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Innocence VS Experience - 9/6/2008 10:50:53 PM   
SKGisWHOiBE


Posts: 1
Status: offline 		William Blake, believed that children are born with the ability to see all things with fresh eyes. He believed that innocence, was what allows one to determine of themselves.

Experience, he believed, slowly replaces that innocence. It fills us with pre-conceptions, teaches us fear, anticipation, and other things.

He spent his life trying to maintain his "innocence"... now, I don't necessarily agree with everything he's ever said, but that specific idea hit me pretty hard.

My whole life, I've been defensive of the ideas of others, because I wanted to form my own. Now, that does not mean that I don't love to learn.

Socrates, through the writings of Aristole, taught me that when you try and teach something to someone that has no concept of what you're talking about... they can't possibly understand.

In Aristole's "Cave Myth" a man leaves a cave, in which all the others are strapped to chairs, heads forcefully facing a wall. Upon the wall, shadows fall, and these shadows, are what those people consider to be the "real world".

The man leaves the cave, sees the real world, and returns to try and explain to the people.

Their ignorance keeps them from believing the truth.

How are these related???

Innocence VS Experience is very dear to my hear, because as I see this world, this world of BDSM, I refuse to base it upon the experiences of others. I'm far more interested in cutting my own path, and seeing who starts to follow me.

The other part? Well... Explaining to anyone who I am, or what I'm like without experiencing, is just like the cave myth. I can try as much as I want to, but it's not like I really expect people to understand me.

Even meeting me, it's not like I expect to be able to explain EVERY idea in a way that is understandable.

But I try. I try to be clear, to clarify when I think it's necessary, and to be original in my thoughts.

I'd love to explain better, and perhaps this post makes no sense. However, I hope that it strikes at the core of everyone brave enough to fight their way through reading it.

- Stefan
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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/6/2008 10:59:29 PM   
Ialdabaoth


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Joined: 5/4/2008
From: Tempe, AZ
Status: offline 		I've always tried to maintain both innocence and experience. The author who opened my eyes to this concept was Robert Anton Wilson.

The idea is to accept everything openly, but maintain a healthy skepticism about it all - especially the parts you hold most dear. Be always willing to laugh at yourself and your own beliefs. Never give yourself or anyone else too much credit, but never expect too much certainty, either. Be willing to entertain multiple theories about your experiences simultaneously, and sort through these theories based on what's useful, not on what's "right".

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/6/2008 11:31:15 PM   
Daes


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Joined: 4/20/2007
From: Diamond Bar, SoCal
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Ialdabaoth

I've always tried to maintain both innocence and experience. The author who opened my eyes to this concept was Robert Anton Wilson.

The idea is to accept everything openly, but maintain a healthy skepticism about it all - especially the parts you hold most dear. Be always willing to laugh at yourself and your own beliefs. Never give yourself or anyone else too much credit, but never expect too much certainty, either. Be willing to entertain multiple theories about your experiences simultaneously, and sort through these theories based on what's useful, not on what's "right".


Thank you for that, it gave me something to ponder.

Wonderful OP ^_^


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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/6/2008 11:38:53 PM   
KnightofMists


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quote:

ORIGINAL: Ialdabaoth

I've always tried to maintain both innocence and experience. The author who opened my eyes to this concept was Robert Anton Wilson.



Looking at experience with innocence and looking at innocence with experience.  These things are not so easy to do.  Sometimes we need help.  but we will not accept such help until we are willing.

The OP gave some good thougths on the extremes of innocence vrs experience.  But like you I think we can try to do both.  For me... innocence is attempting to look at a give perspective from a different perspective.  This is one of the reasons I enjoy the forums... so many people look at a given sitaution differently.  From them I have an opportunity to learn.  However, one will never learn if all you are trying to do is validate your own view points gain with your own personal experience.  I have come to realize that my experience is not complete.. it is not all knowing that it is not even right all the time.  Sometimes my erperience completely useless and other times it can carry me.

I believe that one makes it easier to have innocence and experience working together when one is working on building two specific characteristics....

Love to learn.... learning just for the sake of learning.
Open-mindedness... this not about accepting... it's about actually challenging your own beliefs and values and ideas... looking for the proof as it where to prove yourself wrong.

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 12:00:04 AM   
ResidentSadist


Posts: 12580
Joined: 2/11/2007
From: a mean old Daddy, but I like you - Joni Mitchell
Status: offline 		If innocence means the ability to look at something with the full power of your awareness, unbiased by preconceived opinions and emotional filters, then I have spent my life maintaining "innocence" in many aspects of my life, personality and relationships.  I practice waiting “until the fat lady sings” before I form a judgment about something or someone new.

I have “blind spots” I adamantly maintain.  I do not want to comprehend things like jealousy, insecurity, suspicion, deceit and bias towards people and things I have yet to experience.  I want to meet new people and new experiences with the open heart and open mind of a child. 

I don’t even want to understand the more complex aspects of the new social order in the BDSM community.  I want to remain an innocent dinosaur that lives in a simple world where the line that defines *my* role and duty in life is clearly drawn. 

Sometimes when I read about the modern social and relationship confusions on these forums, I feel like I’m from an age gone by.  The rules I choose to live by and people I’ve chosen to befriend or make my family are a simple and innocent lot.  I was very young when my parents gave me a very in-depth the explanation of the expression “innocence is bliss.” 

I was in my twenties and living a poly TPE lifestyle.  A fellow intellectual who was living a monogamous vanilla lifestyle asked me how I could be so dumb about women and relationships yet maintain more than one lover.  It was a very sincere and heartfelt question from someone very close to me.  So close, I gave my blessing to his desire for a relationship with my younger sister.  He was the main geek for the postmaster general and saving his money to invest in a house and planning his financial retirement.  In his eyes I was “squandering” my income from the medical clinics on limousines, recording studios, a rock and roll band, a house full of “loose” bisexual women and to top it all off I spent my genius studying and becoming an audio engineer, musician and writer in the unstable music industry.  He felt I was squandering my intellect and emotional life as well.  I literally told him “ I chose to be stupid about some things long ago because innocence is bliss”.  I asked him if he was happy and he said yes.  I told him I was happy too and that was all that mattered.  Different value systems for different people… like the cavemen you mention that cannot comprehend that which is outside their experience.    

You mention that innocence lets you see with fresh eyes and allows you to determine things for yourself.  It is those fresh eyes and my ability to look at things unfiltered by my own experience that makes me a good counselor to my friends, an open minded and passionate relationship partner and a creative force for the people and projects I become involved with. 

It takes a lot of experience to maintain the innocence . . . thank you for your post and the deep thoughts.  That is one hell of a first post.  You must lead a charmed life!

< Message edited by ResidentSadist -- 9/7/2008 12:03:11 AM >

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 3:18:22 AM   
zakkan


Posts: 606
Joined: 4/15/2008
Status: offline 		I thought the cave myth was Socrates through Plato? In 'Republic'?

Anyhow, if we are talking about the same myth, the man that escapes from the cave goes through a painful awakening. He was in pain and confused about all he saw until he adapted. And when he went back to the cave, he had to adapt back to the darkness of the cave, so when the others saw how troubled he was, they naturally did not want to follow him.

I agree that we should not expect anyone to understand us. After all, people like to stick to what they are comfortable with. And in time they will find their own way out of the cave, but then you can't be sure if they'll see the same things you do, and everyone will argue about who actually escaped the cave.

That's the trouble with these philosophy analogies Always no definite answer.  


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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 4:43:28 AM   
LATEXBABY64


Posts: 2107
Joined: 4/8/2004
Status: offline 		how about this there was darkness thien god whispered man knew he was not alone in the universe

know your one spec on the cosmic plane of  things

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 4:50:28 AM   
cankles


Posts: 59
Joined: 8/18/2006
Status: offline 		dude, how the hell are you wearing a Yankees hat and a Pats hat in different pictures?

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 5:17:37 AM   
daddysliloneds


Posts: 1351
Joined: 6/28/2006
Status: offline 		on one hand, that would explain why so many tops/doms and wannabe's are jumping on the band-wagon for the fresh meat that the innocent and inexperienced bottoms/subs have to offer; i always thought it was because they were so naive that they wouldn't know any better than to follow...

and on the other hand, if the whole philosophical musings of innocence vs experience, as you defined it, were true, then so many bottoms/subs wouldn't be looking for the experienced tops/doms.

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 7:08:36 AM   
DesFIP


Posts: 25191
Joined: 11/25/2007
From: Apple County NY
Status: offline 		As far as not learning from others. I've always maintained that life is too short to make all possible mistakes yourself. Smart people do learn from others.

You can go out and rob an old lady, and go to jail, in order to learn that's not a smart thing to do. Or you can learn about morality and civilization from others.

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 7:12:55 AM   
rookey


Posts: 100
Status: offline 		'Good judgement comes from experience, experience comes from bad judgement.' 
Experience brings about  preconceptions, preconceptions are necessary to form correct judgements. 

How otherwise would one know if a decision was right or wrong, if one has no understanding of right or wrong? 
Right understanding is a necessary pre-requisite for right decisions and right action. 

Hence innocence is a state of mind that precludes the ability to form correct judgements. 


However one's own personal experience is limited and limited experience can only produce limited understanding.
From personal experience people make inferences (a.k.a. preconceptions) and later use them as a basis to make decisions. 

People sometimes overvalue their own preconceptions, even if they don't always match up with reality and still use as a decision-making basis.
Wrong understanding can only lead to wrong decisions and wrong action.

Hence dogma is a state of mind that precludes the ability to form correct judgements. 


Hence the necessity and utility of open-mindedness.  That is the willingness to learn from others.

To learn about the world requires one to examine it from the perspective of others. 
To engage with the ideas of others.

However one can have too much of a good thing.  Too much open-mindedness can lead back to innocence. 
Confident decision-making requires confidence in the preconceptions they are, at least partly, based upon.


Hence the necessity and utility of sceptism.  Believe when you see it.

To appreciate, though not necessarily agree with, the world-view of others.
To improve one's own understanding requires a willingness to learn from the experience of others. 

But to do this wisely is to do this sceptically, to engage with so-called evidence-based reasoning. 


There will always exist a mis-match between our preconceptions and the reality of the world we must deal with. 
But this mis-match can be improved by critically assessing our own individual preconceptions.


Just my....










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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 7:14:52 AM   
Raechard


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Joined: 3/10/2007
From: S.E. London U.K.
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quote:

ORIGINAL: SKGisWHOiBE
I'm far more interested in cutting my own path, and seeing who starts to follow me.


Could you respect anyone who followed you in the context of all the other things you just said?

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RE: Innocence VS Experience - 9/7/2008 8:43:31 AM   
candystripper


Posts: 3486
Joined: 11/1/2005
Status: offline 		Well, I have a lot of reactions to the Op.  One is to get a copy of something written by William Blake, LOL.
 
I don't really remember being 'innocent'; I do remember being 'ignorant' or as others might phrase it 'naieve'.  I knew from a very early age that evil walks and talks and sits down to dinner, just like regular folk.  That sort of took the 'shine' out of my eyes.
 
For a brief moment after I discovered D/s, i tthought 'O, goodey!  This is where all the good men hang out!', but that passed in a day or so.
 
I no longer even think of myself as 'experienced', since there's too little of what I've known that aids me now.  I guess, perhaps, I am somewhat 'innocent', in the sense the Op seemed to use the word, as I have very few fixed beliefs about people or what I am 'becoming'.
 
candystripper 

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