Aristo Tacoma FIELD OF GENEROSITY -- Or, how to distinguish between what is good from "what is good for me or my group" [[[This text, as e.g. at www.yoga6d.org/genfield.txt, is freely copyable within the yoga4d.org/cfdl.txt conditions, and is also reproduced within an Big Art Booklet made in 2011 by Yoga4d:VRGM called 'My Art', by same author.]]] Field of generosity is the concept that can help you when you plan to do something meaningful in this world. Into this field you saw seeds and from this field you can confidently reap results -- but the key, to do this well, and with a relaxed, sincere attitude, is to combat any tendency to reap PARTICULAR results related to PARTICULAR seeds. The whole notion of a 'field' is indeed that it is rather open, how it is going to work out. And the more this openness becomes part of our expectations, the more it is possible to do good work, and appreciate what is good as a form of flow of meaning. It is also a key to work to go beyond any and all tendencies of egotism. Let us be clear that within limits, some protection of self makes sense, without it having to be called 'egotism'. For instance, a young girl ought to know how to dismantle a brute wanting to attack her, or when to run away. That is not egotism. That is meaningful protection of one's own body. So also, it makes sense, within limits, to protect one's own name, reputation, career-ways and all that. But beyond certain limits, in certain contexts, the self-protection becomes a stinking, self-contradictory thing: it is then it is called 'egotism', and this selfishness is not a virtue, though self-protection of some kinds are sometimes a virtue. I have heard people speak in favour of dropping all copyrights -- and some years later claim copyrights to other people's work. I have heard people speak in favour of dropping all moralisation, all qualification into 'good' and 'not good' -- and some years later push away others by saying that their work is 'not good'. I have heard people speaking about how wrong it is that people use of one another's ideas without telling where they came from -- and some years later they use other's ideas without telling where they came from. So if one is in favour of dropping all copyrights, does it concerns one's own works as well? So if one is if favour of dropping all moralisation, is it only when one's own works is on exhibit? And if one is in favour of using the word 'acknowledgements' for what it is worth, is it only to get one's own works acknowledged? Egotism is like a cold, some has been bitten harder by this cold than others, and some are bitten hard at times, and then better later, some vary in cycles, and presumably all humanity is in some kind evolution towards a state of gradually less of it, speaking really really long term. Realistically, though, if we are to preserve a sense of that childlike enthusiasm which makes one's eyes sparkle and which makes it fun to make good things, fun, indeed, to be generous, we must aim to produce relative to a field consisting of people where one doesn't count on ANY ONE IN PARTICULAR to respond to the generosity that you have. In other words, one can take a statistical attitude about one's generosity: it is likely that, being generous about making high-quality stuff, high-quality performances, high-quality processes, and pouring it with moderation and with intuition into this field, this field will have a generosity back to oneself, in a fairly fixed ratio. This field includes invidividual human beings and groups of them, but it doesn't put all the bets on any particular group, company or the like. Rather, the bets are rather evenly divided. In that way, you have in each concrete case flexible expectations. This is an understanding that one must work and rework to get at, by renewed meditations, and one day surely all humanity will be at a new level of deeper and faster understanding of it (faster, for the thought-processes, also those of the ego, are very fast). In order, then, to evaluate what is good rather than what is merely good for some person's career, good for some group's imagined future well-being, and such, we must be aware of how quickly the two very different evalutions can get confused also in people who APPEARS to be very wise -- and, who you might think, judging from all their wealth, influence or the like, ought to be in a position where they could be generous rather than merely cunning, greedy or selfish. Initially, put very very quickly, it means that when you are going to evaluate what is good, you cannot trust any human person. In some way or another you have got to transcend the sometimes a bit trashy collective consciousness of humanity to reach a real evaluation of what is good. Then, having set aside a fresh and healthy freedom from needless authorities in the question, you must give yourself time. You must give duration, pondering, musing, meditation to a question of whether something is worth the while getting serious attention, serious work from yourself, in upcoming months and maybe seasons and years. And so while spending time with the question, you must aspire to a scientific attitude in the best sense of this word -- unbiased openness, pure wonder, also sceptical wonder. For sure you can listen to people's opinion but listen more to children and those who do not have a professional interest -- not an interest related to their own career, social level, group-belonging or class-identification -- in the theme you are considering. After a while, you achieve some such unbiased openness in yourself also. HOW AWAKE DO YOU GET, thinking about doing it? Or does the mere idea of doing such and such for months and months put you to sleep? Listen to the signals from your body, it is not that every such impulse is a sign of laziness. It may be a clear perception deep in the sublime level of your mind, conveying itself to your body psychosomatically. When eventually you are getting clearer about what seems to be the most right that you can do (not merely "good enough" relative to a narrow group or narrow definition), you must pay more attention to how logical it is, how lawful it is, and how holistic and healthy the influence on people at large, exposed to your future works, indeed will be. You may find that you have to impose various restrictions, but see if you can find formats which are so that you don't have to impose so many of them that the projects get dull by them. So you follow your joy, your enthusiasm, your bliss, but not recklessly. You do so with quiet inner authority, but also so that you are willing to listen afresh EACH MONTH ANEW, as you and the world progress, whether or not the plans should be changed. For some plans are good to follow and then good to change before, also long before, they are anywhere near being completed. (They are, in other words, fruitful, also when they are left behind and new plans are formed.) *** *** ***