``Any idiot can face a crisis - it's this day-to-day living that wears you out.'" -- Anton Chekov
We never keep to the present. We recall the past; we anticipate the future as if we found it too slow in coming and were trying to hurry it up, or we recall the past as if to stay its too rapid flight. We are so unwise that we wander about in times that do not belong to us, and do not think of the only one that does; so vain that we dream of times that are not and blindly flee the only one that is. The fact is that the present usually hurts. We thrust it out of sight because it distresses us, and if we find it enjoyable, we are sorry to see it slip away. We try to give it the support of the future, and think how we are going to arrange things over which we have no control for a time we can never be sure of reaching.
Let each of us examine his thoughts; he will find them wholly concerned with the past or the future. We almost never think of the present, and if we do think of it, it is only to see what light it throws on our plans for the future. The present is never our end. The past and the present are our means, the future alone our end. Thus we never actually live, but hope to live, and since we are always planning how to be happy, it is inevitable that we should never be so. -- Pascal (Pensees)
The attainment of autonomy is manifested by the release or recovery of three capacities: awareness, spontaneity, and intimacy.
Awareness. Awareness means the capacity to see a coffeepot and hear the birds sing in one's own way, and not the way one was taught. It may be assumed on good grounds that seeing and hearing have a different quality for infants than for grownups, and that they are more esthetic and less intellectual in the first years of life. A little boy sees and hears birds with delight. Then the "good father" comes along and feels he should "share" the experience and help his son "develop." He says: "That's a jay, and this is a sparrow." The moment the little boy is concerned with which is a jay and which is a sparrow, he can no longer see the birds or hear them sing. He has to see and hear them the way his father wants him to. Father has good reasons on his side, since few people can afford to go through life listening to the birds sing, and the sooner the little boy starts his "education" the better. Maybe he will be an ornithologist when he grows up. A few people, however, can still see and hear in the old way. But most of the members of the human race have lost the capacity to be painters, poets or musicians, and are not left the option of seeing and hearing directly even if they can afford to; they must get it secondhand. The recovery of this ability is called here "awareness." Physiologically awareness is eidetic perception, and allied to eidetic imagery. Perhaps there is also eidetic perception, at least in certain individuals, in the spheres of taste, smell and kinesthesia, giving us the artists in those fields: chefs, perfomers and dancers, whose eternal problem is to find audienes capable of appreciating their products.
Awareness requires living in the here and now, and not in the elsewhere, the past or the future. A good illustration of possibilities, in American life, is driving to work in the morning in a hurry. The decisive question is: "Where is the mind when the body is here?" and there are three common cases.
1) The man whose chief preoccupation is being on time the one who is furthest out. With his body at the wheel of his car, his mind is at the door of his office, and he is oblivious to his immediate surroundings except insofar as they are obstacles to the moment when his soma will catch up with his psyche. This is the Jerk, whose chief concern is how it will look to the boss. If he is late, he will take pains to arrive out of breath. The complaint Child is in cmmand, and his game is "Look How Hard I've Tried." While he is driving, he is almost completely lacking in autonomy, and as a human being he is in essence more dead than alive. It is quite possible that this is the most favorable condition for the development of hypertension or coronary disease.
2) The Sulk, on the other hand, is not so much concerned with arriving on time as in collecting excuses for being late. Mishaps, badly timed lights and poor driving or stupidity on the part of others fit well into his scheme and are secretly welcomed as contributions to his rebellious Child or righteous Parent game of "Look What They Made Me Do." He, too, is oblivious to his surroundings except as they subscribe to his game, so that he is only half alive. His body is in his car, but his mind is out searching for blemishes and injustices.
3) Less common is the "natural driver," the man to whom driving a car is a congenial science and art. As he makes his way swiftly and skillfully through the traffic, he is at one with his vehicle. He, too, is oblivious of his surroundings except as they offer scope for the craftsmanship which is its own reward, but he is very much aware of himself and the machine which he controls so well, and to that extent he is alive. Such driving is formally an Adult pastime from which his Child and Parent may also derive satisfaction.
4) The fourth case is the person who is aware, and who will not hurry because he is living in the present moment with the environment which is here: the sky and the trees as well as the feeling of motion. To hurry is to neglect that environment and to be conscious only of something that is still out of sight down the road, or of mere obstacles, or solely of oneself. A chinese man started to get into a local subway train, when his Caucasian companion pointed out that they could save twenty minutes by taking an express, which they did. When they got off at Central Park, the Chinese man sat down on a bench, much to his friend's surprise. "Well," explained the former, "since we saved twenty minutes, we can afford to sit here that long and enjoy our surroundings."
The aware person is alive because he knows how he feels, where he is and when it is. He knows that after he dies the trees will still be there, but he will not be there to look at them again, so he wants to see them now with as much poignancy as possible.
Spontaneity. Spontaneity means option, the freedom to choose and express one's feelings from the assortment available (Parent feelings, Adult feelings and Child feelings). It means liberation, liberation from the compulsion to play games and have only the feelings one was taught to have.
Intimacy. Intimacy means the spontaneous, game-free candidness of an aware person, the liberation of the eidetically perceptive, uncorrupted Child in all its naivete living in the here and now. It can be shown experimentally that eidetic perception evokes affection, and that candidness mobilizes positive feelings, so that there is even such a thing as "one-sided intimacy"--a phenomenon well known, although not by that name, to professional seducers, who are able to capture their partners without becoming involved themselves. This they do by encouraging the other person to look at them directly and to talk freely, while the male or female seducer makes only a well-guarded pretense of reciprocating.
Because intimacy is essentially a function of the natural Child (although expressed in a matrix of psychological and social complications), it tends to turn out well if not disturbed by the intervention of games. Usually the adaptation to Parental influences is what spoils it, and most unfortunately this is almost a universal occurrence. But before, unless and until they are corrupted most infants seem to be loving, and this is the essential nature of intimacy, as shown experimentally.
To laugh often and much...
To win the respect of intelligent people,
And the affection of children...
To earn the appreciation of honest critics,
And to endure the betrayal of false friends...
To appreciate joy and beauty
And find the best in others...
To leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child,
A garden path, or a redeemed social condition...
To know that even one life has breathed
More easily because you have lived...
That is to have succeeded.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
Humans have a rather endearing tendency to assume that "welfare" means group welfare, that "good" means the good of society, the well-being of the species, or even of the ecosystem. God's Utility Function, as derived from a contemplation of the nuts and bolts of natural selection, turns out to be sadly at odds with such utopian visions. To be sure, there are occasions when genes may maximize their selfish welfare by programming unselfish cooperation or even self-sacrifice by the organism. But group welfare is always a fortuitous consequence, not a primary drive.
The realization that genes are selfish also explains excesses in the plant kingdom. Why are forest trees so tall? Simply to overtop rival trees. A "sensible" utility function would see to it that they were all short. Then they would get exactly the same amount of sunlight with far less expenditure on thick trunks and massive supporting buttresses. But if they all were short, natural section could not help favoring a variant individual that grew a little taller. The ante having been upped, others would have to follow suit. Nothing can stop the whole game from escalating until all trees are ludicrously and wastefully tall. But it is ludicrous and wasteful only from the point of view of a rational economic planner thinking in terms of maximizing efficiency rather than survival of DNA.
Homely analogies abound. At a cocktail party, everybody talks themselves hoarse. The reason is that everybody else is shouting at the top of their voices. If only everyone could agree to whisper, they would hear one another exactly as well, with less voice strain and less expenditure of energy. But agreements like that do not work unless they are policed. Somebody always spoils it by selfishly talking a bit louder and, one by one, everybody has to follow suit. A stable equilibrium is reached only when everybody is shouting as loudly as they physically can, and this is much louder than they need from a "rational" point of view. Time and again, cooperative restraint is thwarted by its own internal instability. God's Utility Function seldom turns out to be the greatest good for the greatest number. God's Utility Function betrays its origin in an uncoordinated scramble for selfish gain.
To return to our pessimistic beginning, maximization of DNA survival is not a recipe for happiness. So long as DNA is passed on, it does not matter who or what gets hurt in the process. Genes don't care about suffering, because they don't care about anything.
It is better for the genes of Darwin's wasp that the caterpillar should be alive and therefore fresh, when it is eaten, no matter what the cost in suffering. If Nature were kind, She would at least make the minor concession of anesthetizing caterpillars before they were eaten alive from within. But Nature is neither kind nor unkind. She is neither against suffering nor for it. Nature is not interested in suffering one way or the other unless it affects the survival of DNA. It is easy to imagine a gene that, say, tranquilizes gazelles when they are about to suffer a killing bite. Would such a gene be favored in natural selection? Not unless the act of tranquilizing a gazelle improved that gene's chance of being propagated into future generations. It is hard to see why this should be so, and we may therefore guess that gazelles suffer horrible pain and fear when they are pursued to death--as many of them eventually are.
The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute that it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive, many others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear, others are being slowly devoured from within by rasping parasites, thousands of all kinds are dying or starvation, thirst and disease. It must be so. If there is ever a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored.
In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but pitiless indifference
- Richard Dawkins, "God's Utility Function," Scientific American November 1995, p. 85.
"What, did they hang the fellow?"
"No, they cut off people's heads in France."
"What did the fellow do?--yell?"
"Oh no--it's the work of an instant. They put a man inside a frame and a sort of broad knife falls by machinery -they call the thing a guillotine-it falls with fearful force and weight-the head springs off so quickly that you can't wink your eye in between. But all the preparations are so dreadful. When they announce the sentence, you know, and prepare the criminal and tie his hands, and cart him off to the scaffold--that's the fearful part of the business. The people all crowd round--even women- though they don't at all approve of women looking on."
"No, it's not a thing for women."
"Of course not--of course not!--bah! The criminal was a fine intelligent fearless man; Le Gros was his name; and I may tell you--believe it or not, as you like--that when that man stepped upon the scaffold he cried, he did indeed,--he was as white as a bit of paper. Isn't it a dreadful idea that he should have cried --cried! Whoever heard of a grown man crying from fear--not a child, but a man who never had cried before--a grown man of forty-five years. Imagine what must have been going on in that man's mind at such a moment; what dreadful convulsions his whole spirit must have endured; it is an outrage on the soul that's what it is. Because it is said 'thou shalt not kill,' is he to be killed because he murdered some one else? No, it is not right, it's an impossible theory. I assure you, I saw the sight a month ago and it's dancing before my eyes to this moment. I dream of it, often."
The prince had grown animated as he spoke, and a tinge of colour suffused his pale face, though his way of talking was as quiet as ever. The servant followed his words with sympathetic interest. Clearly he was not at all anxious to bring the conversation to an end. Who knows? Perhaps he too was a man of imagination and with some capacity for thought.
"Well, at all events it is a good thing that there's no pain when the poor fellow's head flies off," he remarked.
"Do you know, though," cried the prince warmly, "you made that remark now, and everyone says the same thing, and the machine is designed with the purpose of avoiding pain, this guillotine I mean; but a thought came into my head then: what if it be a bad plan after all? You may laugh at my idea, perhaps--but I could not help its occurring to me all the same. Now with the rack and tortures and so on--you suffer terrible pain of course; but then your torture is bodily pain only (although no doubt you have plenty of that) until you die. But here I should imagine the most terrible part of the whole punishment is, not the bodily pain at all--but the certain knowledge that in an hour,--then in ten minutes, then in half a minute, then now--this very instant--your soul must quit your body and that you will no longer be a man-- and that this is certain, certain! That's the point--the certainty of it. Just that instant when you place your head on the block and hear the iron grate over your head--then--that quarter of a second is the most awful of all.
"This is not my own fantastical opinion--many people have thought the same; but I feel it so deeply that I'll tell you what I think. I believe that to execute a man for murder is to punish him immeasurably more dreadfully than is equivalent to his crime. A murder by sentence is far more dreadful than a murder committed by a criminal. The man who is attacked by robbers at night, in a dark wood, or anywhere, undoubtedly hopes and hopes that he may yet escape until the very moment of his death. There are plenty of instances of a man running away, or imploring for mercy--at all events hoping on in some degree--even after his throat was cut. But in the case of an execution, that last hope--having which it is so immeasurably less dreadful to die,--is taken away from the wretch and certainty substituted in its place! There is his sentence, and with it that terrible certainty that he cannot possibly escape death--which, I consider, must be the most dreadful anguish in the world. You may place a soldier before a cannon's mouth in battle, and fire upon him--and he will still hope. But read to that same soldier his death-sentence, and he will either go mad or burst into tears. Who dares to say that any man can suffer this without going mad? No, no! it is an abuse, a shame, it is unnecessary--why should such a thing exist? Doubtless there may be men who have been sentenced, who have suffered this mental anguish for a while and then have been reprieved; perhaps such men may have been able to relate their feelings afterwards. Our Lord Christ spoke of this anguish and dread. No! no! no! No man should be treated so, no man, no man!"
-Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Idiot
From love for humanity I don't want it. I would rather be left with the unavenged suffering. I would rather remain with my unavenged suffering and unsatisfied indignation, even if I were wrong. Besides, too high a price is asked for harmony; it's beyond our means to pay so much to enter on it. And so I hasten to give back my entrance ticket, and if I am an honest man I am bound to give it back as soon as possible. And that I am doing. It's not God that I don't accept, Alyosha, only I most respectfully return him the ticket."
"That's rebellion," murmered Alyosha, looking down.
"Rebellion? I am sorry you call it that," said Ivan earnestly. "One can hardly live in rebellion, and I want to live. Tell me yourself, I challenge your answer. Imagine that you are creating a fabric of human destiny with the object of making men happy in the end, giving them peace and rest at last, but that it was essential and inevitable to torture to death only one tiny creature -- that baby beating its breast with its fist, for instance -- and to found that edifice on its unavenged tears, would you consent to be the architect on those conditions? Tell me, and tell the truth."
"No, I wouldn't consent," said Alyosha softly.
-Fyodor Dostoevsky, Brothers Karamazov
...there is only one occasion, one only, when man may purposely, consciously choose for himself even the harmful and the stupid, even the stupidest thing, and not be bound by the duty to have only intelligent wishes. For this most stupid thing, this whim of ours, gentlemen, may really be more advantageous to us than anything on earth, especially in certain cases. In fact, it may be the most advantageous of all advantages even when it brings us obvious harm and contradicts the most sensible conclusions of our reason concerning our advantage. Because, at any rate, it perserves for us the most important and most precious thing--our personality, our individuality.
-Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from the Underground
In time of war in an occupied country, a member of the resistance meets one night a stranger who deeply impresses him. They spend that night together in conversation. They spend that night in conversation. The Stranger tells the partisan that he himself is on the side of the resistance--indeed that he is in command of it, and urges the partisan to have faith in him no matter what happens. The partisan is utterly convinced at that meeting of the Stranger's sincerity and constancy and undertakes to trust him.
They never meet in conditions of intimacy again. But sometimes the Stranger is seen helping members of the resistance, and the partisan is grateful and says to his friends, "He is on our side."
Sometimes he is seen in the uniform of the police handing over patriots to the occupying power. On these occassion his friends murmur against him: but the partisan still says, "He is on our side." He still believes that, in spite of appearances, the Stranger did not deceive him. Sometimes he asks the Stranger for help and receives it. He is then thankful. Sometimes he asks and does not receive it. Then he says, "The Stranger knows best." Sometimes his friends, in exasperation, say "Well, what would he have to admit that you were wrong and that he is not on our side?" But the partisan refuses to answer. He will not consent to put the Stranger to the test. And sometimes his friends complain, "Well, if that's what you mean by his being on our side, the sooner he goes over to the other side the better.
-Basil Mitchell, "The Falsification Debate", Exploring the Philosophy of Religion Ed. David Stewart, 118-119
In Joseph Campbell's book, Hero With A Thousand Faces, he illustrates that there are three parts to every hero's journey: the leaving of the familiar, the journey into the beyond, and the return. In The Power of Myth, he points out that these tales aren't arbitrary, but a reflection of the journeys we undergo ourselves, within; that these tales are a reflection of our own heroism; that we are all heroes in our own rite; that simply being born into the world makes one a hero, already; and that the challenges that heroes in myth face are reflective of our own challenges. When I look at these 3 parts of the journey, myself, I think of them as Disintegration, Liminality, and Reintegration.
Liminality is a word that was presented to me in college by a professor I highly enjoyed & respected, and it instantly became my favorite word. If you manage to find it in a dictionary, you'll find it means "betwixt & between" or "on the threshold." It is where we get the word subliminal, meaning "below the threshold" of consciousness, or perception. It is on the threshold, between an old perspective, and a new one; between identities, which is a new identity in itself. Call it that moment when you find out you're wrong, but you don't know what's right yet. Call it being lost.
It's ok to be lost, and to feel lost. In fact, it's more than ok. It's a sign that you are going somewhere. A sign that you're growing. A sign that you've outgrown what will no longer serve you. Call it being a teenager--remember how lost you were then? When you put away all those toys, and you grew out your childlike ways, but you didn't really know what it meant to be an adult yet? Odds are, you went through it to get where you are now. You couldn't be where you are now, without it. You survived it.
It's ok not to know. It's ok to feel like you don't know where you're going. It's ok to feel like you don't know anything.
Because in that moment is when you are most open to all possibilities. It is a magic moment, although it may not feel like a particularly pleasant one. You've broken your filter, and in that moment of being lost, you have the opportunity to truly see.
"The black moment is the moment when the real message of transformation is going to come. At the darkest moment comes the light." --Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth
Nature abhors a vacuum. So, in that time when you feel most empty, most lost, know that you've come to the place where you are most likely to be filled again, more than ever--with light, with love, with more than you've lost. Because you've expanded as a result of it--you've grown beyond what has worked in the past.
There are times that we admire people. . .gurus, spiritual practitioners and teachers. . .for their ability to empty their minds, revering this mindstate as the deepest sense of inner peace. Yet we may find ourselves just as empty-headed, and find it an unpleasant experience, find turmoil and fear, quite the opposite of enlightened. After all, we've just discovered that everything we know is wrong. We know nothing. We have no security in what we know. What's the difference? Why is the ability to be empty-headed and lost considered an admirable quality in others, yet a detestable, fearful thing to be resisted in ourselves? What do these people know that brings them inner peace within it, that we don't know?
They know that it's a sign of learning and growing. They go into it willingly, and openly. They know that it is being truly open, feeling, and allowing one's self to be vulnerable. . .a hero's journey. They hold the reigns because they make this their intention, their destination--to be open and lost and emptyheaded. They find something they seek, and thus accept it. So why should we resist it. . .this happy accident. . .this gift and blessing. . .of finding ourselves in a place of pure potential?
After all, it's not about getting there. It's about the journey, itself.