Conversations For Transformation: Essays Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

Conversations For Transformation

Essays By Laurence Platt

Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

And More




You Don't Only Take A Stand When The Odds Are In Your Favor

Big 3, Sonoma, California, USA

August 6, 2014



"We cannot put off living until we are ready. The most salient characteristic of Life is its coerciveness: it is always urgent, here and now  without any possible postponement. Life is fired at us point blank."
 ... Jose Ortega y Gasset read out loud by  
This essay, You Don't Only Take A Stand When The Odds Are In Your Favor, is the prequel to Essays - Eleven Years Later: Unimaginable.




When I first began writing these Conversations For Transformation, my modus operandi  was publishing a piece to the internet whenever I (in my assessment) had written something worth sharing. It was sporadic back then. Writing something worth sharing was dependent on my mood  at the time. It determined the content of what I wrote, the quality of what I wrote, as well as whether or not I wrote anything at all. There was no commitment  to write "no matter what"  ie there was no commitment to push through whatever got in the way of writing something worth sharing, or which got in the way of writing anything at all. There was no promise  to publish. If my mood wasn't conducive to writing or if it got in the way, I waited for it to pass - however long it took. To me, that was all part of the creative process.

Now, it needs to be said: there's nothing wrong with mood by itself in its own time. You wouldn't be human without it. However, professing to write Conversations For Transformation dictated by mood, is a non-starter. It's not where they come from. It's a no op, the pursuance of which is a fundamental and naïve conflict of interest.

Committing to write / promising to publish no matter what, is (I discovered) light years away from writing and publishing when the mood strikes or when I feel like it. When committing to write / promising to publish these Conversations For Transformation, morphed  into committing to write / promising to publish twice a week at the same time each week on schedule, that's when they broke free of constraints of mood, and began to tap into pure creativity on demand at will. That's when they really took off and started to soar. That's when one thousand essays and a million views with one thousand new website views per essay, became a real possibility.

The body of work on this website, this Conversations For Transformation internet series of essays, is my acknowledgement of Werner Erhard who introduced me to transformation. It's also an expression of my stand for the possibility of real, thrilling, alive transformation in the life of every human being. What generating this has shown me is: taking a stand is a Self-empowered and Self-contained act. If circumstances (mood, in the case of this particular conversation) appear to get in the way of taking a stand, I've gradually opened myself to confronting that whatever it is I'm taking, isn't  a stand. Taking a stand, by its nature, doesn't require circumstances to align. It doesn't require any particular mood. My ability to take a stand (when I'm fully present to its enormous, sublime power) doesn't require anything other than my say so  in the matter. Our say so in the matter, our language, is the access to the miraculous. Taking a stand in the matter is the access to the miraculous.

<aside>

When I say "miraculous"  in this context, I'm not saying it the same way as all those bibles say it. I'm saying it in a way which is simple, transparent, pragmatic, and useful. Indeed I'm saying it in a way which is possibly the same way as all those bibles intended to say it before they became clouded by undistinguished über-interpretation.

In this context I'm saying it Werner's way: that which is miraculous validates who you really are rather than diminishes who you really are.

<un-aside>

You don't wait to take a stand. And if you do, there'd be no point. It does no good to wait. There's no better time to take a stand than now. Now is  the only time to take a stand. Listen: if there were  a better time to take a stand, then taking a stand would be dependent on circumstances - and that's not what taking a stand is. You take a stand by taking a stand  regardless of the circumstances. It's what differentiates taking a stand from any action which commences only when determined by the mood striking or whenever I feel  like it. So if these (or any others') Conversations For Transformation are ever not  the expression of taking a stand, then they're immediately and automatically disqualified from being Conversations For Transformation. Gee! I hope you get that. I don't know why  it's that way. It just is that way.

You don't wait for the right time  to take a stand: this is the right time (in any case, taking a stand happens out of time). The mood doesn't have to be conducive to taking a stand, and neither do you have to feel  like taking a stand - even if you did, it's likely that wouldn't be a stand worth taking anyway. As for waiting before taking a stand and proceeding only when success is assured? That's a chickenshit  way to take a stand. You don't only take a stand when the odds are in your favor.

This is a realm of real power. It's the fulcrum on which leveraging making a lasting, sustainable difference becomes possible. It's what can literally change the world. It was Margaret Mead who said "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.".



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