Workin' It

[maur]

I realized today that although I lack the ambition of a fighter, my mind has always been a gladiator. That is, an enslaved fighter trapped in a cage that takes the form of a very lazy man. My mind is only challenged through the act of challenging. It is only through aggressive interest that anything is learned, passivity brings only temporary

Comments

[harlequinlocke]

Well I fight to avoid this dualism as I think it undermines will and action. And will and action are the real exercise, even more so than aggressive interest. It's a tough battle to fight, one I find myself trapped in momentarily, but a battle I've won before. Ideally we would have active bodies and active minds. We fall into these dualisms, shatter proper balance, and in the end if we are honest we often end up without worthwhile activity in either. But it is def possible to be at a place where you can have energy in both. And it felt to me in the recent past like challenging my instinct to be a thinker and concentrating on enervating my body resulted in having both in my life.

Here's a passage from my homeboy Nietzsche that helped light fire under my ass before, just read mind where it says spirit.

http://cm01.wordpress.com/2008/05/26/on-the-despisers-of-the-body/

[maur]

Dope. Reminds me of Bukowski. Impressive poetry. I'm not sure how aggressive interest isn't a product of will via action, but I'll assume you're referring specifically to the notion of active bodies. I'm all for being of sound mind and body, the warrior scholar is the ideal archetype to me. Unfortunately being of unsound mind makes it significantly more difficult to pursue any desire to be a temple physically as well as mentally.

[harlequinlocke]

Well when I chewed over the phrase 'aggressive interest' I associated it with the way I am with my interests: I feel strong curiosity, I buy a lot of books, I'll spend hours opening new tabs and links around the net on various subjects but...somehow I feel it is all too amorphous and disorganized and not resulting often enough in real will and action.