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Thought of the Week Archives
October 1999
October 4, 1999
...the world in which we live is very nearly incomprehensible
to most of us. There is almost no fact - whether actual or imagined -
that will surprise us for very long, since we have no comprehensive and
consistent picture of the world which would make the fact appear as an
unacceptable contradiction. We believe because there is no reason not
to believe. No social, political, historical, metaphysical, logical or
spiritual reason. We live in a world that, for the most part, makes no
sense to us. Not even technical sense....
Perhaps I can get a bit closer to the point I wish to make with an
analogy: If you opened a brand-new deck of cards, and started turning
the cards over, one by one, you would have a pretty good idea of what
their order is. After you had gone from the ace of spades through the
nine of spades, you would expect a ten of spades to come up next. And
if a three of diamonds showed up instead, you would be surprised and wonder
what kind of deck of cards this is. But if I gave you a deck that had
been shuffled twenty times, and then asked you to turn the cards over,
you would not expect any card in particular - a three of diamonds would
be just as likely as a ten of spades. Having no basis for assuming a given
order, you would have no reason to react with disbelief or even surprise
to whatever card turns up.
The point is that, in a world without spiritual or intellectual order,
nothing is unbelievable; nothing is predictable, and therefore, nothing
comes as a particular surprise.
Neil Postman
From a speech given at a meeting of the German Informatics Society
on October 11, 1990 in Stuttgart, sponsored by IBM-Germany
Comment:
I think that what Postman calls a "comprehensive and consistent picture
of the world" might be what Campbell would call a common cultural myth.
It is the "universal story" of a culture and it guides the culture's view
of life and understanding of the world.
When we educate our children in using computers, in gathering information,
and we do not educate them in a mythos or (perhaps) a common set of values,
our children have no basis for evaluating the information they receive.
They have no foundation from which to evaluate the information being target
at them by the media, the advertisers, and the politicians. And with no
basis for evaluation, they have no basis for determining what is substance
and what if fluff, what is genuine and what is smoke, what is valuable
and what should be discarded.
I believe that we, as educators, are doing a terrible (and dangerous)
disservice to our students by not helping them first, discover and/or
develop, a philosophical basis from which to evaluate the information
they will be presented throughout their lives. To do this, we must teach
philosophy, psychology and comparative religion. These are at least as
important (I believe more important) than any computer skills we teach
them.
Giving them the technical skills (power) without first giving them
a foundation in philosophy is like giving a child a car without teaching
him or her the rules of the road. Sooner or later, someone will get hurt.
- Reg Harris
October 11, 1999
Greed and exploitation are forms of wealth and power
without the awareness of balance and without the tempering of spirit.
Greed wants and exploitation takes without giving back. There is no sharing,
there is no humility, and most important, this concept of wealth is based
on the acquisition of material goods only. Greed makes one blind to the
needs of others and to the needs of the ecological balances in nature.
With some exceptions the first explorers and colonizers [in the Americas]
were not "seekers of life" nor did they see their role as the simple human
one of journeying on the "Path of Life": they sought wealth of the kind
just mentioned.
- Beck, Peggy V., Walters, Anna Lee, and Francisco, Nia
- The Sacred: Ways of Knowledge, Sources of Life
October 18, 1999
There is a destination, a possible goal, beyond the alternative stages
dealt with in our last chapter [the collapse of the conscious attitude].
That is the way of individuation. Individuation means becoming an "in-dividual,"
and, in so far as "individuality" enbraces our innermost, last, and incomparable
uniqueness, it also inplies becoming one's own self. We could therefore
translate individuation as "coming to selfhood" or "self-realization."
...individuation means precisely the better and more complete fulfilment
of the collective qualities of the human being, since adequate consideration
of the peculiarity of the individual is more conducive to a better social
performance than when the peculiarity is neglected or suppressed. ...
Individuation, therefore, can only mean a process of psychological development
that fulfils the individual qualities given; in other words, it is a process
by which a man becomes the definite, unique being he in fact is. In so
doing he does not become "selfish" in the ordinary sense of the word,
but is merely fulfilling the peculiarity of his nature, and this, as we
have said, is vastly different from egotism or individualism.
- Carl Jung
- "Relations between the Ego and the Unconscious"
from The Portable Jung, edited by Joseph Campbell
Comment
Individuation might be the ultimate goal of the psychological journey.
We must strip away the masks (persona) we have built to relate to the
world around us, tame our egos to put them in harmony with the Self, and
assimilate the repressed and projected energies of the Shadow and other
subconscious archetypes. It is a most difficult journey, full of dangers
to our fragile and unprotected egos, but is one that we must undertake
if we are to discover and manifest that unique character that is us.
Reg Harris
October 25, 1999
Things falling apart is a kind of testing and also a kind of healing.
We think that the point is to pass the test or to overcome the problem,
but the truth is that things don't really get solved. They come together
again and fall apart again. It's just like that. The healing comes from
letting there be room for all of this to happen: room for grief, for relief,
for misery, for joy.
When we think that something is going to bring us pleasure, we don't
know what's really going to happen. When we think something is going to
give us misery, we don't know. Letting there be room for not knowing is
the most important thing of all. We try to do what we think is going to
help. But we don't know. We never know if we're going to fall flat or
sit up tall. When there's a big disappointment, we don't know if that's
the end of the story. It may be just the beginning of a great adventure.
...
When things fall apart and we're on the verge of we know not what,
the test for each of us is to stay on that brink and not concretize. The
spiritual journey is not about heaven and finally getting to a place that's
really swell. In fact, that way of looking at things is what keeps us
miserable. Thinking that we can find some lasting pleasure and avoid pain
is what in Buddhism is called samsara, a hopeless cycle that goes round
and round endlessly and causes us to suffer greatly.... the only time
we ever know what's really going on is when the rug's been pulled out
and we can't find anywhere to land. We use these situations either to
wake ourselves up or to put ourselves to sleep....
- Pema Chodron
- When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times
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