> Chade newsguy.com> writes:

>> On 3 Aug, 22:05, monkeym...@hactrn.ch (Monkey Mind) wrote:

>
>

>>> Practicing to read and write changed you from someone who couldn't
>>> read or write to someone who can. It didn't change the form of the
>>> letters you see through your eyes, of course. The words were already
>>> there before you learned to read them. You could already see them. But
>>> your school teachers didn't tell you, "the words are already there,
>>> you don't have to do anything about them", because while true, it
>>> wouldn't have helped you to read them.

>

>>> Now my little daughter is learning to read, and it's *hard* *work* for
>>> her. And sometimes, she tries to cheat when reading: she remembers a
>>> sentence from before, and points at the words, saying them, but
>>> one-off because she missed a word or remembers incorrectly. Just like
>>> many members of the "nothing to achieve"-crowd repeating after their
>>> teachers, but one-off, because they can't be bothered to do their
>>> homework.

>

>> I think meditating should simply be viewed as an end in it's self. I
>> meditate because I meditate. If you treat meditation as work to try to
>> achieve something, such as enlightenment, you are imposing your flawed
>> expectations on the experience, distorting it, rather than
>> experiencing it directly.

>
> I think I see what you mean, but there have been more sophisticated
> "personal development" models even in the Buddha's time, for example
> the "four bases of success/power", the iddhipada.
>

>> BTW I warn you now, Florain, any tricky questions will be thrown over
>> to alt.magick. ;)

>
> Ok, here's a tough one: "How do you spell 'Florian'?"
>