Learning Through Adversity

Any knowledge that is not rooted in experience is suspect. One sentence that boils the essence of a Praxis to it's most basic wording.

The issue with most of humanity is putting stock in their own opinions and what one thinks about any subject. There is even a delightful selection of labels to choose from, that let people know how you think about things. Most are bound to these rather Democrat, Republican, Christian or Satanist. A label based on thought, rather than action.

But what do most do? What is their true knowledge? Do these labels for thinking in a Super Serial manner indicate who that individual is?

As I interact with others, I see most of these terms of identification are meaningless to most. Is there a difference between a Democrat and a Republican? Not really. What about a Christian and a Satanist? Not for most. I despise it.

I have never really cared what "affiliation " one claims as long as they are living it, applying the philosophical constructs they espouse, in their daily lives. I can't stand a lying, cheating, selfish Christian, the same as I can't stand Satanists who still espouse morality, living within the law and the upholding of society's values over the individual and self sovereignty.

It annoys me because anything I truly believe I live. My life has been complicated, difficult, full of just as much success as failure, mind twisting at it's most difficult, full of heartbreak, strife, and adversity, but I have survived all of it. Grown stronger due to the hardship.

The funny thing about learning through real adversity, is you don't become "nice " or "good." You become harder, more willing to do whatever it takes to survive, to thrive, to do better. You lose the comfort of depending on others, rather society or people, in favor of you and your own judgment.

One year ago, I joined SIN. So I could interact with Satanists. I learn better by doing and interacting, not reading. Things I read have to relate to my life, or I don't really "get it." If I can find a mental bridge between the idea being presented and my own life, it clicks pretty quickly.

Finding and exploring Satanism has been the single most liberating experience of my life. I lacked the language to explain my own personal philosophical thoughts. Satanism has always felt more like RE-membering,  than learning something knew. I said on the Ooze once, "I feel like I am remembering what I always knew. " That still rings true.

At the end of the day, rhetoric is just rhetoric, opinions are just opinions, ideas are just ideas, and it's mostly meaningless bullshit.  Knowledge is a personal thing, based on experience, not what others know or think. Let your Satanism bleed out, color and affect every aspect of your life. I firmly believe there is no aspect of life that is free from being infected. No part of my life where I don't apply that Praxis, nothing that isn't altered by my own knowledge and experience.

FS3.0