This should be called the Slaves Forum

This is really entertaining.

I have learned about "reality tunnels" and EverQuest, but I'm not holding my breath on the answers.

Here are some reality tunnels from this thread:

1. The reality tunnel where reality is reality and lunacy is lunacy (the real world vs the loony bin)
2. The reality tunnel where reality is physical and spiritual-emotional is not lunacy (the real world vs the metaphysical world)
3. The reality tunnel where reality is physical and lunacy is always caused by crack (the world of war on drugs)
4. The reality tunnel where reality is best left behind in order to focus on EverQuest 24/7 (virtual reality)
5. The reality tunnel where we can only know our own reality and never truly understand another's (the solipsistic world)

Yeah I reckon the world would be better without TV and computer games but that's just my tunnel. And without TV and computer games there would be far too many people with time to think, which wouldn't do the establishment that much good.

I have to ask, is this the kind of thought process that most clinical psychologists diagnose as just plain crazy?

Actually craziness is a very good topic. There are signs that a significant proportion of the north American population is clinically mad.

Who says what's crazy? If a person does absolutely no harm to themselves or others, can they be crazy?

I'm quite happy with my various quirks, obsessions, compulsions, mood swings and occasional anal retentiveness.

To me, craziness is doing the same thing you've always done, and expecting to get a different result; spending your whole life in suburbia, and being part of the "consume - be silent - die" social script.

Clinical psychologists are really good at putting people into diagnostic boxes. Not sure how effective many of them are at treating people though, I'v never seen anyone "cured" . At least they don't have the power to impose drugs on people like shrinks do.

god doesnt exist

does to.

Originally posted by dragonrider
[People with X traits .ed] ...often have a hard time understanding the difference between reality and fantasy.

As do those who generalize.

Or more closely, those who label things.

The more set you are in what you believe to be 'reality' or 'fantasy'.



[Edited on 26-5-2003 by quango]

Why am I not seeing the comparison to 'Matrix' with his way of thinking? Why is it that anytime anyone has a 'deep thought' it is compared to Matrix? I'm serious too when I ask these questions...because I see no comparison what-so-ever..(maybe I got up during a specific scene or something)

VOD~I'm understanding you, but still somewhat lost as to where you are going with all of what you are saying..
It seems to me that you too..are somewhat lost and searching for that 'awakening' moment when you can completely understand yourself..
You mentioned you just had a birthday..I'm sensing it is a very significant moving point in your life..as was my 30th birthday(I think certain ages we turn do this to us)
It's as though you awaken-30 in my case-and wonder have I been asleep all these years? Where is the truth, the meaning..I must make it a goal to find those things..
I personally think 30 is a spiritual age for myself..whereas I'm hoping to find the more deeper meanings in life, before I was just kind of skimming the surface, and now I've uncovered all that and am moving forward on a deeper level and learning. Which in a way I would also call it a re-birth...being born once again with less focus on the outward world...more on the inward world...this to me will be the most fulfilling turning point in my life...a time for answers, spiritul power and strength and it will also be the most difficult...
but with far more reward..
Well I don't know why I said all that...guess what you have said has just kind of reminded me of how I feel..
Good luck..and look foward to hearing more..
Magestica~

"Their is no Spoon" - Neo

Originally posted by FoxStriker
"There is no Spoon" - Neo

"Ignorance is bliss" - Cypher

Hehehe...thought I'd add that one. The first by Neo seems to speak about seeing/knowing the truth within what you are supposedly seeing...below the layers. Cyphers one speaks about knowing the truth, but not giving a rats hiney about it and choosing to be/act oblivious to it.

...seems appropriate for a Religious Forum...

Do you really give a sh*t anyway? -Carlin

"Hey brother...can I bum a smoke?" - some drunk at the train station today...

I dreamt I was, but never did, yet I am glad I tried.


Lunacy is the state inbetween rational thought. How it last is up for debate with some people LOL.

As per Majestica's quandary....

The Matrix has become a social phenom akin to the Allan parsons project, Woodstock, 68 convention and such. It has become, in some sense, a focal point for some in the younger generation. Actually 1999 was an interesting year in movies anyway. Fight club was released as was Gladiator. Three films with many criss-crossing ideas and perceptions about individuality, modern life and spirituality.
To watch people dismiss, out of hand,ideas by relating them to other ideas is a peculiarly human trait. This is ok. What this means is that people have internalized ideas but lacking real imagination or their own words to express the feelings aroused by these ideas, put them into a cultural context. Every generation does this to some extent. People who served in Vietnam have their own vocabulary as do people from the second world war and the "hippy" sixties.
During times of emotional imprinting, like those, images, titles and words get locked into the indexing part of the brain. I have seen this first hand with friends and family members pushed into identifying unspeakable aspects of them selves. they often relate these new experiences to ones they have had. this grants a certain amount of security, but its also partly necessary. The human ego is fragile and ideas or experiences that threaten the ego (or appear to) must be indexed. The result could be a psychotic fugue unless a proper environment was established a priori.
While this behavior is typical it does help to weed out thinkers who can bridge these concepts and integrate them as their own opposed to others who are content to prelabel and generalize.
Strangely enough, woman tend to be more open this way than men, as generalizations go. You can see a good example in Majestica's response. She has attempted to step outside of the conditioned reflex to meet the new idea. Then she has taken it and internalized it and related it to a similar experience. This shows a linear physiological growth pattern which is impressive for someone turning 30. (I mean that as a compliment since most brain growth and intra-neural processing peaks around 23).
I myself am not far behind in age myself so I don't really qualify as from the "Matrix Generation" but I can appreciate the feelings it evoked and imprinted in others. Personally, I thing the movie, "Say Anything" has had more do imprint my reality tunnel. oh well
the point of this post, aside from pretentious egoism, was ask ourselves if we are truly enjoying more than the crumbs of life, spiritual or whatever. Are we "taking" what we need? I look around and see many people who appear comfortably in consumerism, they can identify the price of everything and see everything by its attached price tag. I see others who don't.
I am of course questioning my own reality. Not so much as I approach 30, but as the dictates of my life change around this age. things like my wife and her happiness, owning a home, having a garden, raising some children take on a greater degree of importance. In some ways the questions about reality have become harder. When your 18 you're supposed to question everything around you, but at 28......
If you do labels can become attached. Labels like lunatic, crazy, troublemaker, peter pan syndrome, matrix fanatic . These labels serve no purpose but to comfort the giver.
On the other hand other labels appear like, father and husband, citizen or anarchist. These labels carry a harder burden for me now. Perhaps this is the way and there can be no other. Perhaps not. I am finding integration to be the most difficult reality tunnel to enlarge right now.
These are the answers provided for now.

Voice Of Doom, in my opinion you will be a better person if you keep questioning vapid materialistic culture into your 30s and 40s and 50s and 60s and 70s.

It will not make you very popular if you travel in, say, business circles where the favourite discussion topics are houses, cars, boats, holiday homes, private schooling for kids, golf, sports, stainless steel kitchens and gadgets, but you will be a better person for it.

Looks like Harry Potter hit Puberty

Originally posted by Voice_of Doom
Still debating the crumbs of spiritual life???

There is real power available. Not given, but taken... by you.
Show yourselves waking wizards and witches. The world of the TV will be ending soon and you will be able to have the life you've envisioned from early childhood.

More answers to come.

Well, when I want to serve in Hell for being a Satanist I'll let you know buddy!!

[Edited on 27-6-2003 by Tyriffic]