From: skutvik@online.no
Date: Fri Jul 25 2003 - 08:49:36 BST
Dear Pi ...rsig ;-)?
13 July you wrote:
> I would like to apologize if this post sounds like 'preaching' and you
> don't like to be preached to. This post certianly does not apply to
> everyone in the forum. But if it does, treat it like a friendly
> advice. :)
This quiet period gave me a chance to read some of the recent posts
more thoroughly and this from your was worth dwelling on."Preaching"
is what we have too little of ;-) . At least your gentle kind.
> I have been reading the posts for a short while now but have noticed
> that a large number of people have trouble understanding what Pirsig
> meant by 'static intellectual patterns of quality'. And honestly, it
> is hard. Pirsig did not spend too much time explaining what he meant
> by it. I personally took about 2 years to completely draw a boundary
> around this thing called the intellectual pattern. Part of the whole
> problem of intellectualizing intellectual patterns is that when you
> try to draw a line around it, you have to draw a line around the line
> drawing process!
I could not agree more about the trouble with understanding the
intellectual level (Q-intellect I call it). The MOQ hinges on it.
> A general word of advice. If you find yourself troubled with the
> various ideas presented by Pirsig and you know that you don't
> completely understand his divisions of static quality, persue
> them. Pirsig's purpose was not to mess up your understanding of the
> world. It was to clean it up and bring peace.
Hear, hear!!!
> I don't even know if
> Pirsig even had a purpose, but I certainly felt very peaceful after I
> understood what intellectual patterns are.
I think those who search, search for recognition of what we vaguely
feel blocks our way. It may be vague to the extreme, but one
immediately recognizes it when someone points to it, even in different
words, and if that person not only affirms the blockage but points to a
path ahead it's bliss.
> That was the last piece of
> the puzzle for me. And it was a very important piece. After I got some
> idae of what it was, I re-read LILA just to absorb anything I
> previously missed.
I would have loved to hear your story here, but to speak about my own
blockage it was (what Pirsig identified as) SOM which only left one
with two alternatives: Give up reason and become a believer in
something, or stay a sceptic to everything. P. had met the same S/O
wall, but seen the Q solution, in ZAMM it was all very vague, but
intensely promising.
> I hope sharing my experience helps you relate in some way. For those
> of you who are troubled by this philosophy, hang in there. That
> unsettling feeling is what one feels when those static patterns are
> broken. And that is a *good* thing. =)
I had hoped for more, is it coming or been presented before? To
return to my own experience, LILA was also a great revelation. The
said Quality solution (as I perceived it) was that of seeing the S/O
reality as a mere static level - intellect - in a series. The whole damned
mind/matter vertical mountain reduced to a mere rise in the Quality
terrain.
NB!
I did not see this SOM=Intellect connection that quickly, but it was
there from the start and grew on me until aired it in the Lila Squad. It
has since stabilized as deep conviction.
As said I had hoped for a more detailed account of your reaction
confronted with Pirsig's works and about the intellectual level in
particular.
Sincerely
Bo
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