Spiritual renewal, inner emigration, riding the tiger, asceticism general

Material "affluence" =/= spiritual well being
Prisoners have those same conditions. Air condition, guaranteed food.

>le capitalism is alienating and individualizing and superficial

kill you'reselve commie cuck

Explain how your spiritual well-being is being destroyed.

You don't have to go online, turn on the TV, etc. and be subjected to mindless media. And I'm sure your life is a lot better now than if you were enjoying life under serfdom or at the mercy of an alpha leader.

Only urbanites who are totally disconnected from nature and have a rampant sense of self-entitlement think modern times are terrible.

Oh boo hoo, people own land and you can't do exactly as you please. Guess what, that era never existed in human history. You're just a juvenile manchild clawing at excuses for why you are unhappy and unsuccessful by virtually all metrics. A pseudo-intellectual version of, "it's everyone else but me".

The culture and economy sucks but we have access to all the literature and music ever conceived. Decent trade off imo.

Women are being brainwashed into breeding with blacks instead of me, and politicians are importing 3rd world savages to live in the same country as me. My misery is not my own fault, but that of cultural marxists and women

>shitposts
>accuses others of shitposting in thread asking for recommendations and discussion

ahaha the /pol/tard emerges from the woodwork.

Let's just take the first point regarding women: what do you have to offer? Sure, you are white, but what makes you an ideal mate from a biological perspective? A body reflecting a sedentary lifestyle and poor eating habits? Atrophied socialization skills due to a reliance on virtual socializing and becoming prematurely embittered from extended periods shitposting with like-minded upset young white men? Living at home with your parents and/or unemployment/uinderemployment with no progress in sight? Dependency, a sense-of-entitlement, unwillingness to take responsibility, being offended by the mere notion of compromise? Being wholly inexperienced in life and never leaving your comfort zone?

Between you and Jerome, I'd probably choose being Blacked (TM) too.

Is this mostly ecology? Is he vaguely perennialist? Seems interesting

You're responding to a resident troll who makes posts like that all the time because he doesn't like /pol/ or something.

It's everything, not just ecology. If you've ever had a "but that just addresses the symptoms and not the core of things" kind of thought then this book is what you need

>reads Herbert Marcuse once

...

>If you've ever had a "but that just addresses the symptoms and not the core of things" kind of thought then this book is what you need

Damn, that hits the mark harder than you can know.

Why do people respond to other people's posts without saying "I'm not that guy but".. it's just common courtesy. That guy wasn't me, the person you responded to.

It's not very helpful to simply compare our life to life during the black plague or whatever horror of history. That doesn't make our current condition any less horrific by comparing it to something more horrific. Technologically induced luxury and human happiness are not equivalent realities. Take that into consideration and then consider also what constitutes the daily life of most people on earth. Forget comparing it to whatever horrible epoch of history. History has been generally awful, and that has yet to change presently. This idea that because people in first world countries can wander supermarket aisles and select from a plethora of products, that this equates to human well being and happiness, designating this current age as something not worthy of criticism,..

"These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world."

Unrelated, but this is a good song:
youtube.com/watch?v=ZF0ACuF_Te8

You're the one who's going on about the current age being a pile of shit as if it were especially bad now. You seem to be backtracking

This desu
>thread about spiritual renewal
>absolutely no mention of contemplating the mystery of the Cross

It's like gnostics want to hate the world...

>be moose
>summer: hordes of mosquitoes, black flies, deer flies, etc., worrying constantly about predation, hunger and disease are very real, have to take care of your offspring by yourself with no social safety net, you can't just take a "mental health day" and sleep in with Netflix on
>Fall: no biting insects! But hunters, predators, diminishing food supply, have to get ready for the hard winter. Mating season, fights, etc.
>Winter: constantly walking through deep snow, greater chance of predation due to lack of mobility, cold, eating bark and twigs and maybe digging through the snow for some lichens. No biting flies but lots of ticks still.
>Spring: mud, wet snow, waiting for the new shoots to come, giving birth alone while hoping a predator isn't nearby, learning to take care of offspring only by your instinct and hard work, biting flies on their way.

Yeah cry about how materialism offends your spiritual well-being some more. Or maybe fantasy about running away some more.

Don't worry kid, when your youth is behind you, you'll realize how much time you squandered and how easy things were now.

I never put it in those words, that was OP, but yes, this is a very dark period. The internet has not been a proper surrogate for the alienation and isolation caused by the omnipresence of automobiles and their corresponding asphalt veins that have seeped into every corner of the world. Community is dying or dead now, and the internet is not an adequate substitute. This is not a superficial problem. Certainly persons like you and me are would be considered as on the 'good end' of the stick, concerning poverty and luxury. It is still a matter of perspective. In the slums of brazil, there is a much greater sense of community and human relation. You know your neighbors, you talk to them, they help you out, you laugh and despair with them. Not the case in some upper class suburban setting. Poor in material but strong in community, or rich in material but weak in community? There is an equivalency of trade-offs occurring. Our current age is the culmination of an underlying script, narrative, collective metaphysical assumption about the nature of human life, and human nature. Physical comfort and psychological well being do not go hand in hand. Anyone sufficiently perturbed psychologically will aspire to die. A man of great psychological health can endure physical hardships cheerfully. Our world is a psychological hell. Tedium in jobs and in education are not insignificant factors. They erode the soul.

We just never learn, do we?

There's a great scene in Horace and Pete where this idiot girl is sitting at the bar complaining about how much she hates the internet. One of the other guys ask her how she manages without it, and she says "Well, I still use it, but I hate it too."

You are that girl lmayo

Then go live in a fucking ghetto, favela, or poor redneck or third world shithole where you'll feel more spiritually fulfilled with the community of like minded impoverished fags

I watched that show too, it was depressing.

If I had another viable outlet for human interaction I would use it. But this is what I am reduced to.

I've gotten this exact reaction so many times.

"If you think things are so bad then why don't you just fuck off and live in the woods."

And what good would that do exactly, it seems more like they don't want to address the content of what is being said

The point is that you won't do it, because you're actually very comfortable where you are and with the position you're in and deep down you are well aware that your feeling of existential """malaise""" is laughable compared to the plight of people who'd give their right arm to be in your shoes. And that includes the vast, vast, vast majority of all who have ever lived.
To make this age out to be worse than previous ones is so hilarious, especially considering what I imagine is the person uttering such nonsense. But perhaps you're right, your type would've been killed off early in life in ages past

if I know this board both posts are the same person

I won't do that because there is no good reason for me to do it.
Once again, it's not very helpful to compare our shallow caricature impression of the daily life of past peoples to our own. The underlying factor of separation in our thinking persists and persisted in the past. It takes different forms now, but it's the same. Forget comparisons here. Subjective realities of suffering are real to the subject experiencing them. Simply because they do not take on the external appearance of suffering that would be obvious in a leper (for instance) doesn't mean that people are no longer in a condition of suffering. School shootings should be some indication of this. I am perfectly capable of listing one hundred and one atrocities currently occurring, but it pains me to feel that is necessary. They're not things simply to list in order to prove a point. There is an incredible, mind numbing amount of work to be done to heal this world. That is mostly my point. To ignore that there is anything to heal is not a helpful position to inhabit. If you want to talk about privilege and bubbles, that would be it - that position.

The guy who posted the racist stuff wasn't me.

>your type would've been killed off early in life in ages past
And this is the proud product of our age of "wealth". It is glorious to pity those that have great (that is, material) problems, but those who have those petty, small inner problems must remain quiet, since those aren't "real" problems. Clearly, it is those people that deserve to die, and not the criminals, not the ignorant masses that further violence and greed out of their own unquestioned fears. One must be happy, not for oneself, but for the vast, vast, vast majority of people to which one has no connection, but has as much say on what lot life will give him.

I know exactly how you feel. Every morning I stop and think, should I turn the computer on? And every time I try not to I realise how empty my life really is. Eventually I'll actually cut it lose.

Can you guys please type "Not the person you replied to, but.." ...

I intend to be rid of it soon enough too. Not just as a pipe dream either. But atm I'm drinking 3 dollar wine and I wanted to talk to humans.

Yep. There's not much apparent motive to reduce the amount of urban mobility we have or to connect to other people on a personal level at all. And yet my misery/depression/social anxiety/indifference most likely has some causality with my family, school, and community. Everything seems surface-level and fake. Its true that I respond with some angst, but how do I overcome myself? OP's theme seems to at least be responsible for the field of Psychiatry.

I don't assume I can know the future in regards to finishing my undergrad and the reasons why I ought to do it. The basic things I need to do are finishing college and getting a job, what's next? I spent enough time being nihilistic. I've traveled around the US, I've slept in my car, campsites, hiking trails, I've seen some cool places and being somewhere natural and perfectly structured as nature is seems like something that humanity will become in the next few hundreds or thousands of years.

On the grand scale I'm not too worried, it's individually that I'm confused. My life is incredibly easy, so hilariously easy as my physical needs are always met. If I'm entitled, spoiled, lacking perspective what caused this? How do I change it? Will surviving on minimal things really change me psychologically, when I know that I can always easily return to the abundance of society?

I'd hope at least that this devastation of human needs at least births a new age of thinking or smarter kids in my generation who grow up writing about this shit. It very much seems like the most important issue of our generation, which (I think) started after industrialization but blew up in our faces after the internet
happened

>I wanted to talk to humans

Yup... It's better to talk to people online than to talk to yourself, which is a habit I picked up years ago and can't stop.

Anyone who considers the problem of the adaptability of the ascesis of the Ariya to modern times, will ask himself to what extent the precept of "departure" as a real abandonment of home and of the world, and as the isolation of a hermit, must be taken literally. The texts sometimes consider a triple detachment, one physical, another mental, and the third both physical and mental. If the last naturally represents the most perfect form—at least so long as the struggle lasts—it is the second that should claim the particular attention of most people today and that, moreover, was given greater emphasis in Mahāyāna developments, including Zen Buddhism. Besides, even the canonical texts mention the possibility of an interpretation of the concept of "departure" that is mainly symbolical; thus "home" is considered, for example, to be equivalent to the elements that make up common personality—and similar interpretations are given for wandering and for property. A variation of a text we have quoted, says that "solitary life is well achieved in all respects when what is past is put aside, what is future abandoned, and when will and passion, in the present, are entirely under control"; elsewhere it is said that a man wanders like a bhikkhu justly through the world, when he has subjugated past and future time and possesses a pure understanding, when he "has left behind him both the pleasant and the unpleasant, clinging to nothing, in all ways independent and without attachments" and so on. Similar expressions recur throughout; they largely refer, more-over, to the principal tasks of ascetic preparation and purification.

Once detachment, viveka, is interpreted mainly in this internal sense, it appears perhaps easier to achieve it today than in a more normal and traditional civilization. One who is still an "Aryan" spirit in a large European or American city, with its skyscrapers and asphalt, with its politics and sport, with its crowds who dance and shout, with its exponents of secular culture and of soulless science and so on—among all this he may feel himself more alone and detached and nomad than he would have clone in the time of the Buddha, in conditions of physical isolation and of actual wandering. The greatest difficulty, in this respect, lies in giving this sense of internal isolation, which today may occur to many almost spontaneously, a positive, full, simple, and transparent character, with elimination of all traces of aridity, melancholy, discord, or anxiety. Solitude should not be a burden, something that is suffered, that is borne involuntarily, or in which refuge is taken by force of circumstances, but rather, a natural, simple, and free disposition. in a text we read: "Solitude is called wisdom [ekattam monam akkhātam] he who is alone will find that he is happy"; it is an accentuated version of "beata solitudo, sola beatitudo".

>On the grand scale I'm not too worried, it's individually that I'm confused.

I feel that. My foray into theosophy / eastern religion / neoplatonic metaphysics have left me with faith in existence as a whole. That doesn't mean that this life isn't going to be hellishly painful though. The immediate life is always the thing to be concerned with, and that has no guarantees, especially considering the scale of cosmic unfolding. One soul among trillion x trillions.

OP read the Bhagavad-Gita

You guys misunderstand. There are no problems. Only opportunities for growth where there is a spiritual lack. You want to change the world? Start with yourself, for "when an entity has turned self unto pursuits that are anathema to the fruits of the spirit, his outlook on life will necessarily become one of apathy and despair."

If you have a poor outlook it's because you have waned from your ideal. "That higher obligation we have to that which gives life its import, to return it purer and better than we received it from our forebears." - Einstein

The only way to have an ideal is to search your soul, and the only way to know your soul is to know God. It doesn't matter what God you subscribe to, but that you know Him as a LIVING God not a stone idol like gnostics like put. Because THAT is the God that stands at your forefront, your ideal. When Jesus said he who climbs up any other way but through Him is a robber and murderer, He was referring to that peace that may theirs; not because peace were a finite object, but because ignorance is a counsel to evil, the distancing of self from God. Is it any wonder you find the export of your soul to reflect what you've given import to?

So God becomes an idea that you tend toward? How do you determine qualities in each persons individual God?

>dude just sort yourself out lmao
Yes, it's all my fault. Everything's my fault. I'm just ignorant. I just have to change my point of view and the dildo will disappear from my rectum. I finally understand. How much are the cat-o'-nine-tails you're selling again?

On the occult side of traditionalism, Chaos Protocols is a good primer on surviving the modern age.

>The expanding material wealth makes the world better
No

The 48 Laws of Power

kek

>Modern world is shit
>uses his laptop to shitpost on a hentai forum

>implying any of us really want to be here

Spoken like a spoiled kid who knows no better.

dumb & dumber

Christianity is Crypto-Atheism. This reads like a Materialist's condemnation of Idealism, down to the pedestrian outlook and bad faith as means of avoiding terror.

All throughout History everyone believed they were living the best possible life in the best possible world.

A moose neither worries nor works.

your spiritual well being is your responsibility you fucking cunt.

>it teachers an automatic immortality which makes an end of a moral interpretation of history
>i have through so little about things in general that automatic immortality sounds good enough to detach me from this world

The common denominator of most Christian Hells is a definitive end to the suffering one does to one's self, and a final plane beyond which there is no greater suffering. Though this is very bad, it is actually not the worst possible model of terminal suffering. If the Human Spirit is indestructible and there is no Hell, then one could very well continue to inflict suffering onto one's self indefinitely. Moreover, if the Human Spirit is as described in Platonic or Gnostic vantage points, akin to a ray refracting from an endless source, then neither the quality nor the quantity of the suffering one does to one's self would have any conceivable limits. And, if Morality is indeed absolute, one's secondary suffering, that of knowing how much one has degraded one's self relative to one's Ideal, is also without conceivable limits.

Living a life of comfort in the first world due to the exploitation of the third world and rape of mother nature herself is kinda evil.

I don't think anyone would deny the material and technological success of the 21st century. What we're talking about is moral, spiritual, and cultural decline.

Mass immigration/multiculturalism, declining birth rates, higher rates of STD's, abortion, suicide, godlessness, the rise of Islam, hatred of White people, hatred of anything considered traditionally Western, hatred of tradition in general, widespread porn addiction, social isolation and alienation. I could go on.

Are you the jew that pops up in every thread about modernity being a soulless wasteland, the one from NYC that awaits some great technological/ideology-based (what ideology you never delve into) empire that spans the globe?

This is a good post. Notice how all the replies defending modernity in this thread are filled to the brim with bitterness and hostility to the poster? Not even the slightest attempt at a discussion. This says a lot about the ego denying to see what is.

Modern man in the West is a siloed, lobotomized individual that is always running away from himself through the billions of places he can hide in throughout the internet, the television, the smartphone, and so on. He has forgotten (if we ever really knew) what it means to be a human.

>Eventually I'll cut it loose

It's now or never, user. Really.

I think obesity is actually the biggest indicator of suffering in America. In most cases, you just don't respect yourself if you allow yourself to become fat.

You are a sensitive user. I like you. Good luck. The person you are replying to is so embittered it's almost not worth exposing yourself to their tirades.

>methods for fixing it

I agree with the quote by Geunon completely. There is no way to fight against a massive tidal wave; you can only attempt to survive it. The post WW2 myths are so strong that only some new and equally cataclysmic event will be able to make a new world.

So, what are you all doing to survive this time period? For myself, I want to setup enough passive income online where I do not have to work all day, stockpile guns, books, and seeds, and buy a nice comfy acreage outside a small town in the mountains in either Colorado, Idaho, or Montana, one with a very tight-knit community.

moar

Absolutely not. I am a Canadian who is an avid hunter, fisher, mushroom collector, naturalist, and biologist by trade (I am a post doc).

I have spent lots of time outdoors for work, research, and leisure activities. I am far from an urbanite and could never live in a place like NYC... but I understand how blessed we are in many ways.

I am an individualist. You think this world is killing your soul? Do something about it: go against the grain or blaze your own trail. Complaining on social media/an anonymous image board is literally the essence of what OP is supposedly against.

Millennials with a rampant sense of entitlement just complain about what they've been handed. It's pathetic. Grow a spine, cultivate a passion, or at least do something different.

Besides, stress encourages strength, creativity, etc. If the western world is so awful and painful, then this should drive people to new depths. Only mediocre prats fall turn to apathy with occasional sophomoric, impotent, "I'm going to run away!" outbursts.

Thank you for this ... OP is just some loser who can't bear the fact that the life his parents bought him doesn't accord with a life of wierdo cloistered mysticism

Fucking idiots

You are a part of God yourself. It is the ideal you seek. You already have the idea aspects by being in this thread. The ideal is that which enables you to be a more able-bodied vessel of service and blessing in your respective walk of life. In other words that which you're most suited for to make the world a better place. We are all a limb in the body of God, and so we all find our way to Him by using that which we have as we recieve it day by day. One day at a time.

>You have to be an individualist.
>So do what I tell you to do and be like I am.
>If you just get rid of everything you are you'll be happy.
Okay then.

You are ignorant for giving up before you start so yes, in a sense, it is your fault because you gave outlet to those those things which would convince you as such bt abusing your free will. But each day is a new opportunity like I said friend, to grab fast to that which you have and use it as a stepping stone to high ground again. Sometimes the highest of us are those who are the hardest to fall, and that's not entirely our fault. But once we have have heard the word. Once we know there is a way to redeem ourselves, we have no higher obligation than to permutate our intent to be in line with that which we hold as God. "For he who knows right and chooses to not do it, that thing is sin."

You all seem to take a lot from just a line or two OP said. Just since he said this current age is a "pile of shit" does not necessarily mean that he hates his own life or is not taking action to better himself.

Has it ever occurred to you two that one could be an individualist, care about himself, and at the same time also deeply care about the welfare of others and the direction the world is going in? Why are you being so black and white?

And there is nothing wrong with wanting to start a topic about this on an anonymous imageboard. All he did was ask for a brainstorming thread about how to either fix this age or how to survive it.

See the joke here is that you're trying to come off all buddy-buddy with me but all you're doing is repeating the same bullshit people say so others will shut up. You have no sensibility to the situation and no insight for me beyond some mysterious appeal to a higher force which will somehow empower me from the outside for taking charge of my life. And of course it's all on me (as always), meaning there's no reason for us to communicate nor anything to communicate. You won't lend an ear, but beating others down? That you're glad to do.

>Godlessness
>Rise of Islam

good post

Wow, you've definitely shown beyond any doubt that being a Westerner in 2017 beats the hell out of being a moose, during all four seasons.
Now do a Filipino transgender slam poet living in Portland vs. a really large trilobite.

I think the first step in achieving peace in the modern world is to detach yourself from materialism. I'm still new to my search for inner peace, but I think the root of misery stems from love of worldly pursuits.

People don't need to say that because this is not fucking reddit and the whole point of this fucking site is to remove identity from the equation. If you don't like it and youd prefwe a long candlelit internet wankoff with one particular fuccboi from the next door basement, all you have to do is go back.

>For myself, I want to setup enough passive income online where I do not have to work all day, stockpile guns, books, and seeds

Even though it is well-intended, I have my doubts about such materialistic escape plans. (Often thinking about this myself.)

Spiritual well-being is attained in spirit.

If the massive comfort offered by living in the first world is exactly the thing we are doubting, why should attaining maximum comfort be a way out?
Is this thinking of
if I could only become a millionaire"
or even
"if only one day I could work less and enjoy life more / take care of my spirit -- I’ll try working hard for that!"
not precisely what is keeping a lot of people in the rat race?

24 No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

25 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?

26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?

27 Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature?

28 And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin:

29 And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.

30 Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?

31 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed?

32 (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things.

33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

34 Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

If you think these are end times, user, it hardly matters if you are an online merchant and hope to use your money for some good. We all have to survive, and to be able to pursue spiritual endeavors you cannot be worrying constantly about survival. It's a contemplative life, and that either takes money or living bare bones as a hermit type or in a monastery.

"Worrying [constantly] about survival" is precisely a thing we have eliminated in the first world, whereas it still exists in e.g. the slums that have been mentioned earlier in this thread.

On the one hand, actual risk of dying from the hardships of life is very remote now; on the other, we are still afraid of our living standard lowering, even being as comfortable as we already are.

Becoming a millionaire and moving into contemplative isolation can not work for everyone -- I mean, ironically, everybody is already dreaming of "not having to work" anymore.
(Only most people are not only not talented enough, but also not disciplined enough to become rich. However, it is clear that slogging through hours of boring office work will have all but the most steadfast minds screaming for some kind of instant gratification in return, be it fast food, be it a TV series or just anything to spend money on.)

Of course it can still work for you personally.

But as a model for the civilization as a whole (which is also part of this thread’s topic), I believe it would be a more promising idea if people started cutting down on both their work hours and their expenses -- instead living more idealistically, chasing after concrete things they believe in (rather than millions of money to escape).

It is actually incredible how magically comfortable even a life on just a few hundred dollars (flat, food, internet) is, nowadays:
>Nutritionally rich, diverse assortment of food right from the super market.
>Have it nice and warm all year without having to buy wood or anything.
>As long as you have internet, you can read a lifetime’s worth of books, discussion and commentary for free.

>Manufacturing jobs shipped outside of the country.
>Automation rapidly replacing workers and will continue to do so exponentially.
>College grads drowning in debt after being encouraged to do so.
>People drowning in credit card debt after being encouraged to do so. (You need to establish good credit to buy a house etc...)
>Traditional family unit is destroyed. Husband and wife spend all of their liquid on hiring divorce lawyers, the children grow up in broken households.
>There is "freedom of the press" however, that does not imply a truthful press.
>Elderly are left to rot in nursing homes while being kept alive as long as possible. They are sacred cash cows for the nursing homes. (Billing Medicare perpetually)
>While there are numerous cheap goods at our disposal, it all stems from slave labor. Even then these "cheap goods" are feeling increasingly more expensive as wages go down and jobs are harder to find.
>Massive immigration problem that neither side truly wants to address.
>Racial problems the media perpetuates that left and right view as third rail.
>Lobbyists buying influence in government.
>Gerrymandering
>Infinite supply of splinter issues to argue over, while avoiding real issues.
Wooo hooo it's so magically comfortable.

It's 2017, if you aren't getting a uni degree and then fucking off to the third world to live off online business or some other source of location independent income then you are playing the game wrong.

Living in some apartment with a rooftop pool in Phnom Penh or Bangkok while spending most of your free time reading/developing your mind and spirit is the way to go. Fuck corporate 9-5 life.

You're 100% American thru and thru, right?
Can you guess how we can tell, taking into account everything else is your post is more or less exactly what a left-of-centre European could say/think?