For me, submission in this spiritual context is placed within my religiously 
zealous and passionate insistence not to accept and fixate anything but to 
constantly steer up, mercilessly ponder at, question, critically and 
constantly think, shake, critically reflect from every possible opposite 
angles and perspectives, constructively deconstruct, deny and falsify 
everything with a view to understand, grounded within the possibly 
unrealistic intention to make sense, and continuously emerge as stronger and 
more developed being-in-the-world.

This is my sole authority and my submission to it -  A submission to my 
denial of any authority.  I personally see any fixed, convenient and 
predefined type of 'authority' as the biggest enemy of humanity.  I do 
believe that humanity is synonym with and all about progress and pushing 
itself forward.  I see prefixed authority as the enemy of progress.  And it 
does not matter to me if it is a fixed, organised definition of a God, a 
clear fixed, institutionalised unchanged sense of identity, value and belief 
system and self, or a prefixed conception, model and theory to approach 
one's values with.  The authority defines and clarifies itself through 
tested out internal hectic struggles, confusion and constant, endless 
self-transformations.

As my sole spiritual commitment in-the-world and authority, I continuously 
self-deny, self-critique, self-question and self-interrogate with a view to 
reconstruct, redevelop and re-empower myself.  This is the core of my 
proposed heuristics.  And I do believe this makes the 'I' sufficient as it 
includes the immersed phenomenological, critical struggles of 
being-in-the-world.  In order to be able to account for my self and clarify 
it for myself I need to be able to be attentive to the world that I embody 
within me and the confusion and paradoxes this entails for me. 
Constructively and transformatively showing my struggles with my 
being-in-the-world as an 'I' in-the-world is in my opinion a mode of 
theorising human existence.  It is my preferred one.   I constructively 
challenge any other heuristics of human existence.

My living, heuristic A/R expedition is becoming longer.  It is lingering 
further, driving me mad and frustrated and pushing forward the future.  It 
is extremely difficult carrying out an A/R in this active mode of constantly 
denying, questioning and falsifying it to attempt to understand and 
reevaluate it.   Yet it is [hopefully] far more meaningful and educational 
for myself and intended to be pedagogic when placed in the public domain in 
this manner of pleading for accepting no submission and no authority as the 
authority and submission.  I personally could easily find an authority for 
myself, besides that of not having any.  But then I would not believe 
anymore in anything I write or say and lose any self-respect that I have for 
myself.

The Ontological confusion that I intentionally inflict on myself and send 
myself to immerse myself in is my spiritual commitment that I have for my 
Ontology and myself as a human being.

I am certainly committed to my confusion.  The day that I find complete 
clarity and unable to question and confuse myself and others and cease to 
see for myself how I make no sense at all will be the end of the Ontology 
that I am zealously committed to for myself.

Cherishing my confusion in public as an educational/pedagogic act for 
humanity
Alon
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Alan Rayner" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, July 01, 2005 2:44 PM
Subject: Re: A/R as spiritual practice


> Dear Jack and all,
>
> Yesterday morning I was intrigued to note a quote from the bible (Romans) 
> in our Parish newsletter exhorting us to 'submit to the governing 
> authorities'. This quote had followed on from the story of Jesus saying to 
> 'Render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's and unto God that which is 
> God's'. Our Parish priest apparently interpreted this to mean that we had 
> both secular and spiritual responsibilities. It is easy to see how this 
> interpretation could result in subservience to what might be called 'The 
> Vampire Archetype', a tyrannical regime in which an elite few or one at 
> the top of a hierarchical governmental structure impose their will upon 
> those many upon whom they depend, whilst declaring their independence of 
> these many, their 'host'. My feeling is that there are many such 
> tyrannical regimes at large in our modern world, not least in our 
> educational Institutions.
>
> So the questions that occur to me are as follows:
>
> 1) Who or what are the governing authorities?
> 2) What is meant by 'submission'?
>
>
> In 'inclusionality', the awareness of space as a vital physical presence 
> (a 'holeyness') within nature, inseparable from energy-matter, leads to an 
> understanding of universal dynamic form as the product of an 
> ever-transforming relationship between what we might call 'electromagnetic 
> information' (equivalent to 'Word' or 'Light') and 'space' (equivalent to 
> 'Void'). The latter is infinite relative to the former. The former 
> 'informs' - gives shape to the latter. The fundamental nature of both 
> these universal ingredients, which I liken to the solute (information) and 
> solvent (space) of a natural 'solution' is mysterious. They form what I 
> think of as the fundamental 'indeterminate couple' that comprises the 
> composite nature of nature (i.e. nature as 'togetherness' rather than 
> 'unified whole').
>
> If we represent information as 'I' and space as '-', we can represent this 
> couple as
>
> - + -
>
> where '+' is 'I' crossed through (not crossed out!) with space.
>
> Hence we have a symbol of the 'Trinity' as a universal couple that 
> combines infinite space with finite informational 'lining'. This couple is 
> fundamentally 'incomplete' and hence capable of relating dynamically over 
> scales from microcosmic to macrocosmic. So we can generate an infinite 
> series:
>
> - + - + - + - + - ....etc
>
> where '-' always both envelops and is included in 'I'.
>
>
> This links to the concept of the 'complex self' as a coming together of 
> inner and outer spaces through an intermediary bodily lining: a 'self' 
> that has both 'local' and 'non-local' aspects combined through its body. 
> The complex self is simultaneously both 'individually' distinct and 
> collectively 'together', without contradiction. Our neighbourhood is the 
> outer aspect of our inner selves.
>
>
> By contrast, where space is 'excluded' from matter, as the cognitive 
> illusion of our eyesight may lead us to believe, then the 'body' 
> represents the separation of inner from outer.
>
>
> We then have:
>
>
> - I -
>
>
> Which is at the heart of the 'either/or' objective logic based on the 'law 
> of the excluded middle' that leads to the notion of an external 
> 'authority' or 'force' that is imposed on objective bodies to bring about 
> their movement (i.e. the basis of Newtonian mechanics).
>
>
>
> In these terms, for me, 'submission' implies 'attuning my personal agenda 
> with my living space' and 'holding openness', rather than imposing closure 
> between my individual 'self' and 'others'. I try to bring this sense of 
> submission into my educational work with others as a facilitator of 
> learning rather than dictator of learning.
>
>
> Please note that this is my 'personal' interpretation, and underlies my 
> personal 'spirituality'. I do not wish to impose it on others or use it as 
> a basis for rejecting others' heartfelt beliefs.
>
>
> Best
>
>
> Alan
>
>
> --On 01 July 2005 09:44 +0100 Jack Whitehead <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> I'm hoping that we will return to this thread on spiritual practice as we
>> develop the review phase of the seminar. If anyone has an explanation of
>> their educational influence in their own learning and/or in the learning
>> of others that expresses and communicates their meanings of the
>> 'spiritual' , as a motivational/explanatory value or principle in
>> educational influences in learning, do please add this to the archive of
>> explanations.
>>
>> I know Je Kan Adler Collins is working on this issue from a Buddhist
>> perspective and I sent on to him yesterday a piece by Joanna Macy at:
>> http://www.dharma.org/insight/2001a/macy.htm
>> I went into this url this morning to find the message:
>>
>> "What you are looking for
>> Is no longer there.
>> Change is like this."  !
>>
>> (i think you might share my mixture of frustration and laughter)
>>
>> i experience my own spirituality as a flow of life affirming energy. In
>> the following addition to our archive:
>>
>> "Living Educational Theory and Standards of Judgement: A contribution to
>> the debate about assessing the quality of applied and practice-based
>> educational research",  at:
>> http://www.jackwhitehead.com/monday/c12805.htm
>>
>> In this account there is a visual narrative that helps me to express (and
>> I hope communicate) my meaning of the flow of life-affirming energy. Here
>> is the extract I'm thinking of:
>>
>> "Expressing and representing inclusionality
>>
>> I am using the following 45 second video-clips to communicate my
>> experience and meaning of inclusionality. The clip is from a gathering on
>> the 18/12/02 in the Department of Education of the University of Bath, to
>> celebrate the graduation of Jackie Delong with her doctoral degree.
>> Jackie is the person in the right hand corner. At the beginning of this
>> video-clip Peter Mellett is setting the scene for a piece of music by
>> Django Reinhardt and Stefane Grappelli, playing Minor Swing. He is asking
>> the group to listen attentively to the moment after the final note when
>> both men express themselves in a way that Peter believes is a shared
>> affirmation of having created something that satisfies them both.
>> Margarida Dolan, the person in the foreground with her back to the
>> camera, asks the question, 'But how will I know if this is the final note
>> if I haven't heard the piece before?' In the seconds that follow there is
>> flow of energy in the laughter and expression of pleasure from
>> individuals in the group that opens channels of communication across
>> self-boundaries in sharing the pleasure. I characterise this energy as a
>> life-affirming energy that is consistent with Bataille's idea of
>> assenting to life up to the point of death.
>> The flow of pleasure through the laughter is co-created in the sense that
>> Margarida responds to Peter and we all share in the laughter of a group
>> who gathered together to celebrate Jackie Delong's accomplishment of her
>> doctoral thesis.
>> http://www.jackwhitehead.com/pmjd181202400.mov  (11.63 MB) "
>>
>> What Mohamed said about 'submission'  in relation to spirituality
>> resonated with me. I experience my expression of the spiritual value in
>> the flow of life-affirming energy, as freedom that connects with
>> compassion and pleasure.
>>
>> Love Jack.