I have recently been reading Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, which is a modern classic and which, in my opinion, is one of the better books on practical psychology available today. Flow, in short, is the psychological state induced by tackling of problems in the accomplishment of certain ends. It is almost (but not quite) the dhyana of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali: when the mind recieves an unbroken flow of concentration on any object. In Flow, the object is the work at hand.
It is then a theory of teleological ethics; like the ethics of Aristotle, who is invoked in the first sentence of the book, its end is not success in the usual sense of the word, but happiness. In agreement with all sages, from Plato to Freud, that neither wealth, nor simple pleasure, nor honors and medals, are what we seek. What we seek is happiness — and moments of flow are when people feel the most happy.
It is quite correct, then, to call Flow a kind of Karma Yoga (that is, Union by Work) as described in the Bhagavad Gita.
There is a very, very good short article in Psychology Today by the same author, on The Creative Personality which is something like a briefer course to the book; it is also quite good. It is somewhat interesting to note, from the theoretical perspective, that Csikszentmihalyi (what a name) is not afraid to invoke “libido” in the Freudian sense of the term, writing:
One manifestation of energy is sexuality. Creative people are paradoxical in this respect also. They seem to have quite a strong dose of eros, or generalized libidinal energy, which some express directly into sexuality. At the same time, a certain spartan celibacy is also a part of their makeup; continence tends to accompany superior achievement. Without eros, it would be difficult to take life on with vigor; without restraint, the energy could easily dissipate.
It is also interesting to note that this is, essentially, the same theory which is espoused by every sect of æscetic mystics, that “without restraint, the energy could easily dissipate”. But sexuality in the end has little to do with the theory of Flow, per se, and the doctrines of æscetic mystics or, for that matter, of Freud, are not required hypotheses.
At any rate, I find the theory of Flow, as Csikszentmihalyi gives it, to be among the best of the "pop psychology" books, and I recommend it to anyone whose life seems — a waste.
Made some small fixes to my Wayfarer's Guide to Norrath, mainly to the styling. The site is in disarray; and RPGExpert seems to have added a bunch of perplexing ASP.net code that has bloated every page to many times its ideal weight.
So far, I have only fixed Part I and Part II, although I do have a basic CSS template which works to make things easier.
The above is, perhaps, the way it would be stated in the terms of a play in Steve Jackson Games' Illuminati: New World Order.
In a major, major development (see the Washington Post article, The White House's Immune Deficiency), the Supreme Court has flatly rejected...
“over their refusal to cooperate with an investigation into the politicization of the Justice Department, including the mass firings of U.S. attorneys in 2006.”
...the White House's “excessively broad and legally
insufficient claims of 'absolute immunity' — never recognized by any
court — in declining to appear.”
The import of this is that Karl Rove and other high-ranking Bush officials have been subpoenad by Congress, and refused for the above reason; this gives Congress the ability to holding them in contempt of Congress,
Following a contempt citation, the person cited is arrested by the Sergeant-at-Arms for the House or Senate, brought to the floor of the chamber, held to answer charges by the presiding officer, and then subjected to punishment as the chamber may dictate (usually imprisonment for punishment reasons, imprisonment for coercive effect, or release from the contempt citation.) — Wikipedia
What this means is that the Supreme Court has agreed with the Congress that members of the Bush Administration, including Karl Rove, can be punished for contempt of Congress. It is a sign that the Supreme Court will not protect the Administration from prosecution, and I believe it is a very promising measure of the political culture of our nation.
Iustus et Iusticus in Victoriam!
In the process of setting up an archive of the posts on this blog, I seem to have destroyed the whole text of them — irrevocably.
Oops. Shit. Well ... this was intended to be a “New Start” to the page. I guess it is now...
I beat Akuma today in Street Fighter III Second Impact: Giant Attack; not only that, but I got a Perfect off him! Now, be it noted that I was playing Ryu, who is, I feel, a much stronger and sleeker character than my favorite, “Proto-Shoto-” Sean.
For my efforts, I took the top spot on the high-score list (reaching the complex prerequisites to fighting Akuma assure this) and got a little “t’ien” symbol next to my high score and my name †.
The next game I played, I chose Yun and promptly got my ass handed to me. Figures.
† I accidentally entered as “CDC ” as opposed to my customary “DED”.
P.S. 8/06/08 1819. Spent some time cleaning up a few little typo- graphical issues; fixed the title font and centered it in its box, added (for once) images in the main article text — and you have no idea how annoying it was to get things to line up. Have also made a few other changes. But really, until I have access to better graphics- manipulation software, the design and layout of this page are for the time being fixed.
In the meantime, I think I am going to save some of the "best of" blog posts and put them on their own page (just not today); this thing is getting way too bloated for my liking, although the stats are fine.