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C O N T R O L S Y
S T E M S
The Inner Dictator:
How to Think Bad Things
Written
by Swami Lego Ver,
exclusively for Anxiety Culture
As you’ve probably noticed, there is a
lot of resentment going around: political, ideological,
economic and personal. Much of it seems justified.
It also appears very contagious.
I tell my celebrity clients that no matter
how justified their resentment seems,
the effect on their health is still bad. And
while forgiveness looks like an antidote, the
moment they think they should forgive,
their resentment grows.
Recommending forgiveness upsets people and
it’s bad for business – so I don’t
mention it. I instead give my clients instructions
to calm down. In my soft guru voice, I say to
them:
Could you sit quietly and let go of your
responsibilities for a moment?
Could you relax and let go of wanting to
change things?
Just for a moment, could you let go of wanting
to control yourself?
If they have problems relaxing, I have them
visualise their servants, chauffeurs and lawyers
taking care of all the troublesome things. Then
I continue:
Could you trust billions of years of evolution
to produce in you normal, natural states such
as anger, fear, cowardice and greed, which can
be embarrassing and awkward for a person of
your high standing?
Could you feel a pleasurable lack of trust
in your ability to control these embarrassing
and awkward states?
Could you feel a pleasant sense of relief
from letting go, just for a moment, of wanting
to control everything?
Once the client is sufficiently relaxed, I
start to work on their resentment. First I get
them to think of a person they resent, and I
suggest that they welcome the feeling of resentment.
Generally, we are too controlling; our minds
are like dictatorships – everything, inside
and out, has to be controlled. Most of my clients
are politically liberal, but since they run
their brains like totalitarian regimes, they
deal with resentment in the same way that they
deal with everything else – by attempting
to control it. To ease up on controlling resentment,
just welcome it instead. Let it develop naturally
into a grudge.
If you resist the resentment, it will just
launch a coup d’état in your
head anyway. So just let it exist. I say to
my clients:
Could you let this person exist in a way
you resent?
Could you let go of wanting to control them,
for a moment?
When you grant people the right to be obnoxious,
and you let go of wanting to control their annoying
behaviour, sometimes your resentment seems to
spontaneously dissolve. This is a mistaken perception
– the resentment hasn’t dissolved,
it’s just been postponed for a while. I
recommend that you allow your resentment to
linger. Reserve a little area of your brain
where you can store grudges.
It’s possible to sincerely believe that
“love is the answer” and still hold
grudges. That’s because the human brain
is complex and can accommodate a multitude of
mental states. And, by definition, we experience
only one mental state at a time. In other words,
saints don’t exist and the guru game is
a con. Love, saintliness and wisdom occasionally
manifest, but only for a while before pettiness
and stupidity reappear. People who manifest
wisdom relatively frequently all seem to agree
that the most one can hope for over the course
of a lifetime is to become a little kinder.
And perhaps to think more clearly. The rest
is guru bullshit, but it’s good for business.
Some people get confused about this. For example,
they worry about ethics and morals – they
think ethical codes about behaviour should
also dictate how we think. They therefore
feel that it’s wrong to think “bad”
things. This is a recipe for a totalitarian
psychology – an inner dictatorship.
To give an example: We have social rules about
honesty and politeness. But politeness often
means social lying (we tacitly agree to lie
to each other – eg “I had a nice time”
– to save time and energy). If you internalised
the rules about honesty and politeness, your
psychology would have to become extremely narrow
and controlling (basically neurotic) to exclude
all the psychological functions that aren’t
both polite and honest.
(Many people who rigidly internalise the kind
of qualities we’re supposed to exhibit
– duty, responsibility, selflessness, rectitude,
etc – end up with clinical depression).
So, my message to my clients is: Loosen
up your psychology. Play around with the contents
of your mind in ways that completely ignore
what you “should” or “shouldn’t”
do. Feel free to commit sins inside your own
head.
As the dark saying goes, “Everything is
permitted, nothing is true”. Make the most
of your psychological freedom while you can.
I guarantee that God won’t strike you down
for thinking bad things.*
Unreasonable Happiness
For example, we believe that our level of happiness
“should” reflect, in a reasonable
way, the circumstances in our lives. We “should”
be unhappy at a funeral; we “should”
be happy at getting promoted, etc. But there
are an infinite number of reasons in the world
to be unhappy (or happy). Why limit your choice
to your own immediate circumstances? Your mind
is free to rove the universe of space-time for
a reason to be happy (or unhappy). In fact,
you don’t even need a reason, you can just
practice being happy or unhappy in a way that
disregards circumstances. (Neuro-Linguistic
Programming claims you can experience happiness
by just remembering the mental and physiological
states you associate with happiness).
(Note: Unless you’re from the cerebrally-challenged
right, the idea that happiness needn’t
depend on circumstances doesn’t seem like
a very good argument for appallingly low wages,
poverty, shit jobs, cutbacks in welfare, lousy
public services and endless war).
What does all this have to do with “control
systems”? Well, the control system is what
makes people react to circumstances in a socially
acceptable way. Social expectations, laws and
rules, etc, have their place… externally.
But internally only your own rules can
apply. It might be a good idea to behave
like a “responsible citizen” (at least
when people are watching), but it’s not
a good idea to think or emote
like one.
This seems like good news to me. It’s
an official** licence for you to use your ingenuity
to convert your brain into a pleasure generator,
without any social guilt.
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