ARII | another angle on STEA | Confused? Don't Be.

The quandary to which we human beings are subject may be summarized as this:

We have a sense of being beset by conditions,
meaning,
we feel confronted by life
and are demanded of a response
or we, ourselves,
demand things go a certain way.

That's where our attention is.

We have certain memories of "how it is"
including "how it is, right now".

Somehow we frame intentions toward all of that,
intentions that may not be crystal clear,
well-formed,
or particularly coherently defined.
They may be defined, in actuality,
more by memory than by imagination.

This vagueness of intention, shaped by memory,
is not exactly something we may be particularly enthusiastic about,
since it seems to lead to some variation of what we have already experienced.

Thus, to ourselves,
we seem destined to face more of the same (what we remember) --
not an entirely pleasant prospect, in some ways.

Feebleness of imagination
underlies feebleness of intention,
feebleness of will.

When we don't know which way to point the arrow,
we're not exactly excited to pull the bowstring.

Imagination is the lodestone,
the compass,
the magnet
of a propelled life.

Thus, by our imagination and our intention, we propel ourselves,
or not.

Thus, we are drawn by the eros of life,
or not.

It is not the future understanding of these words,
but their recognition as pertaining to the present
that allows them to make a difference.

In any moment, attend to something of which you have a direct,
first-hand, present-moment experience.
You know:  SOMETHING.

Remember, about it,
until you have recalled all you can.

Imagine where it might be going,
in terms of its changing in some manner.

Observe whether you can muster any intention toward
moving things the way you imagine them.

Round and Round
until the psycho-activity has shifted and stabilized.

Burt Goldman,
a mutable vessel for so many faculties
a teacher of that kind of mutability, for others,
has articulated a formula, which he summarizes by their four initials:

Stimulus
Thought
Energy
Action

STEA

1. Some condition is a stimulus, to you.
2. You take thought about it, toward a direction for which you have some enthusiasm.
3. That taking thought rouses an energized arousal state
4. that you put into action.

STEA

Some condition has your attention.

You recall associated memories.

You imagine where it might yet go or where it might be going, now.

You notice your level of intention.

You cycle-through again

in a more able way, this time,

You do each step a bit better, more deeply,

more penetratingly

more steadily,

and gradually, in steps,

you come into focus.

Improving with each cycle

until you stabilize.

a variation on STEA:

ARII.

It's amusing.