do. lol

[Wei Shan Yang]

Lea, thanks for explaining...so you stopped the consistent habit, ok, that's a way of looking at habits, breaking them down into little steps. Cool.



I quit smoking years ago. It wasn't for health reasons, I just began to associate cigarettes with unpleasantness and once the association grew to a certain point, I actually wanted to not do it. None of it was intentional. So I think definitely habits become so becasue they are pleasant to us, once that stops the habit will too. I did smoke periodically years later for a bit, but it never lasted beyond a week each time and finally I gave it up completely but can't remember when that was. I am glad I quit though.



The other thing I wanted to tell you is my grandpa began smoking at age 14 and smoked heavily his whole life and still smokes about a pack a day. He is turning 90 this year. So genetics must have something to do with the health consequences. I think if your DNA is from a culture that has smoked for centuries, the body has the capacity built up to handle it where as if you come from a culture that didn't smoke until recent. I haven't actually researched this though.

[Lea]

genetically modified granpa

[Wei Shan Yang]

My grandpa is Spanish, possibly some native American too...



Question:



When did cigerettes first become invented? Also how did smoking start,was it with the Native Americans?



Answer:



According to The Times, Guardian, BBC Online, FOREST, Tobacco.org "Tobacco in its original state is native only to the Americas, and began growing in 6000 BC." Please see an excerpt from that website:



1493 AD Rodrigo de Jerez became the first European smoker in history. One of Christopher Columbus' fellow explorers, he took his first puff of the New World's version of the cigar in Cuba. When he returned home he made the mistake of lighting up in public and was thrown into prison for three years by the Spanish Inquisition - becoming the world's first victim of the anti-smoking lobby!



1000 BC People start using the leaves of the tobacco plant for smoking and chewing. How and why tobacco was first used in the Americas no one knows. The first users are thought to have been the Mayan civilizations of Central America. Its use was gradually adopted throughout the nations of Central and most of North and South America.



6000 BC Tobacco starts growing in the Americas. Tobacco in its original state is native only to the Americas.Sources: The Times, Guardian, BBC Online, tobacco.org, FOREST

[Lea]

I think it was probably a different world back then. I would like to see it. Perhaps If any of us make it to freedom we will be able to!

[Guest]