I mean voluntarily letting go of all the things that you have used for your protection. For some it may be their property or money. Other it may be their guns, religion, or political beliefs. Still others it may be friends, familiar places, the web. I surmise what it would be like to be total stripped of everything that you've been socialized into believing are needed for your security or perceived security. It would be like a diet detox but much more broad. I wonder if anyone could survive it. A hermit life might be the closest thing. Even the most primitive and reclusive of cultures usually involve people working together in groups and are not completely hermit.
But..but..my guns...i take care of them like i would a small child...i could never give up such a wonderful gift. and music....cant give that up..its a death ticket to not have music... To everything else except family, yes i say fuck it.
I think that's a wonderful cathartic thing to do. I have done just that! tho not intentionally.. stripped myself of need, materialism, personal love, assets, money. The only things I want are my kids and spirituality. The rest are empty vessels. What you need is provided if you have God. If you don't it would be very frightening to go down this path at my old age. (Went bankrupt, lost most of what I had) Now working as engineer for someone else and rebuilding my life.
Everything I do, everything I think, everything I have, and everyone around me make me me. You ask to give that up and I will be what you want me to be, not who I am.
Well, I don't know. That's one of the reasons that I said voluntarily, instead of someone imposing it on you and taking it away from you. Even though all these things around us are part of what we are at the moment, maybe some aren't really the best things for us. Feeling defensive about giving up some of them could be part of what imprisons us when we think all of those things are our freedom and identity. Case in point: I remember a news story a few months after 9/11 of a father in NY who was working about 200 miles from his main home and his wife and kids. He would sometimes come home from his job location on the weekends. He was doing it mainly for the extra money which wasn't really needed and was missing out on raising his family. His high-paying job was part of his identity and prestige and his freedom to buy extra things. After 9/11, his viewpoint changed and he found a job in town with his family. They didn't have as much money and the freedom to buy things, but they had enough to live comfortably together. For him, it took an external event like 9/11 to force him to re-assess what was meaningful to his life. It's similar to the post that Thing One made in this thread.
