needs_wants_requirements tender square “a NEED is that which is absolutely necessary to continue dwelling within the human experience—like food, water, oxygen and so on. “a WANT is that which we seek to make us feel better about the uncomfortable condition of our imprinting. the intent of wanting is to diminish our awareness of the discomfort that arises from our charged emotion by sedating or controlling it. because the causal point of this behavior is discomfort, the inevitable outcome is also discomfort. “a REQUIREMENT is identifiable in that it’s ‘what happens.’ requirements are given whether we want them or not. they are all the aspects of our experience brought into play by Presence and intended to facilitate personal evolution. a requirement is seldom an experience we want, but when we respond to it, the consequence is personal growth. “when we are driven by our unconscious definition of love, we are only interested in wants. because of this, we manipulate everything to get what it is we assume we want. but no matter how many of the objects of our wants we acquire, they are never enough. out unconscious definition of love, since it’s by nature CONDITIONAL, can never bring about the unconditional experience we seek—therefore it deprives us of ever feeling ‘we are enough.’ only the resonance of ‘being unconditional’ is able to initiate the experience of ‘enough.’ “as long as we are manipulating our experience, it’s challenging for us to respond maturely to our needs, and it’s almost impossible for us to greatly receive what’s required. what’s required appears to continually interfere with us getting what we want! “by integrating our unconscious definition of love, we are able to discern between our needs, wants, and requirements—and to respond accordingly. only when we are able to identify our ‘needs’ as the primary nutrition for our body, and ‘requirements’ as the primary nutrition for our soul development, we are able to cease manipulating our experience. “it’s only then that we recognize manipulation as ATTEMPTING TO TURN WHAT’S ALREADY HAPPENING INTO SOMETHING ELSE. the intent ‘to be with WHAT IS without condition’ integrates manipulative behavior by revealing the imprinted charge that drives it… “here is an important realization to digest: our wanting, which is driven by our unintegrated emotional charge, leads us to believe that what we seek in order to feel satisfied is something solid and tangible…but it isn’t. it’s never the ‘thing’ that we are really after, but the RESONANCE ASSOCIATED WITH POSSESSING THE THING. “we therefore ask ourselves: ‘what is the resonance associated with having what i want?’ then, instead of chasing this thing, we give ourselves this resonance by feeling it NOW. we feel this resonance without condition. “we perform this exercise whenever we realize we are again entering the experience of wanting. learning how to feed ourselves the resonances we are seeking through our endless wanting gradually diminishes our ‘getting by taking’ mentality. “instead of attempting to get whatever we feel is missing in our experience by taking from others, if we first give it to ourselves unconditionally by feeling the resonance associated with it, our sense of lack noticeably decreases. lack is a resonance that arises from not having the capacity to feed ourselves emotionally… “once we are able to feed ourselves the emotional resonance we associate with [love], we are able interact with others in a way that empowers them to feel [love] without placing any conditions on our intent to do so. “then the magic really happens! “by feeding others this resonance, treating them with [love] without placing any conditions on them, we awaken to another powerful realization—THAT GIVING UNCONDITIONALLY IS RECEIVING.” —michael brown, “the presence process: a journey into present moment awareness,” pgs. 216–217, 219–220 210911 ... unhinged when i was rather young my father taught me the difference from need and want in a way that infuriated me but i now find hilarious. i would find a toy or a more likely a book that i wanted and i would run up to him 'dad dad, look what i found! i NEED this!' raising four kids on a firefighters salary he would just laugh at me 'you don't NEED that. you want it. there's a difference.' my lower lip would jut out and i might start to argue and then he would inevitably start singing the chorus of that rolling stones song to cover up my whining 'you can't always get what you want...you can't always get what you want...but if you try sometimes you get what you need' and i knew the conversation was over. that lesson has served me pretty well as an adult though, helps me keep my spending in check when i might otherwise spend a stupid amount of money on things i don't really need to comfort myself. i am allergic to manipulation especially in romantic relationships. it causes my stubborn streak to dig in, to even fight with others. my shambhala_training and studying was really like a vajra_bolt to the heart mind when i read trungpa rinpoche's book on dharma art. pure perception before concepts...what does that look like in terms of human relationships? it means truly seeing the other person and not projecting all your needs and wants and narratives onto them. the storytelling i do as a depressive writer keeps me distanced from others and makes a whole toxic mental stew i like to soak in instead of seeing the other person as a suffering being probably lost in their own misery like most of us are, the best beings for me to practice compassion with/for if i'm truly practicing my path. after all, tonglen starts with the ones we love precisely because they are the easiest beings for us to extend our compassion to. listening goes a long way 210912 ... tender square what was it that lacan said, “love is giving something that you don’t have to someone who doesn’t want it”? projections can be complex and messy things. i’m reminded of an episode of “this jungian life” that i listened to a few weeks ago where the analysts dug into this topic. there were some takeaways i hadn’t previously considered before, namely, that projection is a natural process that we all participate in, and second, what we’re projecting on the other person is something that is actually within us and needs to be acknowledged or activated. so, for instance, when we project negative qualities on someone who rubs us the wrong way, say selfishness, some of that may stem from issues we have of accepting our own selfishness, of realizing that we have flaws too. when we project positive qualities on someone we have romantic feelings for, say kindness, we’re actually looking to bring that characteristic out from our unconscious and incorporate it into our conscious living. i am trying to work through a whole mess of projections right now. that’s why i started my indiscriminate thread—where are the times that i have projected outward and when are the times that i have been projected on? i am realizing that the times that i’ve been projected on have produced a flattening effect on me, like i’m not being seen for my full humanity by that other person, as you’ve mentioned here unhinged. and i don’t want to do that to others. as i wrote in i’m_not_sleeping yesterday, i clearly have some history with an orpheus archetype that i’m processing. i’ve also got an animus projection (which means ‘spirit’ in jungian terms) that i’m getting my hands messy with, hence all my sexy spirit poems as of late (delicate, stand_with_me_at_the_site_of_longing), because i’m working to bring about an inner harmony. but this shit is tough! thank you for reminding me about that breathing exercise in tonglen! i had read about it in pema chodron’s “living beautifully” (she studied under trungpa) and i need to start using it again in my practice. 210912 ... unhinged oh i wasn't fingerpointing about projections! i also do a lot of projecting especially when i'm angry. and i tell myself all kinds of stories to keep myself angry. i'm better at catching and disrupting myself when i'm doing that now though. i first encountered tonglen through a different tibetan teacher sogyal rinpoche. i know pema but prefer trungpa rinpoche. the midwesterner, german in me appreciates his blunt directness over her gentleness. but when i feel extra shitty, reading some pema chodron feels like a hug. 210912 what's it to you? who go blather from