Why are you here?

Most people don’t realize how many of us are here at the temple pretty much every day but don’t post in the forums. Why? Because (for me anyways) this temple has changed so much since I joined over two years ago.

First and foremost the forum post. I find myself reading almost every post that goes up and I have the same thought every time. What was the point of that? When I first joined I could read a post and almost always learn something factual about the topic or the person posting it. Meditation techniques, ways to improve myself, some new piece of tech, personal post about the person writing the post. Now it’s endless back and forth about pointless, unrealistic, made up super powers, political opinions and endless nonsense that all ends the same way. Disappointment. I came here to LEARN! Not to watch everyone banter like a bunch of five year olds just to try to prove there right about a topic that dosent even matter to the Jedi way of life. My first teaching master Atticus was huge on me staying focused on what matters, finding the meaning in everything around me, and always learning. IMO this is no longer a temple or place to learn....it’s a place to argue about some of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen.

I dove heart/ head first into this way of life two years ago. Abandoned my religion (which I don’t regret) for the Jedi path and opened my eyes to the world around me. Started meditating regularly, and training my body for the first time since my army career ended. I soaked up the IP like a sponge and applied it to my life, and I am all the better for it. But I feel soo disheartened every time I come to this site just because I know it’s gonna be the same ol bunch of bull. And every day I’m right. My brothers and sisters hunting for reasons to argue with each other. And all too proud to just let it go, or god forbid, say I’m wrong. What’s wrong with saying , wow...cool point of view! Or saying I never looked at it that way. Instead it’s let me throw some made up facts at you, the call you an idiot for disagreeing with the made up crap that I just couldn’t resist typing.

Who cares! We need to come to the temple with open minds and open hearts. We all came here for a reason, and I promise you that reason wasn’t to “ be right” or to have fun fighting with someone one who’s supposed to be my brother/sister.

So here’s my challenge to TOTJO. Every chance you get, come to this thread, and post at least one thing you learned today at the temple. If your not taking something away from what’s being taught here then maybe it’s time to go. And p.s. if what your trying to push on someone isn’t inline with temple doctrine, then you definitely need to find somewhere else to push it. You wouldn’t walk into a Catholic Church during mass and tell everyone there idiots for not being Hindu. Don’t do it here!

Let’s see if we can get this temple we all love back to where it needs to be. A place of education, brotherhood, and faith in the force.I look forward to seeing who will post here and seeing what people are taking away from there time spent here. Private messages are always welcome. This however is not a discussion board. So no rebuttals to anything anyone post here with the exception of the knights corps and the council for educational purposes. Everyone else just post something you’ve learned.

Force be with you all!

I learned you are still around. And I am happy about that. I'll have to post more

Zero Storm,

I am new to this temple and I enjoyed this post. Most of what you said drew you to the temple is why I am here. I hope to learn from someone with your knowledge and passion, as well as from the IP.

Respectfully,
M.R.

I have learned a lot from this temple and from reading your post . I learned now I need to be mindful of my post and what I post . I learned that there are a lot of nice people on here trying to get points across but fail or are scrutinized for there beliefs . I learned to let go of emotions but not to abandon them all together . I have learned so much from this temple and everyone here and I hope to continue to learn . As well as this quote from Albert Einstein holds Merritt : " two things are infinite the universe and human stupidity though I don't know about the universe ". I am human and I make mistakes and I learned to apologise for those mistakes , not just keep making the same ones over and over again .

Thank you for this post it really opened my eyes to my actions .

I learned that there are people around who unironically think that the Open Discussions subforum "is not a discussion board" but should instead be treated like the journal section. That was new to me.

Zero Storm wrote: This however is not a discussion board. So no rebuttals to anything anyone post here with the exception of the knights corps and the council for educational purposes. Everyone else just post something you’ve learned.

And I learned when first making my open discussion forums that the creator has every right to call the shots on the topic .

Zero Storm wrote: Most people don’t realize how many of us are here at the temple pretty much every day but don’t post in the forums. Why? Because (for me anyways) this temple has changed so much since I joined over two years ago.

First and foremost the forum post. I find myself reading almost every post that goes up and I have the same thought every time. What was the point of that? When I first joined I could read a post and almost always learn something factual about the topic or the person posting it. Meditation techniques, ways to improve myself, some new piece of tech, personal post about the person writing the post. Now it’s endless back and forth about pointless, unrealistic, made up super powers, political opinions and endless nonsense that all ends the same way. Disappointment. I came here to LEARN! Not to watch everyone banter like a bunch of five year olds just to try to prove there right about a topic that dosent even matter to the Jedi way of life. My first teaching master Atticus was huge on me staying focused on what matters, finding the meaning in everything around me, and always learning. IMO this is no longer a temple or place to learn....it’s a place to argue about some of the dumbest things I’ve ever seen.

We need to go back to the old ways. I agree completely with this (though I am guilty of these things). I will no longer contribute to any forum posts or arguments that are superfluous to the Jedi way. How did this place get so off track?

My topic my rules.... if you can’t abide by them then don’t post! This is exactly what I’m talking about! Anything to get a smart assed comment in....if you can’t post about somthing u learned at the temple then keep your comments to yourself please!

ZeroStorm is 100% correct.
This is an international Jedi community, not f'ing Reddit.
This place is about learning, espousing, and living the Jedi way.
Not arguing about pointless things that have nothing to do with the Jedi way.
We have become far too divisive.

I learned to be open minded and not cling to my opinion so tightly. However, what I found
disappointing is, as ZeroStorm said those word´s gunfight. I am very sensitive to this.
I am not avoiding nor refusing other people’s opinion which is different than mine,
but I think that people should communicate more with respect.
Seems to me, that if you want something to post you have to check it carefully with
all possible sides, otherwise...
I found out that here in TotJO aren´t just people over 18, but also under and that would explain
that kind of behavior.

Next thing I learned, is to regulate my negative emotions, nor express either suppress, but find
middle way through which they are processed with empathy. Then it doesn´t harm other people,
nor myself, thanks Proteus.

TIL or re-learned about the zone of proximal development. Alexandre and I were having a bit of a discussion about teaching philosophy and we are on opposite ends as to how to help people explore some of the stuff.

There is this article about how to digest books above your "level" which Alex shared
https://medium.com/@RyanHoliday/how-to-digest-books-above-your-level-and-increase-your-intelligence-a11bd134da13

And if you read the above my suggestion is that, specifically TM's because we were talking about the Temple, are a bit like personal trainers. We need to understand how people are learning now and move them further according to Vygotsky's Zone of proximal development.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zone_of_proximal_development

Even though it's a child development idea, it's still really helpful in any sort of mrntor/mentee relationship

For me, this has been a call-to-arms. A "come to Jesus moment" if you will.
This is a serious issue in our community.
Those of us who are true to this community, who wish to follow the Jedi way, need to start showing it.
Myself included.

From now on, we need to rise above the pointless argumentative nonsense and set an example of equanimity for others, whose hearts are inclined to the Way, to follow.

Seriously, this is my pledge of decency, of respect, to my fellow Temple Members, and to the Way.

I will abide.
And I suggest we all do the same.

Since 2012 I've learned that no community that tries to base itself on righteous virtue can ever be exempt from human flaw, and in fact, naturally faces more of its human flaw the more righteous it strives to be. Among this inevitable outcome, when I watch threads that are likely to be seen as pointless bickering, what I have come to see in each one of them are individual lessons in social and psychological development.

I once used to feel like this community was simply lost and my irritation would burn me out to the point most of us get to where we just want to stop associating with this place. But I stuck around and something interesting happened. I began seeing each instance of bickering as an opportunity to observe and learn why each participant was saying what they were. Each bit of insight helped me understand myself as a person and in turn, trained me to learn new things about how to interact with people on a more effective level. I realized it was something extremely crucial to my path.

The more I learned, the more I realized that the nature of this temple is not necessarily what we want or hope it to be (that is a projection of our selves we put on it, and that in itself can be observed and learned from), but it is something that gives us an opportunity to learn things about ourselves that we rarely ever know we need to learn - the way our expectations about the world works, why, and what that says about ourselves and others. That alone carries information that can last, and take us well beyond any apprenticeship if we're paying the right attention.

But at this point, I learned that things are just the way they're supposed to be - a community of quite normal people all learning typical things from one another, just talking, miscommunicating sometimes, facing our insecurities, our ignorances, and our egos. After realizing this, I think I would be concerned if this place didn't have these kinds of quite innocent characteristics. I think it's a healthy sign and I'm no longer feeling disheartened. Every discussion is a lesson. Those of us who begin paying the right attention can always come away with invaluable information to implement on our own paths.

Thank you for this thread.

In my time here, I've come to learn, or have been reminded from prior lessons, how vulnerable we can all be. I've learnt to let myself be wrong and/or confused (most likely a bit of both). I've learnt that retributive anger is silly. I've learnt that some things suck and we just need to let them suck until they don't do any more (some of those things are others' attitudes ; sometimes me). I've learnt 'presencing', forgotten it again, recalled it again, forgotten it once more.

It's no huge mystery: we're living through a transitional era. Old values are having to give way to new necessities, just like they've done for centuries. We have a worldwide communications grid in our pocket, so these transition phases happen more frequently and more intensely.

That worldwide information grid is pretty useful, but allows us greater latitude for taking our frustrations out on others. There's something gratifying about the righteousness my apprentice was just talking about and the tendency to cyberbully anyone, not only who challenges it, but who is just there. These are pretty flimsy gratification.

I've learnt that I don't have to have a response for everything. If someone is feeling the need to point out my faults, how shame-ridden are they ? It is no defence of my dignity to make someone else's day worse.

There can be moments a fighter realizes there are more fights in the heart and mind than in real life.
There can be moments a singer hums and its not theory.
There can come moments when a sword is displayed rather than shown.
As a modern day Jeddist, there came a time, there was in my in my life, when I realized I don't have to ACT all the time.
The sword has its discipline for a reason and sometimes our speech needs a bit of parallel to it as far as ideas and action. First hand, its worth it. For me, part of the romance of manners and my Jedism is knowing when and where to use it. Think about that. Just because we have sabers and are Jeddist sometimes DOENT mean we whip it out and chop hands off every time.
Every idea and faith and way and path seems to have this one parallel and its that every thing has its season. There are moments for a fight and for NOT fight. There are moment for salt and NOT salt.
FIND OUT.
My encouragement is find these JEDI. Find those people. Sit with them. Part of the romance for me is the fact that as a Jedi - there are moments I DONT have to act.
Kicking against the pricks leaves ya with sore feet and the ability to walk hurt. Eventually, its my hope, modern day Jeddist learn - it takes as much as it takes to use a real sword is as much as it can take to use our words. HUGE PARALELL for benefit.
As a modern day Jeddist - I don't pick fights any more. Not my cup of tea. No one can make me fight. Takes two to tango but it only takes one person to be the example of what CAN be.
What im really saying. Get ya some real training for real things. Talk to folks you wanna be like. Sit with them. This is where change can enter. Identification is key but what then? Its easy to find a fault but to find the solution or make it.....Theres more to this than just one choice as in life. hope this helps.


...that's why im here...

This is the internet, you determine your own level of participation. We can have a thousand little separate rooms all right next to each other and all completely quarantined off from one another. You are not obligated to read every post or care about every thread. You are not obligated to reply to everyone who speaks to you. You are the captain of your own TOTJO experience. If youre being pulled into the drama, perhaps thats just as much a statement on your own maturity as it is on your neighbors? The “authorities” arent going to save you from your own inability to regulate your own attention and your own behavior; save yourself.

OB1Shinobi wrote: This is the internet, you determine your own level of participation. We can have a thousand little separate rooms all right next to each other and all completely quarantined off from one another.

Exactly. The journal section is pretty much it, bar the completeness part of the quarantine. It's pretty close, though. Your journal is the place you go to say things you do not wish discussed in any way. Or so I thought until I learned that apparently any and every thread can be essentially a journal, if only one declares that they ought be. It turns out, don't you know, that which ever thread one creates one gets to be King in, because of a reason too obvious to be explained in the rules.

Gisteron wrote: Your journal is the place you go to say things you do not wish discussed in any way. Or so I thought until I learned that apparently any and every thread can be essentially a journal, if only one declares that they ought be. It turns out, don't you know, that which ever thread one creates one gets to be King in, because of a reason too obvious to be explained in the rules.

This could be a potentially useful discussion. There is a precedent of topic starters having some authority about the direction the topic is meant to take. Zenchi’s Dark Side Meditations thread is one that comes to mind for me because i remember him specifically telling people it wasnt intended as an open discussion and it wasnt going to become one. But it doesnt seem like a good idea to me that the entirety of the forum be made into some kind of intellectual safe space, where we all have the privilege of silencing any idea or opinion that is contrary to our own. How much authority should OP have? None whatsoever? Dictator status? Is there some reasonable point between?

Edit: im just gonna go ahead and make this a new topic

.

I give up....by all means, let’s all fight and argue on what was supposed to be a place for people to share about what they are learning from others here. But no...we can’t do that because I said I specifically didn’t want that, which in turn means We get to debate about weather or not I had the power to have just one thread where people don’t act like jack asses. A thread where potential new members could see that this is a place where they can learn skills to better themselves or the world around them. Now it’s become just another thread to show people how we can’t get along no matter what the topic.

Pretty sure my time at totjo is over. I have enough issues going on that coming to a CHURCH online shouldn’t cause me more stress and frustration.

Totjo helped me through some rough times. But when I need it the most I get nothing but ridiculed. It’s obvious now that this place is no longer a CHURCH or a temple. It’s a place to discus politics, and to argue, and to openly make fun of others for there beliefs. This used to be a place to learn but those times are obviously over. I’m having a very hard time in my personal life right now and I used to be able to come here to ask for help or opinions or even to be cheered up with a laugh. Those days are obviously gone.

I have no where else to go from here, no one to turn too. But at this point no one and no where is way better than here.