Love this quote.

Intuition? With all respect, bosh! Then it was intuition that led Darwin to work out the hypothesis of natural selection. Then it was intuition that fabricated the gigantically complex score of "Die Walkure." Then it was intuition that convinced Columbus of the existence of land to the west of the Azores. All this intuition of
which so much transcendental rubbish is merchanted is no more and no less than intelligence--intelligence so keen that it can penetrate to the hidden truth through the most formidable wrappings of false semblance and demeanour, and so little corrupted by sentimental prudery that it is equal to the even more difficult task of hauling that truth out into the light, in all its naked hideousness. Women decide
the larger questions of life correctly and quickly, not because they are lucky guessers, not because they are divinely inspired, not because they practise a magic inherited from savagery, but simply and solely because they have sense. They see at a glance what most men could not see with searchlights and telescopes; they are at grips with the essentials of a problem before men have finished debating its mere externals. They are the supreme realists of the race.
Apparently illogical, they are the possessors of a rare and subtle super-logic. Apparently whimsical, they hang to the truth with a tenacity which carries them through every phase of its incessant, jellylike shifting of form. Apparently unobservant and easily deceived, they see with bright and horrible eyes. In men, too, the same merciless perspicacity sometimes shows itself--men recognized
to be more aloof and uninflammable than the general--men of special talent for the logical--sardonic men, cynics. Men, too, sometimes have brains. But that is a rare, rare man, I venture, who is as steadily intelligent, as constantly sound in judgment, as little put off by appearances, as the average women of forty-eight.

--H.L. Mencken (1880-1956)

Nice quote.

I really think women at the age of 48 have all the insight but none of the advantages here in life. Especially the single ones. They experience themselves being forced to look for a soulmate among immature and rigid men at the same age, or find themselves stepping aside to let men their own age marry women half their age.

Tough

h

So the point of this quote is basically that one exceptional guy out of a million or so is brilliant enough to match woman's inherent genius? I'll have to think about that one. Will be hard though since me just average stoopid man.

The idea is not to try to match the woman. No man can ever 'match' the woman. (Dirk Oellibrandt really has this down to a fine art.. explaining this to men and getting them to laugh at their own resentment at the wonder of the feminine).

If you can "meet" a woman on this level with respect and love, and be in your maleness with all that has to offer, you will be doing what is needed for the feminine to flourish, and for the masculine to feel rooted and deeply in honour of itself.

Still kungfused. No man can ever "match" a woman at what?

Let's complete the following sentence as specifically as possible:

In my opinion, humans born in male form cannot match humans born in female form at _______________.

I'll go first. Off the top of my head, and perhaps the most obvious:

In my opinion, humans born in male form cannot match humans born in female form at getting pregnant and giving physical birth to a child, given the confines of our present level of technology.

Sean.

I used the word "match" in response to your use of it in your previous post.

I was not speaking of actions, when I answered. The OP was about feminine wisdom, I think. About the feminine way of perceiving.

[/QUOTE]
Women decide
the larger questions of life correctly and quickly, not because they are lucky guessers, not because they are divinely inspired, not because they practise a magic inherited from savagery, but simply and solely because they have sense. They see at a glance what most men could not see with searchlights and telescopes; they are at grips with the essentials of a problem before men have finished debating its mere externals. [QUOTE]

I didn't post that quote to try to diss men, though I do see how it could be taken that way. Sean and others are probably aware of my sort of old-fashioned views on men and women's roles, I unapologetically believe that women are better at nurturing. Can men nurture? Yup, if they have to. But not as well. And same with men as protectors. And I know some people would disagree with this. That's fine.

(I also believe that gender is in the soul, not the chromosomes, and in fact like I mentioned briefly on another list I'm on they are trying to decide whether or not transwomen would be welcome, and I can't believe it's even an issue.)

Whatever..I can totally beat any woman at grappling, videogames and comic book knowledge.

*point of thread flies miles above head

Lozen, it didnt sound like it was dissing men. It sounded like it was in praise of the feminine.

I bet Molly Helsel would kick yr ass.

I'm kidding, I'm kidding! Not. Okay, just kidding!
Not

KIDDING!

I would LET Kyra Gracie kick my ass.

Ok..she would probably kick my ass anyway she just got her black belt.

Hot chick that can grapple= My future wife.

LOL, not much of a criteria there.

Anyways, I prefer Erica Montoya and Debbie Purcell.

But still, you did respond "No man can ever 'match' the woman." I'm not trying to be inflammatory or argumentative here, I'm just genuinely curious what you mean by this. In what ways do you think women are intrinsically superior to men? Or even just statistically superior.


No offense taken Lozen. It's an interesting subject. I think the quote, like anything I guess, can be taken on different levels. In some ways it's an inspirational quote in praise of a common aspect of feminine intelligence and natural groundedness. In another sense it reads like remnants of the worst of Victorianism that subjugated women by putting them up on pedestal of impossible ideals. (It's called "topping from the bottom" in BDSM circles. It's interesting a man wrote this quote.) IMO women are just not intrinsically more in possession of some deeper, mysterious access to wisdom in general, then men are. I think we all know plenty of genuinely vacant women. And walking around thinking "Hmmm... all this girl seems to care about is getting drunk, and laid and then going shopping ... but on second thought, she is a women and not a man so she is probably actually really deep and grounded and initiated into the mysteries of Earth", is just going to put you out of touch.


Ahhh... see, I believe we are androgynous souls having a human experience which gender is just one aspect of. Interesting you bring up transsexualism. Gender dysphoria, in the case of let's say a male to female transsexual IMO occurs when the psyche is so strongly identified with the feminine aspect of the adrogynous soul, that the man feels he was born into the wrong gender. I'm not saying it's a choice, necessarily, just that this strong identification has arisen in this birth. In the context of spiritual enlightenment, I think one of the causes of suffering are these strong identifications that we cannot see for what they are (empty). The heart of the spiritual path IMO is set on loosening the grip of these ego-identity attachments of "I am a woman. I am black. I am American. I am better than. I am right. etc. etc." and this is done through a combination of external and internal alchemy that is up to each person. For some people it might be through joining a monastery, renouncing all personal desire, and meditating all day. For other's it might mean having a sex change they feel is their destiny, and meditating every day. etc. etc.

Anyway, I'm strongly for getting over the the overly gender-based ego-identity because I think it's particularly destructive. We actually touched on this when I was taking you to the airport, when I said I think it's sad when a woman builds her entire identity around "I am a woman" ... This was another super-rushed lunch break at work post, so I apologize if it's incoherent.

Sean.

Sean,

reminds me of something the late Phillip Kapleau Roshi wrote in one of his books I read years ago.

He was giving a lecture on zen and someone asked " I am Jewish, can I be Jewish and become enlightened?"

He said no as long as you have this attachment of being jewish you will never be enlightened.

I don't think he was implying one should trash one's inherent identity..whether it is being a Jew, a catholic, a Man or Woman or whatever..but Enlightenment from the Zen perspective is basically dropping the idea of a seperate self that stands in contrast to the rest of the universe . So from this perspective, any kind of egoic views that reinforce the strong sense of seperation from others " I AM A JEW", " I AM BLACK", etc..is contrary to the path..

Not saying this is right or wrong, truth or falsehood but one teachers perspective on the matter shared by one tradition(though probably many traditions).

Agree with or piss on it as you like..

Interesting, I was just reading something Natalie Goldberg wrote on how the more she sits zazen, the more Jewish she feels. Her teacher at the time, I believe it was Katagiri Roshi told her that made perfect sense. By sitting, you are becoming more of what you already are.

I have some pretty strong feelings on this so I'll write more once I have it more sorted.

I don't want to seem one sided so to add a bit to that...

I studied Zen with 2 female zen teachers that illucidated on Dharma in a way very unique and differently from men. So, definetly woman can come forth with there own unique expressions and point of views that men would not.

For example, many men tend to be competitive and testosteroe driven and this shows up somehow or another no matter how spiritual they say they are while woman may inherently have no desire to compete with others and thus probably can get the dharma easier.

Not saying all woman have no competitive drive I know woman that are at least as Yang, competitive and driven as men just the more yin, less edgy type female is the one that tends to be drawn to enlightenment practices.

But come to think of it I met a couple pretty agressive woman in zen and a HT workshop to so when you get down to it I think this debate is mute.

Probably thousands of years ago it was more cut and dry but these days you can find every type of variety of personality and Yin or yang traits(I would call intuition Yin and Intellect yang) so you can't label the wide generalization of " man" and "woman" and excpect it to be as defined.

Most of the said male/female differences are probably hormonal and not spiritual as sean said .My guess is if you pumped a woman up with enough testosteroe she would begin exhibiting more male charactersics and if you started giving a man more estrogen more female charactersitics.

Not that you should do that but the way medical science is these days you could be whatever the fuck you want if you wanted too bad enough.

That's interesting too. But that implies that there is something inherently " Jewish" about a Jewish person. Jewish people go back pretty deep and if anyone has experienced a strong sense of seperation resulting is suffering it is Arabs and Jews.

NOT saying it is there fault before you burst a blood vessel in your head

I come from a totally mixed family. I have people from the middle east mixed with english/ Irish...and potentially a little Jewish we don't know for sure..so I see myself as a mixture of all these things and ultimatly a mixture of EVERYTHING. I like most cultures and don't feel a strong overwheling pull towards one or the other.

But I know many people have this strong sense of identity that comes from there heritage and, personally, I don't have a problem with it.

Obviously the problem arises when you devleop this hatred towards another race like Jews have with the rest of the middle east which is based on this idea of 2 brothers from different mothers fighting with eachother and then carrying that fighting through anscestors for thousands of years.

I think that type of ego attachment is insane and alot of what the world has to resolve right now for there to be a better future.

Ok, I feel compelled to get a little deeper into this so let's go...

what constitutes someone being anything? What makes a person Russian? Do you know scientists have done tests and every human beings chromosomes or whatever you call them are like 99.9% the same. The difference between one human and another from a cellular level is practically nonexistant.

Insert for educational purpouses....How Much Genetic Variation Exists Among Humans?
Homo sapiens is a relatively young species and has not had as much time to accumulate genetic variation as have the vast majority of species on earth, most of which predate humans by enormous expanses of time. Nonetheless, there is considerable genetic variation in our species. The human genome comprises about 3 x 109 base pairs of DNA, and the extent of human genetic variation is such that no two humans, save identical twins, ever have been or will be genetically identical. Between any two humans, the amount of genetic variation—biochemical individuality—is about 0.1 percent. This means that about one base pair out of every 1,000 will be different between any two individuals. Any two (diploid) people have about 6 x 106 base pairs that are different, an important reason for the development of automated procedures to analyze genetic variation.


Ok, then..

So, what we are talking about when we start to carve up humanity into these long standing groups and tribes is we are talking about a big group of people who got together a long time ago and lived in the same area and started having sex and over thousands of years they started sharing similar physical charactersisitcs.

This is not any kind of inherent permanent thing..it is very transitory in the large scheme of things.

if America lasts 10,000 years(doubtful the way things are going but there is always hope) you will see all these change into something else. The Whites and the hispanics and the Eauros and every type of person on the planet that came here will have created a different looking person that is still like 99% the same as everyone else.

So what else is it that makes someone inheretly different? A tradition? a Language? A religion?

ALL of these things are man made AGGREGATES. They change OVER AND OVER. They will look as differntly to future humans as the Greek worship of the thunder God Zeus and other Gods looks to us modern humans.

There is nothing permanent or trully differnt between anyone .To carry such ideas is an attachment to a small, impermanet aspect of yourself.

No prblem with it..but when you start affirming you think that there is something really, really real about that..I would have to disagree with that view.

And if everyone understood that you could be an Italian or a Greek or a Egyptian or a new yorker or a southerner of a Canadian or a whatever the fuck but realize ULTIMATELY it is an illusuon. And your missing the big picture..which is your EVERYTHING. It condenses into a small refernce point so you can experience shit but when you get lost in the refence point and take that to be the really real your putting a limit on yourself IMO.

Most likely 90% of the world disagrees with this and oh fucking well..

Cameron, the idea that being Jewish is inherently about hating Palestinians frankly is ridiculous. I find your statement that Jews develop hatred toward the rest of the Middle East one-sided at best. Israel is fighting for their very existence. They are surrounded by enemies that are sworn to annihilating them. They understand the gravity of their situation.

As far as identity as attachment, well I do agree that at some point a common truth can be found between all people that goes beyond gender identity, race, etc. And I can certainly see the value of stepping outside of one's identity box and trying to relate to someone as a human being, instead of "I'm a New Yorker" or a businessman or a mother or soldier or whatever. And of course I think we have soul identities that go beyond this lifetime, that are influenced by more than the particular gender, race and body this soul has manifested in (not to mention external influences based on it.) BUT at the same time I think throwing away identity (if it were even possible) is a bad idea. The way tht I perceive and experience this world is based on my identity. It colors everything about us and you can't really entirely get rid of it. You ARE it. Not to mention that I don't necessarily agree with the premise that identity is attachment or that attachment causes suffering! In my life, more suffering has been caused by trying to deny or hide my identity.

As far as men and women, well gosh I see this as pretty clear cut. I always go to women for nurturing and healing. I don't seek out men for that, I seek out men for protection and respite. They are better at it. Of course there are exceptions and I know men that nurture fairly well, but it's different... and I know women who can kick ass and take names, but the quality of it is different. I'm sure most people reading this will disagree, but I think equality is illusionary at best. Nobody ever said life was fair or easy. I feel like denying my role as a woman takes me off track. And yeah I do believe women are more intuitive than men, for a wide variety of reasons--one being the inherent cycles in our bodies due to menstruation, along with other things, chemicals, the way our brain works (again scientifically proven) hell they even did some studies I read about that indicated that women do not get fight/flight reactions as often as men do, because they get another reaction--which is to discuss their problems with other women. This isn't something I had to read a study about to believe in, I just always knew.

Of course there are women that are vacant, but I'm thinking of my old friend's exgirlfriend who was a model...hated reading, would walk out of the room when her boyfriend and I would talk politics, philosophy, etc. Still she had this uncanny ability to tell when a situation or person was in trouble, could sense what people were like very easily, etc. Obviously I don't know what it's like to be a man, but I know when we get all women together, the energy is different, we relate to one another on an intuitive/perceptual level differently than I relate to men. I think I read some kind of article-very scientific, so you would like it Sean , that discussed women being able to feel a wider variety of emotion than men, they feel things much more deeply. This is why I like being around men that can make quick decisions. I think men are better at making decisions, they can make the damn decision while I am still vacillating between emotional extremes. I'm certainly not trying to deny men the opportunity of experiencing ridiculously strong emotions, I just don't think it comes as naturally to them. You see this play out amongst teenage couples, even, girls will say their boyfriends are "distant" (read: able to make quick detached decisions) and boys will say their girlfriends are "moody" (read: vacillating between emotional extremes). I have found in my life that it makes a lot of sense to tap into what it means for me to be a woman rather than trying to deny it and pretend that it's not there and try to be androgynous.

So when I train in martial arts, I am training as a woman, keeping in mind my center is different than a man's, I will execute the moves differently (usu. more fluidly) and even when it is filled with strength, the strength has a different tone to it. In fact one of the things I like about TCM and qi gong is that it acknowledges the difference between men and women--the exercises are different in qi gong, which hand you put on top, etc...and TCM deals specifically with physical/energetic issues that women experience, and realize that yin and yang manifest differently in men than they do in women. And of course TCM has a huge myriad of dysfunctions that can apply to different people and express themselves differently in individuals, whether they are men or women.

I hardly think that perceiving myself or identifying as a woman is an ego attachment or is causing destruction int he world. It works for me. It is what helps me keep my head on straight and figure out how to best serve others, which I really see as the root and heart and purpose of my path.

I am glad you wrote this because I was just about to write that the shit I just wrote is in itself only a half truth. I still think you defiently should value whatever you are .There is a reason we have traditions and obviously you are a man or woman and should respect that and your own uniquness.

I defnietly was not implying ALL jews hate middle easterners. No way was I saying that. I was using that as one(out of probably hundreds of exapmples going on today) of wars and fighting going on becasue of a percieved difference that is BASED ON EGO.

Religion is all Ego .It is MY religion. It is MY GOD.

What are these people really fighting about..nothing..a man made creation..it is a waste of life and hopefully thousands of years from now humanity will look back on us with this same wonder as we look back on the Mayan tribes that would sacrifice people to there " Gods" or Romans who would watch gladitiators kill eachother for entertainment.

That's all.

Cam, I really agree with your perspective, in particular your second to last post. These labels just don't hold up to close inspection on almost every level. Biologically, gender division is just an evolutionary strategy to produce a consistently virile species. (Read The Red Queen amongst probably two dozen other books making the same point.) And race is just a very popular folk myth. There are just not genetic principles behind a claim “I am Jewish” or “I am Middle Eastern”.

On the other hand I do think we are born into the specific details of our apparent form for "a reason". It's not just some horrible mistake we need to "solve" by running to the womb of emptiness and cultivating a blanket aversion to labels. IMHO the Great Work is to find Happiness as True Self dancing in a Celebration within Form. I truly love the wondrous diversity of apparent forms, including the expressions of form found in the various genders that mind distinguishes, ie: male, female, hermaphrodite, MTF/FTM transsexuals, etc., and in the beautiful tendencies of form found in the races we invent through perceived differences in skin tone, face and body structure, birthplace, religion, temperament, language, karmic inheritance, etc.

Quickly, as an aside, it's actually the karmic inheritance that I think is one of the deeper aspects of our form to work through. I really like the way Eckhart Tolle talks about this. From The Power of Now:

The crux of my point though is that the details of arising forms are not The Absolute. Gender, race, physical beauty, health, strength, intelligence, etc., etc.. all the human forms are all just transient labels arising in mind in response to perceived distinctions in the living machine we are interdependent within. Metaphysically we are both 100% form and no-form All arising right Now simultaneously. So as spiritual experience deepens I believe your True identity as your Self is revealed. And this can be expressed a zillion ways, sometimes by simply taking your shoe off, putting it on your head and walking away. Someone else might say "I am becoming more Jewish" or "I am really coming into myself as a man" or "I am becoming more like God" or "I am realizing True Happiness" or "I am becoming empty". How you express your Truth in language is of course only words. I know it's a terribly tired spiritual cliche, but it's the experience beyond the words that is where the pudding’s at. It’s difficult if not impossible to judge a single statement like "I am becoming more Jewish" as indicative of spiritual progress or ignorance. I'm not trying to do that. I just strongly believe that "what we Truly are" is beyond the words we choose to describe It with, even the most deep, subtle concepts we can conjure, ie: God, Emptiness, Tao, Ain Soph, etc.

So, quick summary if you don't feel like reading the whole rant here. I believe labels are, at best, party favors in a celebration of the Diversity of God. But at worst they are rooted in ignorance and are the very fuel for hatred, bigotry and war. So please, live fully as the best Jewish Woman or Middle Eastern Man that you can be. But seek to recognize the face you had before you were born and the one that will remain after the form of your body dies and returns to dust. It's the chance of a lifetime.

Sean.

I was joking around with a friend that we are all basically the same and share this little planet and can't get along . We have spent the better part of known history fighting each other . And maybe the reason Aliens( I have to say Aliens exist just look how big the universe is it's only rational) don't communicate with us openly is because we havent learned to get along with eachother.

Like maybe we have to get to the point where there are no more wars and senseless killing and care more about eachother and figure out how to take care of people and not feed the greed and power.

Then maybe those more advanced beings will be like " Ok, there ready".

Maybe we are the RJ's of the Universe and have been banned from the really high shit because we are just so ignorant.

Or maybe I am wrong and it's just late...

Lozen, just wanted to say I liked your post a lot. (I read it after my post above). I think in a way we are just approaching a truth from different perceptual positions. I am attempting to speak about reality from positions closer to what I am imagine the Absolute to comprise, whereeas you are speaking more pragmatically from the eyes of your accumulated experience as a person.

I do want to comment on one thing though:

Personally, I don't see the qualities of nurturing and protection as being intrinsic to being male and female. This get's into the age long nature vs. nurture of course. But if you think about it, human behavior is mostly running on software these days. Software taught to us by our family and cultural traditions. If you stick a few babies in the woods they are just not even going to survive much less have the male baby grow up in some inborn protective role and the female in a nurturing role. It's been shown over and over in studies that male and female babies are treated drastically different by, for example, babysitters who are misled about the actual gender of the child. I mean just really simple stuff, like the boy is given a toy truck and pushed away to go play with it and the girl is nuzzled and spoken softly to. So of course there are going to be statistical differences in gender, but I think intrinsic distinctions between men and women outside of the physically obvious are a bit more elusive. Sure we have different hardware but you can draw the same picture on a chalkboard that you can in the sand. It's the androgynous mind and soul that are breathe life into the body. So honestly, to my ears, saying "women are more intuitive" hits me the same way as if I heard someone saying "black people can sing and play basketball". Maybe (maybe) it's a useful generalization in some contexts, but I think in the big picture it's just a perceptual limitation.

Sean.

Ok, I'm gonna take a horribly male approach to analysing this debate. What I'm about to say is just one way of seeing this, it is not "the truth" or anything like it, it's just a different take on the debate.

In Cybernetics people deal with 'systems', specifically comunication systems, you can break down anything into a system (just like breaking down the way rabits multiply into a mthematical formula - that's how the fibonacci sequence came about btw). So for the purpose of this little logical game lets apply Cybernetics theories to some of the stuff that's being discussed here.

Firstly: "I am Jewish", "I am Muslim", "I am a woman", "Women are wise", "Men are protective", "The grass is green".... What's going on liguistically with each of those statements?... In Cybernetics, you always think in terms of structure and context rather than content... so with each of these statements we have this structure: "a is b", this is also known as 'complex equivalence' in linguistics. The overall context of these statements is what we call "Reality", but in "reality" we never have complex equivelences... so if we comunicate about reality in a structure that is completely different to this 'reality' we're going to run into problems.

So why do i think that this structure (a is doesn't exist in reality? well I think Lozen has laready answered that:


A is B was devised by Aristotle a while back - he thought that everything we observe has it's own individual 'essense'... So green grass has the essence of 'greeness' . and a twig 3 inches in length has this length as it's identity - its length exists as an objective property. The problem with Aristotle is that he's long dead, but his theories still permeate our language and the way we, westerners think. The fact is that length does not exist independently from someone measuring it (and if it was traveling very fast in a spaceship, and we measured it from here, it would actually measure smaller ) Green is only 'green' because the light that bounces off the surface and enters our unique eyes registers as that colour - a snake might see it like a light vapour of heat... Our individuality means that the things we percieve must go through our filters - but our filters are hugely limited.

So when we make a statement such as "John is stupid" that's an Aristotalian statement - John somehow contains the essence of stupidness that is completely objective and is obvious to anyone. In actuality, John might go home to his young child who sees him as an all-knowing genius. So when you use "a is b" structured statements you tend to leave yourself out of the equation (in "reality" you are always part of the equation - otherwise you would not be able to experience reality).

So that's problem number 1: "a is b" type statements assume an objective reality - an objective reality does not exist (if it so happens that you found it, please drop me a line .

The second problem is to do with words as labels:



because there is no objective reality, a word cannot have an objective meaning. when you say "women are nurturing", appart from the initial "a is b" problem - we also have a problem with the extremely loaded word "nurturing". Every person has their own experience of 'nurturing' and my experience may not be the same as yours, and even though you can look up the word in a dictionary and find the definition - you still use the word to describe experience - and experience cannot totaly be described in words.

So what can you do to improve the system and structure of these. Well firstly you need to be much more specific and grounded (experiential) in your language. Since, in all our modern wisdom, we still havent built any Jewishness meters or Nurturingness meters, or Stupidity meters; you need to give specific examples that you have experienced to clearly structure your statements. So going back to "John is stupid" you could instead say "I saw John carlessly spill coffee all over his computer today" - that in itself overcomes both of the problems. Not only does it make it easier to comunicate more exactly using these experiential statements, but it also saves you from cursing john with this label - (which in turn curses you, since you stop thinking - because you know all there is to know about John) - Also say if the statement was "I am stupid"... and you changed it as above... any benefits?

So arguing whether a is b or is c or maybe d, just keeps you in this loop of sillyness... stop and consider what you're trying to say... rewrite it from "a is b" structure into "I experienced a demonstrating b on such and such date" and see if it helps. Stop using the "is of identity" - reformulate your statement without the word "is" and include yourself in the assesment...

anyway - i hope at least some of this makes sense - I wrote my whole dissertation about this kind of thing... and also without using a single version of the verb "to be"... it was hard to say the least - but it made me evaluate my preconseptions in a different light... I learnt hell of a lot from that.

Cool post freeform. Your latter point is exactly why I found the patterns in Structure of Magic so profound.

Person A: Men are protective
Person B: What are men protective of?
A: Men are protective of women.
B: All men are protective of all women?
A: Uhh, well, no not really I guess.
B: Which men are protective of who or what?
A: Well ... John in my math class is protective.
B: Who or what is John protective of?
A: John is protective of me.
B: How is John protective of you?
A: Well ... when Tim says mean comments to me, John sticks up for me.
B: How does John stick up for you?

etc..

Through this process, the distorted generalizations of your surface structure connect with the actual visceral experience of your deep structure and beyond. Then I think you can't help but be humbled by how ridiculous it is to try to take the data from your perceptions as one single person in one single context and extrapolate sweeping judgements about entire genders, races, countries, etc. Giant beliefs like "women are emotional", "men are selfish", blah blah blah ad nauseum are rarely based around a quantitative study outside your own experience with maybe a few hundred people in your own country, in your own neighborhood, in your own family. Which is fine. We need labels to communicate and generalizations help simplify our life. But it's important to see things for what they are. Generalizations are just confessions of your personal experiences and the way you've organized them into filters. They are not an actual insight into the inherent properties of reality IMO.

Sean.

Lol, I read an article once about a boy who was given a Barbie doll once, and he turned it into a toy gun.

Speaking from my own experience, my "perceptual limitation" of what it means to be a woman has pretty much changed my life in a very positive way, which is what really matters to me. So I suppose we will just have to agree to disagree.

Your post got my synapsis working overtime freeform - thanks!
This is especially so with ineffable states beyond language. Charles Tart argues that even though spiritual states are incommunicable to those who haven't experienced them they are objective and readily communicable to others who have experienced them. He calls this state dependent communication where in a sense spiritual traditions become state dependent sciences just as objective and communicable as conventionally recognised sciences.

How's this for "Life's a bitch and then you marry one" in E-Prime?
'Life appears to me to exhibit qualities that I experience in females who on many occasions seem to treat others with contempt. I am also married to a female who on many occasions seems to treats me with contempt'. Right according to the Tibetan calender today is the 25th day of the lunar month, the day when the divine feminine energies are honoured and celebrated so I'm off to do just that (thought I'd better throw that one in in case I'm mistaken for a misogynist!).

I'm saying be a woman. Be a woman to the fullest. But be more also. Because You .... YOU are not just a human in female form crawling around on the land mass of a planet.

Sean

sean, I am not asserting that women are intrinsically superior. I am speaking not from a cultural point of view, but from a taoist point of view.


QUOTE s from Lao Tzu -

Having no name, it is the Originator of heaven and earth; having a name, it is the Mother of all things.

The Tao is (like) the emptiness of a vessel; and in our employment of it we must be on our guard against all fullness. How deep and unfathomable it is, as if it were the Honored Ancestor of all things!

The spirit of the valley dies not, but remains the same;

Thus we name it the mysterious female.

Its gate is called the root from which grew heaven and earth.

Long and unbroken does its power remain,

Used gently, it will never be exhausted.

END QUOTE.

I'm sure you are well familiar with these concepts.

Yes I am familiar with them and therefore know they have nothing to do with women or this topic or your original assertion that "men cannot match women" which I'm still very curious for you to clarify.

Sean.

"Men are analytical."
(I just had to say that.)

Quite obviously, it seems to me, could be talking about the bedroom arts.

The attitude that's coming forth is really (can't find the right adjective),.. well, I appreciate it. There has to be some basic, deep, acknowledgement respect honor basic to healthy gender relations that the above quote surely is expressing.

(I hesitate to bring this back to a martial metaphor, because the statement diffuses the "battle of the sexes" so well, but..)
This seems very much like internal martial arts' push-hands. There's always a deep consciousness of one's own center and root, and an unwillingness to stray from that, that allows you to give what you can (actually more effectively than if you try to over-extend) and yet be respectful and aware of your own limits. And, actually, push-hands works most effectively if there is no 'battle', only attention to such conscious integration. That is, if you abandon your own root, there is more effort and you have less to give to your partner. But, if you are unshakably centered in your own root and at the same time are sensitive to your partner, then there is really very little effort and, ironically, you give a lot more.

btw, welcome to the board.

Trunk

Thankyou Trunk, for your welcome and your understanding of what I said. The bedroom arts, yes. Those arts are the essence of what is going on between man and woman all the time, in some essential way, I think. The mutual need to interact and balance one another out.

Sean, I think we are simply on different pages re what things mean, and if those quotes seem to you to have nothing to do with the nature of woman, then we can agree to differ.

Cat,
In lieu of starting the Cat appreciation thread, I just want to say I love your posts and your writing is a breathe of fresh air. Thanks!!
Lozen

Ok. Briefly though, I think it's very common for writers to anthropomorphize abstract principles into human and animal forms. It doesn't mean you are going to try to penetrate the mysteries of a lamb's nature by reading Christian poetry with a literal mindset.

Even in respect to sex, it's all about perspective. Here are two quotes taken from different Yogani lectures (my latest teacher) and I agree with both of them:

"It is the man who holds the keys to tantric sex, for it is he who experiences the greatest loss of prana during orgasm. Because of this, it is also he who determines the duration of the sexual joining, and, therefore, the extent of cultivation of sexual energy that can occur during lovemaking. While a woman may be filled with bhakti to bring sexual energy higher and higher in herself and her partner, it is the man's bhakti that will determine to what extent this can be accomplished in sexual union."

"Everyone knows that the woman is superior to the man in the sex act, and in other things as well. Nature has built her to be biologically superior in sexual relations. The survival of the human race depends on it. She will have the semen no matter what. She does not even have to try. Her beauty calls the semen from the man on sight. Her curves, her lips, her eyes, all call the semen out."

So who's on top?

Sean.

I feel the same way. The community has needed more women, really glad to have you here. Your timing is good. More toward healthy balance.

Yes, I am being a terrible host. Arguing with people before I even say hello. Please accept a warm welcome from me, cat! I apologize if I am coming off rudely. It's this aggressive man suit I have to wear this whole lifetime ... it makes me act out.

Cheers,
Sean.

sean. and others. thankyou for your welcome. I love it that you welcome me, and I am pleased to meet you.


I am not intellectually naieve and I am not anthrophomorphising abstract priciples. On the contrary I would say that you are creating divisions, with that thought, where there are none. If the dao is feminine and a woman is in deep contact with the dao then she IS the dao. She IS the earth. She IS lunar. She IS the mysterious female. It can pass through her and she can embody it.


Imagining the tao te ching to be about abstractions is .... amusing! we are working here to be aware of ourself as fragments of cosmic energy, arent we.. we are fragments of the dao, looking to merge with it, arent we? we feel it in our meditation, I think.

By the Way.... sean, you dont know me, so I will just tell you, I LOVE men, as well as being a woman. I have absolutely no axe to grind.

I would add "IMHO", if it were so.... but what I say here is not my opinion. It's deeper than that by far.
Maybe the Jungian texts on anima and animus would interest you, with their definition of the ineffable elusiveness of the feminine, which has it's sacred space which no man is allowed to enter uninvited.( and of course when he barges in he meets the kali like wrath of the woman and retreats wounded and amazed...) and it's description of the logos principle which is essentially male. It is soul(female) and spirit(male). They dont match each other. But if soul and spirit should meet................

Hey, waitaminute! I thought you said we were just going to have to agree to disagree? Which is it? You women sure are mysterious with your intentions!

Cat, by "abstract principles" I just mean the deeper Truths that we, as individuals, have not realized yet. Our intuitions that these higher Truths exist is why we seek spiritual teachers and teachings to begin with, otherwise we’d all just be resting in the Bliss of how simple it all is. And spiritual teachers and their teachings tend to be full of unique language patterns and metaphors that are, almost by definition, hard to make clear, logical sense of, or to interpret literally. From the perspective of enlightenment I imagine these concepts are not abstract at all, so I agree with you. From the “enlightenment perspective” they are probably perceived as completely obvious facets of nature. But from my vantage point, as someone who has not realized enlightenment, I find them very abstract and not intended to be taken literally. They are “fingers pointing at the moon” as they say.

Since you don’t know me either, I do want to say, quickly, that I am not nearly as arrogant as my writing tone might suggest. In person I am quite humble and even on the shy, self-conscious side (I believe Lozen can confirm this, as we’ve hung out before and had a lot of fun together). Intellectually, though, I can be very aggressive because I happen to find it important to weed out illogical beliefs that us spiritual types are often criticized for being lazy about and that I think prevent spiritual science from wider acceptance.

Back to the topic, if you look at the incredibly diverse language the sages have used through history to describe various aspects of God, deeper/higher aspects of reality, metaphysics, cosmology, etc. I think you will find that these sages are merely using the terminology and metaphors that were available in their time and that suited their attempt to describe phenomenon that is often beyond description. So in all honesty I do think it is naïve to read passages from the Tao Te Ching about “the mysterious female” and think the authors were literally referring to you and your physical womanhood as distinct from a man. This is along the same lines as the mistake external alchemists make in interpreting “immortality” as referring to the physical body literally living forever and the same mistake the Western alchemists make when they try to literally turn lead into gold, etc.

We are all within the womb of the "mysterious female", you no more so than I. The mysterious female is Binah on the Tree of Life. Or perhaps more accurately The Empress on the path between Binah and Chokmah. It's a huge, living, breathing Archetype available to us all. Perhaps this Archetype resonates more profoundly in your body, since it was shaped from the archetypes of life in a female body. But both the Male (Chokmah) and Female (Binah) principles are within us equally. One may be more strongly longed for in response to our need for balance, but this is irregardless of born gender IMO. I believe a male to female transsexual may more strongly long for her Animus, but I'm a crazy California liberal like that.

At one time, at the height of the Hindu caste system, it was believed there were intrinsic properties to the people born into a particular caste. The lower castes cannot do math but they make a mean thousand layer bread. The Brahman class are closer to God but seriously can not dance to hip hop. Stuff like that. Nowadays it’s obvious that these were just self-perpetuated limitations built into the memes of that culture. So I think it’s become extremely obvious that caste-systems are artificial social hierarchies laid over reality and are not actual descriptions of objective human characteristics. And slowly I think people are also realizing that racial stereotypes are not objective properties built into the “genetics” of skin tone. And very slowly I think people are beginning to realize that generalizations about gender are not objective qualities inherent to being born with a penis or a vagina. And I think even more slowly a few rare individuals are beginning to wake up to a realization that none of the details of our physical body, none of it’s success and failure, it’s beauty and ugliness, it’s happiness and sadness, it’s good and evil, it’s thoughts and emotions, etc. ad infinitum … none of these things are intrinsic to our True Nature as untouchable Pure Awareness always behind and inside of every moment.

Sure being black, white, brown, red, yellow or green, having more estrogen or testosterone, having a uterus, a penis, breasts, being skinny, fat, being considered beautiful, ugly, stupid or smart by your community, etc.… any perceived physical difference can be collected and studied to derive probabilities such as how your particular body-mind is likely to develop and react to stimuli, or more complex predictions such as the most likely balance of subjective personality traits, ie: intuition vs. sensation, thought vs. emotion, etc.. I think the trouble happens when these probabilities expand outside of the real-world data they were originally derived from. Then they grow into stereotypes out of proportion with the facts. And they spread through memes among the less critically thinking, crystallizing as unquestioned “folk wisdom” that is so frequently flat out wrong and dangerous, racist, sexist, etc. a single generation later, or even just fifty miles south today. Highly contextual statistics are about as close as you will get to quantifying the mysteries of human nature, or anything for that matter, and even then you are probably only just grazing the most gross physical level.

So back to the original quote Lozen posted. Again, I strongly disagree with the idea that women are somehow intrinsically more mysterious or intuitive or more much of anything than men, and of course vise versa. The terms themselves are so highly subjective and practically immeasurable that it actually makes the debate pretty meaningless. But personally I can think of two girls I know off the top of my head who actually report a stronger reliance on sensory facts (both scientists) and that they actually feel “off balance” when a situation requires levels of intuition that come naturally to me and other men I know. And I know guys who strike me as way more enigmatic than some women I know. So I don't even bother trying to make these overgeneralizations anymore and frankly find them utterly useless. A big part of this is probably from living in the Bay Area where making nice, neat little boxes for male and female traits is just really inapplicable given the incredible diversity of gender expression in this community. And I think as more communities like this one spring up and flourish and as more and more people drop their filters and expectations on how the genders should or will most likely act, a wonderful space is created for authenticity. Which is one of my deepest values.


Cheers,
Sean.

If we are talking about Taoism I don't agree that the mysterious female means simple Yin or just a physical female. From my understanding(which could be incorrect) the mysterious female is referring to the primordial or Early heaven realm which gives birth(Like a Mother) to the ten thousand things.

From the Taoist Alchemy teachings(As taught in HT) you need both the yin and yang to open up Yuan Qi that is supposedly what produces the Immortal Pill in the Kan and Li practices.

from the Buddhist or Zen perspective the dualities of gender, color, race are mostly arbitrary to the realization of Buddha Nature which is not confined to those diferences.

at the same time, as Lozen said, you appreciate the relative point of view that your a female(or whatever) just realize there is more to yourself than that(or don't).

http://www.nd.edu/~ehalton/Maleanfemale.html

Yeah, I can confirm that Sean is on the shy and self-conscious side in person, and really nice too, and yes we had a lot of fun when we hung out. But honestly Sean your writing style as of late seems more like intellectual bullying than an authentic quest for truth, and I'm having a really hard time understanding where you're coming from.

[QUOTE] I do think it is naïve to read passages from the Tao Te Ching about “the mysterious female” and think the authors were literally referring to you and your physical womanhood as distinct from a man. This is along the same lines as the mistake external alchemists make in interpreting “immortality” as referring to the physical body literally living forever and the same mistake the Western alchemists make when they try to literally turn lead into gold, etc. [quote]

Yes, I take that as a given too. I wasnt interpreting it literally either.






[quote]
We are all within the womb of the "mysterious female", you no more so than I. The mysterious female is Binah on the Tree of Life. Or perhaps more accurately The Empress on the path between Binah and Chokmah. It's a huge, living, breathing Archetype available to us all. Perhaps this Archetype resonates more profoundly in your body, since it was shaped from the archetypes of life in a female body. But both the Male (Chokmah) and Female (Binah) principles are within us equally. One may be more strongly longed for in response to our need for balance, but this is irregardless of born gender IMO. I believe a male to female transsexual may more strongly long for her Animus, but I'm a crazy California liberal like that. biggrin.gif
[QUOTE]

Yes, I am aware of this. I would say that the archetype resonates far more strongly in my body,mind, being, this being because I am woamn, and also quite a yin woman, and because I am living a lot of the mother archetype due to having children, and for mysterious reasons, that for example, mean that my sexuality is more yin than yang, ie that I would prefer vaginal orgasms over clitoral - and there are many women who are not this way. There is a great book "Exploring the Hidden Power of Female Sexuality"by Maitreyi D. Pontek - which is a taoist book, and much more feminine than Mantak Chia's book about female sexuality... it explains a lot of the false yang habits that woman can become subject to.
I would say also that when the archetype of the feminine visits you and passes through you, it has a very different influence and reaction and meaning, than it does when it passes through me. because your nature is yang, essentially, and so what you are experiencing has to be put in a different place for you energetically/psychically/psychologically/mystically, in order for you not to be dominated by the feminine or fall into false yin.

If you think of us as test tubes... one sean test tube, and one cat test tube, and we are lucky enough to have the dropping in to us of some mysterious female archetype, then do you think this would result in the same affect in each test tube?

sean, the rest of your post I just simple take as given, yes, agree, it is as you say.

For me, however, I cannot ignore that fitting together of yin and yang, and where the kaleidoscope of energy would have these qualities reside.

As yet, we havent reached spiritual androgyny. I dont think, when I get to a state of deep bliss/disapearing that I lose my yin - nature. If anything I become MORE the way I am designed, and more and more false Yang drops away from me.

I would be interested to know how you feel about this : what do you feel that your contact with the deepest feminine archetype has given you?

Lozen,I think that this is a bit of a supercharged issue for men who may not yet have got into deep relationship with the feminine? I think that some taoist men's groups are a great help because they can laugh together at the difficulty of being different from women, and searching for the answers by pushing their penis into a woman, and finding only a receptive space... which is blissful. So the thrusting male intellect coming into play in the face of this possibly ungraspable issue is just more yin/yang friction. hopefully it will being forth some issue..

In a way you could say sean is thrusting his yang questions into my yin answers. each time he thinks I am being literal, but no .. it's not that simple... this is a quintessential dance!

The danger is that the male can be felt as bullying, and the yin as incomprehensible from the position of the yang mind.

Ho Hum. quite good fun though, innit?

This is very offensive image. Unfortunately it also seems to be a very common belief amongst both men and women, and it's pumped through the mass media every single day. Men are stupid and simple and obvious. Women are complex and subtle mysterious. Lozen, it's called sexism. Plain and simple. And then you wonder why smart, sensitive, and in very in touch with the femine Taoist boys get pissed off at you. And then you have the audacity to say I'm acting like a "bully". You post a quote that says one and a million men are as intelligent as every single women is innately. Then you post a follow up image making the same point in an even cruder way. Lozen, again, as I've brought up in another thread, I wonder where you are coming from.

Whatever. Lozen, cat, anyone. I hope prejudices like these work out for you. And I hope whenever your prejudices are sincerely and honestly questioned, you are comfortable pulling out the "I'm a mysterious female and so therefore can dodge questions because that is just Yang intellectualism and I can also post insulting follow up imagery and smile and talk about how fun the dance is because stupid man's sincere attempts to have an intelligent discussion are misguided and he can never understand how deep and in touch I am." Pffft... Because no matter how you try to whitewash it, and how many times you say that you "love men" that is what you are professing to believe when you post quotes like that, and post images like that.

But hey, I will try my best to remember this image you posted next time I see a commercial for the latest Girl's Gone Wild video. I'm sure I am missing something there too. Or maybe I am just not blinded by sentimental gender prejudice and so can more accurately call bullshit on disturbing male and female social trends.

Sean.

I took the image (designed by a man, btw) as being about sex. Speaking as someone who's slept with both men and women, I thought it was pretty accurate. Is it inherently sexist to think that men and women are different? I know there is even science behind it (and not just statistics) the way that men and women's minds work. I didn't say either was BAD, in fact I think they work really well together...

What's sexist is to extrapolate complex, subjective qualities such as levels of intelligence, intuition, sexual arousal patterns, creativity, etc. as being the incontrovertible result of the physical differences in men and women. Same with skin tone. Same with religion. It does take awhile for somewhat complex ideas like these to trickle into "folk wisdom" though. Which is actually the exact reason we have laws governing discriminatory hiring practices based on prejudices like yours.

"Men, too, sometimes have brains."

Sean.

i recognized that image you posted, because i saw it online a few years ago posted online stating something along the lines of "how to turn-on a man, how to turn-on a woman" - that tagline puts you in a different frame of mind while viewing it rather than "Scientific Diagram of Male and Female" which is what is stated at the link you provided.

viewing it stated as that, in my opinion, is almost as offensive as this:
http://www.thetaobums.com/forum/index.php?...p=197&#entry197

point being, both images were created to hurt feelings and to further separate the sexes. pretty lame.

and also being someone who has had long term sexual relationships with both male, female, and etc... i don't agree that any aspect of a male (sexuality, emotional complexity, spiritual drive) is any simpler than that of a female.

okay, I just clicked on lozen's link and see what you have taken offence to.or one of the things. I'm sorry, I didnt think to look at it before when I posted earlier.

um..... sean, two things, 1) you are lumping in what I have said with Lozen's responses, as if we were the same person.

2) If we lose our sense of humour in a discussion, then we know we're in a complex.


I have no interest at all in being reductive about what is the nature of yang, or maleness. The image that Lozen posted as a link can be taken as a thought provoker about singleness of purpose, about the opposite of a diffused consciousness.

"men too sometimes have brains" you say. this has never ever been in question in anything I have said. I think I mentioned Dirk Oellibrandt and Carl Jung, both of whom are men...

I do not feel that getting a sense of what the feminine is, is in any way logically creating a mind set which is to the detriment of the male.

It is actually difficult to have a sensitive, subtle, discussion of depth in this format, isnt it.

Where's the love, people?


If everyone could cut eachother a bit more slack, it'd go a lot better.

You're all intelligent and making good points, and a variety of pts of view makes a better discussion,.. some interpersonal friction seems to be complicating and tangling things. Maybe I'm stating the obvious.

If all of you could just take a deep breath, go "ommmmmm", and chill in a little bit of universal , and let conversation play out in a more spacious way - that might help a lot.

My 2 cents.

I think excellent 2 cents from trunk.