FAQ and Article Updates

Old wrote: Welcome to TOTJO's Initiate Studies Programme.
The Initiate Programme is the first step to study Jediism at Temple of the Jedi Order.

You do not need to have submitted an Application or be a member of the Temple if you wish to begin this training.

We strongly encourage people to read the FaQ before they begin studying at the Temple.

Posting ‘I NEED A MASTER’ will get you nowhere and your post will be deleted. The only way to get into an Apprenticeship is to get on with the Initiate Programme and complete it. A prerequisite of Apprenticeship is holding the rank of "Initiate", which can only be attained by completing the Initiate Programme.

To prevent people from rushing through the Initiate Programme to completion we will only grant the rank of Initiate after 60 days of study or contribution (in the form of "chat" or forum posts) has been recorded since you began the Initiate Programme. This waiting period is to encourage patience, because becoming a Jedi Knight will likely take longer than a year. If you are serious about becoming a Jedi then you will be just as serious after 60 days, but this time will give you greater insight into the Temple and our training programme.

If You Are Under 18
If you are under the age of 18 years, we ask you to first introduce yourself, by sending a private/personal message (PM), to a Youth Officer and follow their instructions. For more information about this please read this section of the Youth FaQ.

Our Youth Officers were carefully selected and need to be made aware of you for legal reasons.

Following Instructions
If you have completed the Initiate Programme and are awaiting a Training Master to take you on as an Apprentice we advise that you spend some of that time completing the bonus parts of the exercises.

Without meaning to sound rude, we know who has read and followed the instructions, simply by the questions they ask. Important information can be found on this page, the Front Page and the FaQ.

Please invest a few moments of your time reading this information if you have not done so already.

IP Team
The Temple operates an Initiate Programme Team who contact new Novices.

Introduce Yourself
First of all we ask you to introduce yourself. This is done in the Introduce Yourself forum so others can greet you and welcome you to our Order; we are a friendly community and we enjoy greeting new people. We also encourage you to select an avatar and fill in your profile information. One of the best ways to meet people is through the forum, the wall, and chat.

Create a Personal Journal
The easiest way to start a 'Personal Journal' is to make your first post about yourself. Where you have come from, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and what you hope to achieve, or what changes you would like to see in yourself. You are even welcome to talk about your hobbies and interests etc, this can be as personal and in-depth as you would like. We will read your posts, but you may one day go back and reread what you have written. This will allow you to see how you might have changed since you have joined TotJO. These posts might one day be a "letter to yourself".

In the New Members forum, there is a section called Journals. Go there to create your own Journal and click on the 'NEW TOPIC' button to create the thread. We advise giving the new thread a title that will easily identify the thread as being your journal. For example if your username is 'Jimbo' then we suggest you call the thread "Jimbo's Journal"... And fill the message box with your Journal Introduction.

The Journal is where all your answers to the Initiate Programme exercises should be posted. It’s similar to a diary in some ways, and like an exercise book in others. The purpose of this Journal is simply for you to have somewhere to post your work, whereby yourself, and potential Training Masters, can easily access it. You will more than likely continue to use the same Journal should you be taken as an Apprentice by a Training Master. Some people continue to use their Journal even long after Knighthood and beyond.

While our servers are reliable we encourage everyone to create a back-up of their work, because if your work is lost then we will require you to re-do it.

Purpose of the Initiate Programme and Journaling
The Initiate Programme teaches you some of the basic fundamental ideas present within our Temple. If you wish to become an Apprentice a Training Master will use your journal to see if they feel a connection with you and if they are able to teach you.

The material in the Initiate Programme is not doctrinal. The ideas in the material can explain some of the doctrine, but they are for teaching purposes only and need to be looked at critically and with an open mind.

Nothing in life is black or white and for these exercises there are no right or wrong answers as such. The point is for you to tell us your views on the material and thus give a potential Training Master a better understanding of you. Your journal will be one of the ways in which all members in the Temple come to know who you are as a person.

You may discover that you disagree with some of the points made by the authors within the material of the Initiate Programme; if you disagree with something they say you must give an explanation of why this is so. You are not required to agree with everything, and it is unlikely that you will, but you must explain why you do not share the same view just as much as you must explain why you do share that view.

To get the most out of the Initiate Programme you must ensure that the work is your own and done from the heart. It is likely the you will need to do some deep thinking and soul searching while studying the material and this is entirely normal and even encouraged.

Copying and plagiarizing other people's work is not allowed. Of course you can quote someone but you still have to do the lessons yourself. If you do cheat then in the more in-depth stages of your development you will lack the fundamental wisdom behind what is being taught and will not progress any further. All cheats eventually just lose interest or are discovered in time. This is your training for your benefit. Jedi value effort. What kind of Jedi do you want to be?

Every journal post will be read by members, but a lack of responses in your journal does not mean that your journal is not being read. Members will generally not post in your journal, because posting in journals, while not banned, is highly discouraged. Some of the following reasons are:

Posting in journals by a member with great experience might make you mistakenly believe that their view is definitely true.
Posting in journals can and has led to people changing the way they post thinking it might please a specific person or get them noticed.
Posting can make it harder for a potential Training Master to read and check your journal because additional posts can make it incredibly cluttered.
Posting in journals can also confuse that journal owner's line of reasoning with another's.
You are not in a competition to complete your journal the fastest and there is no need to 'bump' your journal to remind us it is there as we keep records.

If you are stuck on a particular lesson and wish to understand it further, we encourage you to make a new thread and discuss it in one of our General Forums.

Do the Lessons have to be Completed in Order?
Lessons in the Initiates Programme do not have to be completed in the order they are presented.

Self Help and Research
Exercises later in the Programme will require you to be self-sufficient in information seeking. We are aiming to have you find your own information so you can find the truth of matters for yourself. History is written by the victors, but there is always more than one side to any story. In order for any of us to make our minds up on a matter, we all need to know as much as we can without relying on others to fill in the blanks for us.

Privacy
We advise people to read the FaQ: Privacy.

Your Journal will ony be visible to registered users, search engines will not index it.

How to Post Your Answers
Please make sure you post a reply to your journal rather than starting a new thread for each exercise.

We ask you to follow a set format when making new entries, though we do not insist on the programme being followed in any particular order. At the start of each post, or the beginning of each exercise and lesson, please follow this example:

Lesson 1, Part 1 - The Hero's Adventure

This way it is clear what you’re talking about and a lot easier for the people who check your work to keep up.

To avoid any accidental mistakes we suggest you proof read your work before submitting it and also suggest you use a spell checker. We would also ask for correct punctuation and grammar where possible.

We are a multi-language organisation and you may use whichever language you wish in your journal. The majority of members here speak English as a first or second language, so, while it is not required, you may receive more help and feedback if there is another translation of your work.

If you are studying the Initiate Programme and have the status of "Temple Member" (the bar beneath your avatar displays as "Member" rather than Guest"), and posted your first lesson, please contact Br. John so your rank can be updated, as it is not an automatic process. If you are not a "Temple Member", but have sent in your application, your rank/status will change when your application is processed.

Novice status/rank is for those who have submited an application.

If you would just like your progress to date checked then please ask any active Knight to look over your journal. A word of warning, not all Knights teach directly or already have a full schedule, so there is a chance a Knight may ask you to ask another Knight. Also, it may take a day or so for them to respond, as availability varies, so patience is important.

How to Use Our Materials
We realise that some people learn in different ways so some of our materials will be available as audio, video and text formats; you are free to use whichever version you prefer.

Please do not 'stream' the files from the server; we would prefer that you downloaded them which can be done by right-clicking on the link and selecting the 'save as' option and saving it onto your computer.

If the material is not currently available in our library then the material should be available elsewhere, such as a public library or a bookstore or available online.

Bonus Material
Bonus material is included in many of the lessons. All parts, except bonus parts, of the lesson must be completed to finish the Initiate Programme. These parts are here for your benefit as many include teachings that you might find valuable.

New wrote: Back to Beginning

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Welcome to the Temple of the Jedi Order's (TotJOs) Initiate Programme (IP).
The IP is the first step to becoming a Jedi Knight at TotJO, you do not need to have submitted an Application or be a member of our Temple if you wish to do the IP. We encourage people to invest time reading the FaQ before they begin studying at TotJO.

There is no prize for completing the IP quickly and to prevent people from rushing through the IP we will only grant the rank of Initiate after 60 days of study or contribution to the Temple. This waiting period is to encourage patience, because becoming a Knight will likely take longer than a year. If you are serious about becoming a Jedi then you will be just as serious after 60 days, but this time will give you greater insight into our community and our teachings.

If You Are Under 18
If you are under the age of 18 years, we ask you to first introduce yourself, by sending a private/personal message (PM), to a Youth Officer and follow their instructions. For more information about this please read this section of the Youth FaQ.

Our Youth Officers were carefully selected and need to be made aware of you for legal reasons.

Non-English speakers
Most IP materials are in English, but you may write in any language. Most members speak English as a first or second language. Your work cannot be reviewed, and we cannot give help or feedback, if it is written in a language we do not understand.

IP Team
The Temple operates an IP Team who contact new Novices. Contact them if you have any questions about the IP or you would like the work submitted so far to be checked.

There is also an IP Study Hall where you can discuss the IP.

Introduce Yourself
First of all we ask you to introduce yourself. We want to welcome you to our Order, we are a friendly community and we enjoy greeting new people. We also encourage you to select an avatar and fill in your profile information. You can also post a hello on our Shoutbox and the Temple Chat (lower right of the screen)!

Creating a Journal
Your Journal is where all your responses to the IP exercises should be posted and some also use it as a diary. You can use the first post to tell us about yourself, maybe where you have come from, physically, emotionally, spiritually, why you are here, what your hobbies and interests are etc. Your Journal can be as personal and in-depth as you like. One day you may go back and reread what you have written, showing you how much you have changed since you joined TotJO. Some people continue to use their Journal long after Knighthood and beyond.

In the New Members forum there is a section called Journals. Go there to create your own Journal by clicking on the 'NEW TOPIC' button to create a thread. The subject/title can be anything you want, but we suggest your Username+Journal. For example if your username is 'Jimbo' then we suggest you call the thread "Jimbo's Journal".

While our servers are reliable we encourage everyone to create a back-up of their work, because if your work is lost then we will require you to re-do it.

Purpose of the Initiate Programme and Journaling
The purpose of the IP is to familiarise you with some of the basic ideas present within our Temple. The purpose of a Journal is so the TotJO community can familiarise itself with you!

The material in the IP is not doctrinal. The ideas in the material can explain some of the doctrine, but they are for teaching purposes only and need to be looked at critically and with an open mind. We're not looking for the "right" answer, we're looking for your views on the material. If you agree with some of the material say why you agree, if you disagree then say why you disagree.

Your journal will be one of the ways in which all members in the Temple come to know who you are as a person. Your journal will be reviewed by a potential Training Master (TM) when they are deciding to take you on as an Apprentice. The more personal and in depth your journal is the easier it will be for a TM to judge if you are compatible for training with them. You will more than likely continue to use the same Journal should you be taken as an Apprentice.

How to Post your Answers
Please make sure you post a reply to your journal rather than starting a new thread for each exercise.

Please follow this format when posting your responses:

Lesson 1, Part 1 - The Hero's Adventure

This way it is clear what you’re talking about and a lot easier for the people who check your work to keep up.

Please proof read your work before submitting it, double checking spelling, grammar and punctuation.

If you have submitted an Application and have posted your first lesson response in your journal, please contact Br. John so your rank can be updated. Changing rank is not automatic, please be patient and continue your studies while you wait for your rank to change.

Every journal will be read, but members generally do not post in your journal because:

Posting in journals by a member with great experience might make you mistakenly believe that their view is definitely true.
Posting in journals can and has led to people changing the way they post thinking it might please a specific person or get them noticed.
Posting can make it harder for a potential Training Master to read and check your journal because additional posts can make it incredibly cluttered.
Posting in journals can also confuse that journal owner's line of reasoning with another's.
Plagiarism
To get the most out of the IP you must ensure the work is your own and done from the heart. It is likely the you will need to do some deep thinking and soul searching while studying the material and this is entirely normal and even encouraged.

Plagiarising other people's work is not allowed and please cite and sources you use. If you copy other people's work you will lack the wisdom to progress far. All cheats eventually lose interest or are discovered in time. This is your training for your benefit, what kind of Jedi do you want to be?

Self Help and Research
Later exercises will require you to be self-sufficient in information seeking. We are aiming to have you find your own information so you can find the truth of matters for yourself.

Privacy
We advise people to read the FaQ: Privacy. Your Journal will ony be visible to registered users, search engines will not index it.

Do Lessons have to be Completed in Order?
Lessons in the IP do not have to be completed in the order they are presented, but the order they are presented in is the order we suggest you do them in.

How to use our Materials
We realise that some people learn in different ways so some of our materials will be available as audio, video and text formats; you are free to use whichever version you prefer.

Please do not 'stream' the files from the server; we would prefer that you downloaded them which can be done by right-clicking on the link and selecting the 'save as' option and saving it onto your computer.

If the material is not currently available in our library then the material should be available elsewhere, such as a public library or a bookstore or available online.

Bonus Material
Bonus material is included in many of the lessons. All parts, except bonus parts, of the lesson must be completed to finish the IP. These parts are here for your benefit as many include teachings you might find valuable..