📜 notes/journals/2021_10_11.md (contribution by @forshaper) ☆ 📎

From "The Scribes and Scholars of Ancient Mesopotamia". In [[Sumer]], [[scribes]] (who formed the [[bureaucracy]]) were typically male children of the upper class. They were the children of [[kings]], [[priests]], [[merchants]], governors, ambassadors, and occasionally scribes. collapsed:: true
- Clay envelopes were marked with the signs of witnesses to verify the transaction inscribed within.
- Metal was reserved as a medium of record only for royalty.
- Wax-on-wood boards were used frequently, and could be erased. The ‘tablet of life’ was sometimes shown as a wax-covered board where the [[god]] Nabu recorded the actions of kings and their sons. Some wax boards were attached with hinges, like a book. While papyrus was available, it was not widely used due to a lack of alphabet (as opposed to cuneiform signs.
- Scribes were trained in a tablet house. A [[school]] for scribes. They were taught the proper way to use language, literature, mathematics (to include surveying), and music.
- Sumerian stayed as the [[language]] of [[scribes]] long after the language of [[diplomacy]] had become Assyrian. The more solid or eternal a medium of living is, the less inclined it is to change.
- The proper structuring of language was learned first. Once it was learned, other subjects were built on it.
Two things stop [[flow]]: a [[habit]] of keeping some muscles in [[tension]] and [[resistance]] toward [[movement]] that your tension was not shaped by.
[[Stress]] that is not habituated to results in muscular growth with lots of [[tension]] that is designed to protect us when we are stuck in a relatively confined position.
[[Flow]] is not something that is built, it is something that comes from a pouring out.
You can’t [[hunt]] flow. You simply get out of the way of it. [[Tension]] is a [[choice]].
Your favored [[priors]] compete with your ability to [[perceive]].
One step to helping [[flow]] is to notice when you stop it by noticing your [[fixations]].
The more you let your [[fixations]] control all of you, the less [[agency]] you feel.
Ongoing [[tension]] comes from a [[perception]] of a [[threat]] that has not been addressed. Accept that the threat was there and let it resolve.
When you have undergone [[change]], others find it a [[threat]] because they cannot [[predict]] you by using your old patterns. This is especially true if you have become more [[capable]]. However, if they are your [[family]] they will stay, and staying, they may learn how to let go of their own [[fixations]].
When you give up a [[mask]], it threatens to unmask others. Which is why they will try their best to get you to keep it on.
If you don’t try to define others, and you don’t [[identify]] them with their [[fear]], it helps them overcome their fears.
A [[mask]] you are especially attached to becomes [[heavy]] rusted [[armor]].
When we have an [[attachment]] to a [[mask]], we become [[comfortable]] with it. We define ourselves by what we are proudly not, rather than what we are.
You were born graceful, as a baby. Your [[breathing]] was perfect. You learned how to [[control]] your breathing, and your structure, in a way that stops [[flow]].
If your [[breathing]] is off, you may attend to [[movement]] and structural [[alignment]]. If your movement is off, you may attend to structural alignment and breathing. If your structural alignment is off, you may attend to movement and breathing.
[[Tension]] creates a lot of [[thought]].
When you sense excess [[tension]], [[breathe]] in and release all tension that you do not need for whatever you’re doing. Use the bare minimum of tension.
[[Flow]] only stops because we try to stop it or we’ve forgotten how let ourselves flow.
[[Soviet]] psychology was aware that academic excellence meant simply someone who could study well.
When you assume a [[stance]] or a skill, you typically mimic a static snapshot. Let whatever it is flow, rather than stand still.
If you trust in a pattern like a move or a technique, you are not trusting yourself.
You can’t actually analytically break down a [[technique]]. It’s just a snapshot. What works in one second does not work in the next.
Having [[agency]] is scary, because it means you’re [[responsible]] for what will happen.
[[Fear]] of [[change]] was a primary [[block]] for [[athletes]] in the [[Soviet]] [[Olympic]] program.
In the [[Soviet]] view, strength of stimulus to change/strength of conservation against change=[[change]].
[[Pain]] is a [[catalyst]] for [[change]]. Change will not happen if pain is not faced.
[[Pleasure]] is conservative to change, because it results in wanting to prolong the pleasure. So it [[fixates]] you in stability.
N. Boyko of Kiev University noted that rats that were occasionally given painful shocks of electricity grew faster than those who were not shocked, and had more assertive behaviors later in their lives.
You have to know your [[limits]] to transcend them. collapsed:: true
- Notice when your personal records are in any skill- patience, climbing, hunger, DotA, and then let yourself exceed them.