(My Philosophical Evolution) This version (2.0) is my inner work of systematic deconstruction, deconversion, uprooting, and dredging up a lifetime of deep-seated conditioning, ingrained beliefs, and embedded dogma, much of which has been unconscious;
discerning trash from treasures and thoughtfully reconstructing a world and life view that reflects the shape of my heart.
As I go deeper and beyond, answers fade into questions, certainty into uncertainty, knowing into unknowing.
I was taught as a child that the world was created 6000 years ago, which means that creation and Adam and Eve happened 4000 BC according to young earth creationists. During this time, Adam and Eve disobeyed God and got kicked out of the garden of eden. 1650 years went by as mankind got worse and worse. So out of great forethought and compassion, in 2350 BC, God destroyed the earth with a flood due to how evil man had become. The fix was to wave a magical wand, destroy everyone and everything, and start over from one man and his family. Somehow this great creation wasn’t working out so well, so rather than solving the problem, God wiped out the problem. Not very creative problem solving. Then it still took until 1500 BC, 3500 years after creation, for God to figure out that maybe, just maybe, he forgot something in this grand design. Moral laws! The 10 commandments! Oh yeah. These 10 commandments will save the world from destroying itself. Except that 1500 years later, God had to sacrifice himself because he saw that mankind was going to hell in a handbasket, even preceding god’s judgement, or something. So then, finally God transformed culture and religion from animal sacrifice to human sacrifice with the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the world has been saved by human sacrifice (at least it wasn't babies). Fast forward to 2021 and can we see that the great wisdom of the 10 commandments has saved the world? Christians still teach that this is the foundation for all morality and that America was founded on the 10 commandments.
Is this really the best of all time?
Is this epitome of human morality straight from divine origin?
Is this foundational for American democracy?
Is this foundational for all human civilization, morality, and decency?
"Bear in mind what the humble humorist James Thurber said when asked why he wrote: 'I don’t know what I think until I read what I have to say.' (Philip Cousineau)
“I feel that I have had a blow; but it is not, as I thought as a child, simply a blow from an enemy hidden behind the cotton wool of daily life; it is or will become a revelation of some order; it is a token of some real thing behind appearances; and I make it real by putting it into words. It is only by putting it into words that I make it whole; this wholeness means that it has lost its power to hurt me; it gives me, perhaps because by doing so I take away the pain, a great delight to put the severed parts together.” (Virginia Woolf, Moments of Being: A Collection of Autobiographical Writing)
When I write, I don’t regurgitate other people’s answers.
What I write is who I am and who I am is what I write.
My words do not come from the noise of external sources, external voices.
They are my internal voice; words from silence, words from the center, words from the heart.
In the world of creative expression, there is no right and wrong, good and bad, light and dark because it is an expression of the artist or the writer; raw and vulnerable, a statement of who I am from deep within.
“A writer is dear and necessary for us only in the measure of which he reveals to us the inner workings of his very soul.”
(Leo Tolstoy (September 9, 1828 – November 20, 1910), was a Russian writer many consider to have been one of the world's greatest novelists)
This post is “Why I write, version 2.0.” Originally, I wrote a post about the importance of writing for me back when I started blogging 15 years ago (https://ronirvine.wordpress.com/2010/07/27/why-i-write/). But now I feel a need to update and upgrade my thoughts to capture the depth, disruption, and transformation that I have experienced; or would that be a downgrade? For so many years, I felt that upward should be the direction of my striving. But I have since found that the essence of life is always downward; down to the ground, the common ground of us all, the ground of being. That has become the direction of my spiritual journey. (https://ronirvine.wordpress.com/2008/11/19/ground-of-being/) and (https://ronirvine.wordpress.com/2020/09/30/seeing-with-eyes-of-the-brokenhearted/)
Some writers write the answers to to questions that they think they “know” often after many years of study and research. This is a very traditional and necessary way of writing. All of my college and grad school books were books full of expertise. Almost all of the religious books I’ve read for 50 years are written this way also. These books display the great knowledge of the author, puffing them up with fame, success, and notoriety. But for me, this no longer works. I’ve read and read and read their books on being more spiritual, mature, and wise. But… “of the making of many books, there is no end; and much study is a weariness to the body” (Ecclesiastes).
The point of this blog, Living with Open Hands, is birthed out of the feeling that each of those books and teachers were dragging me back into a box or a pit that is so narrow and shallow that I would suffocate if I continued. I had become so stuffed up with knowledge, being right, and "knowing" that I was going to burst. Actually, I did. It took this dramatic upheaval, uprooting, and unraveling for me to see things differently. And once the heart has stretched and expanded to such a new dimension, it cannot go back to its original shape. I’ve used analogies like putting new wine in old wineskins in my writing. Another way of seeing it for me is the analogy of a baby maturing from “being fed with milk” (nourished by external authorities) to an adult “feeding oneself with solid food or meat” (nourishment from the Source deep within). But then going on to express one's inner workings in a way that just may touch another's vulnerability with my own vulnerability, another's story with my own story that is original, authentic, and radical in the sense of its root meaning of root. Truly being radical begins with downward movement to the "root" that is grounded in the Source. Radical and Root both come from the same root word.
From Other People’s Stories to My Story
For 50+ years, my spiritual journey consisted of allowing myself to be fed by the great teachers and preachers and professors and various authorities and experts without ever learning to shift my source of life and love and wisdom from external people telling me what to be, think, and do, to my inner teacher inspiring me and enlightening me as I grow into a mature spiritual man. My voice of authority could no longer come from within the cocoon, the bubble, the echo chamber, the box where we seek conformity and comfort or any other external authority or influence. It took a long long time to wake up. But can I ever go backward? Do I ever want to go backward? IT WOULD HAVE BEEN SO MUCH EASIER TO STAY PUT IN MY COCOON! I don’t think it is possible anymore than it is possible for the butterfly to crawl back into its cocoon. First, the cocoon is gone, shriveled up, useless, and in the wind, and second, I could not fit. That’s not the shape of my heart now. This is like turning a freshwater pond into a stagnant, smelly pond that recycles the same old stink over and over and over; a weariness of the soul. This was the reason I started writing in the first place. (see my first blog post written on April 1, 2006, Adrift in an Endless Sea). This is when I realized that I have a voice and that my voice matters.
Another way I see it is that I have grown from an author that writes what he/she “knows” or thinks he/she knows into an author that writes an autobiography, or a novel. This is a type of writing that brings forth inner knowing and expresses it in this world so that others can see and feel and listen and learn another perspective about life. This is a type of writing where the author must break open the heart and allow the stories from within to flow outward for the world to see them, feel them, and touch them; without expectations, hidden agendas, or ulterior motives of convincement. We can argue and disagree with each other's opinions and beliefs but we cannot disagree with each other's experiences; the stories of their lives.
This opening requires such great vulnerability that it can quickly become a wound or even a scar when it is not “touched” with tenderness and gentleness, honor and respect. Sometimes I get questioned about something I wrote. "What if you are wrong?" And I stop and think how absurd this is. Most of the time I had no words for a response but now I’m seeing that this is a writing paradigm that has been turned on its head. Not all people understand. Not all people can. Not all people want to. But that’s ok. It is like an artist’s creation, a sculpture or painting, a novel or an autobiography being criticized or judged to be right or wrong, good or bad. How absurd to try to box up such inspiration and creation. How absurd to correct some minor points. How absurd to argue. My life is what it is. It can be nothing else, nothing less, nothing more. That’s all it is and all it can be. Take it or leave it. Accept it or move on. I am what I am. And I am exactly who I am meant to be. I am exactly where I am meant to be. And I’m good…
For me, in order for writing to become a transformational process, I am learning to ask better questions in order to go deeper, inquiring into what I don’t know, in wonder and awe of the mystery. Never ever wanting to solve the awesomeness of mystery, only to appreciate and behold it in wonder. When I write, I don’t expect everybody to understand. I stand alone on this island of me. People can learn to speak my language and I theirs, but first the person must come to my island, my world, seeking to go deeper in order to begin to understand. Only if we first desire and find common ground can reciprocation begin.
When in Doubt, I Write!
“When in doubt, write,” an English teacher drummed into me long ago. Why is this so important? Because you are changing…and there is nothing more fascinating than to closely observe the process of change and deepening, and how we respond to that quicksilver phenomenon. Bear in mind what the humble humorist James Thurber said when asked why he wrote: “I don’t know what I think until I read what I have to say.”
-Philip Cousineau, The Art of Pilgrimage, page 113
For me, writing is a process
of the intrigue of inquiry
into life without hidden agendas, expectations, or
presuppositions of an answer.
Because any truth jammed into a fixed agenda
is nothing more than diluted truth with a spin,
which is not truth at all.
Writing is my way of living the questions
and over the years, as I fully
and faithfully inhabit the questions,
I wait to see if perhaps tentative answers
might grace me with their emergence.
I started blogging 17 years ago. I had no idea what I was doing or why. I just knew I needed a creative outlet and a way to work through the growing dissonance in my head and heart that is like the tinnitus that I now experience in my ears 24/7. The constant ringing of dissonance, between reality and all things I’ve been told to believe, was both a distant siren (an alarm) and a siren song (an irresistible magnet) that I heeded by writing. I didn’t even know what a blog was back then. But I wanted a platform that I could use because I sensed the need to keep coming back in order to remember (see Cairn of Remembrance). What I write is very personal and I had no intention of using a blog so that it would reach others. At that time, I had an audience of one. Me. A few months later, my grandma had found it. She said that she loves reading what I write, and everytime she reads it again, she gets something new from it (that blew me away). So she said that she started printing my blog. 60 pages later… I miss her. My dad has also been one of my most faithful readers too. I appreciate his open mindedness to exposing himself to what he called my renegade thinking. That was meant as a compliment, I think.
As I continued to blog, slow but steady, I figured out how to check the blog stats. Back then, I didn’t even know there was such a thing. Living with Open Hands seemed to have appeal to many people from many walks of life; countries and religions, theists and nontheists. I was always careful to not write in a way that was dogmatic with a lot of religious language. I was very careful about the use of god, knowing that no one really thinks of god in the same ways, that not only was it was very personal, but often very divisive. The values and beliefs of others are always deeply personal. We must always honor and respect others. I felt a great need to get past all of the philosophical, political, religious, racial, cultural barriers we construct between humans. I wanted to overcome or get past all those stories we tell ourselves and go to the basic common ground of humanity. I have had a great need to write in such a way as to not divide but unite, not spotlighting differences but rather finding common ground.
This was my marching orders from within: “Gotta search the silence of the soul’s wild places to find a voice that’ll cross the spaces.” (Bruce Cockburn)
And my best imagined outcome is this: “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I’ll meet you there. When the soul lies down in that grass the world is too full to talk about.” (Rumi)
So the stats kept growing over the years and then I figured out a way to track back where the blog readers were from. Currently, I have had over 80,000 hits from 150 countries. I am shocked and amazed and grateful for the affirmation I got even though that was not immediately my intention.
As I write, I always remember:
Life is more about the questions than the answers.
Life is more about the process than the outcome.
Life is more about the journey than the destination.
I write to develop depth, understanding, compassion,
and the passionate patience of waiting and listening to life;
observing and experiencing life just as it is,
life without pretense or expectation,
life without a hidden agenda,
life without appeal.
Camus called this living fiercely in "rebellion against the absurdity of life," "living to the point of tears," or “living without appeal,” which I am gradually understanding to be living without any appeal to our pet illusions of gods or saviors or other stories, dogma or beliefs to save me from me and my unwillingness to face “life as it is”.
“Superficiality is the curse of our age. The doctrine of instant satisfaction is a primary spiritual problem. The desperate need today is not for a greater number of intelligent people, or gifted people, but for deep people.” (Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline)
And what is Depth? Why does it Matter?
Recently, I was questioned about my religious beliefs by a family member that is a very evangelical Christian, a person that I care about. After I explained how I differed in the way I see the world and how I see religion and god, and heaven and hell, and dogma and doctrine. The response was, “Wow! That’s deep! But I do so much better just taking things as they come. I don’t like to go deep. There’s no need for it.” Or something close to that. I’ve been struggling with that response. I would never try to convince that person of my way of seeing and interacting with life. But I know that for me, if I lived like that, my mind and my heart would shrivel up and close up so tight that I would probably die; or at least that response would be a sort of philosophical and spiritual suicide for me. I'd become a stagnant pond with nothing fresh or new or pristine. For me, following someone else’s stories and myths is cheating myself of “life as it is” by prescribing answers where there are none, by killing the questions and the doubts before they have a chance to live in me. Any type of system of belief is taking the easy way of downloading prefabricated answers and cancelling the questions and the mystery. Life does not work that way.
This is just who I am, and who I am is what I write;
and it doesn’t matter that others are different. I’ve always known that anyway. I’ve always been a misfit and a renegade thinker. The older I get the more this is true. But this is something that I must answer for myself.
I refuse any form of suicide, killing myself or cancelling my questions, neither physical suicide nor philosophical suicide... and that is why I write.
I need to keep fanning the flames of passion and compassion for all of life; as it comes, as it is. Writing is a way of fanning those critical flames. I need to keep questioning things, questioning everything because I am coming to a conclusion (not an answer) that we all have been led astray and fed a lot of false narratives. Our conditioning is insurmountable. And I'm sure that there is a better chance that we are all wrong than that any of us are right. All of our lives, those stories are telling us who we are and what we are supposed to do and to think, how to see and to feel, how to understand and interpret the things that we see on the surface of this life. But I know, there is more if we can get past the surface! I can sense it, feel it, see it.
All dogma kills understanding and force-stops all learning and dialogue because
“As a blind man, I think that I see a lot better than I did when I was sighted because I don’t really think we see with our eyes. I think we live in darkness when we don’t look at what’s real about ourselves, about others, or about life. No operation can do that. When you see what’s real about yourself, you see a lot. And you don’t need eyes for that.” (At First Sight 1999 Val Kilmer)
”What every single human being longs for, at the deepest level, is to be seen for who they are.” (Sarita Chawla)
And on the flip side, I believe that what each of us longs for is to See and Live “life as it is” without appeal, pretense, expectation, illusion, or deception.
For me, writing is a form of discernment, a way of Seeing into life in different ways, penetrating our fabricated facade more deeply, more honestly, more authentically. But in order for this to happen we must have an open will, a willingness to follow the truth wherever it may lead.
For me, writing is a spiritual discipline of going from
seeing with my eyes to Seeing with my heart.
“When the eyes of the heart open, we can see the inner realities hidden behind the outer forms of the this world. When the ears of the heart open, we can hear what is hidden behind words; we can hear truth.” (James Fadiman)
An Intriguing Discovery of the Other
Ever since I started blogging my spiritual journey, I’ve found that I long for conversations that matter. That too is why depth matters. So often there is so much noise. Nothing more than just clamoring, often for my attention. But how rare it is for that clamoring to be replaced with conversations that matter. My writing has become part of the process of deepening that allows me to See others and to Hear others beyond the surface to the heart, the source at the center of each of us. This is how we find ourselves again in a world of noise… neverending bantering and blathering. When we connect at a deeper level, we create new meanings, new understandings, and new connections. But this can happen only when we get dogma out of the way. That is exactly what this life needs. Often, my conversations at this level last for 3 or 4 hours, once we break through the surface and the facade.
“When is the last time you had a great conversation? A conversation which wasn’t just two intersecting monologues, which is what passes for conversation in this culture. When have you had a great conversation in which: you overheard yourself saying things you never knew you knew; you heard yourself receiving from somebody words that absolutely found places within you that you had thought you had lost; you and your partner ascended to a different plane; memories of the exchange continued to sing in your mind for weeks afterward?” (John O’Donohue)
Learning to talk with each other again. Our lost treasure: conversations that matter
Once we get beyond ideas and assumptions, opinions and beliefs, we find a field that is purely human, the hummus of common ground, our ground of being. It is then that conversation becomes true dialogue; a creative force filling the space between, flowing among us. It is this creative force that begets something new and alive that sustains itself in the deeper connection and understanding that was just created.
It is when we hear the other person saying things that “found places within you that you had thought you had lost.”
It is when “you overhear yourself saying things you never knew you knew.”
It is when the shared words between us remind us of those things that we have always known but have long forgotten.
“A great question refuses to be answered; so it keeps leading us into deeper connections with each other and into deeper thinking.” (Judith Snow)
And greater questions lead us
into greater conversations and deeper understanding;
among, between, and through each other.
A great conversation awakens memory of ancient wisdom that resonates deep in the bones of our being.
A great conversation is the process of uncovering shared understanding of reality and truth; a process for moving forward together.
“Since our earliest ancestors gathered in circles around the warmth of a fire, conversation has been our primary means for discovering what we care about, sharing knowledge, imagining the future, and acting together to both survive and thrive.” (Juanita Brown, The World Cafe)
Even though this journey may take me down a way less traveled, it is what I must do. I cannot settle for what I have been told. I’d be lying to myself. I’d be giving up. I’d be committing philosophical and spiritual suicide.
“Go into yourself. Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write. This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write? Dig into yourself for a deep answer. And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your whole life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.” (Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet)
And I began to see that for me writing is non-negotiable… I must!
I must keep writing to strip life down to the essentials.
I must keep writing to discern those things that are treasures or trash.
I must keep writing to fan the flames of compassion and understanding.
I must keep writing to humiliate and humble myself
right down to the bones,
leaving no pretense or pride,
no assumptions or presumptions,
no preconceived notions or illusions.
I must keep writing to see more clearly life as it is.
I must keep writing to keep opening
my mind, my eyes, and my ears.
I must keep writing to make sure my heart
breaks open and stays open.
Although I have been greatly deepened by further opening my mind, my heart, and my will as I have been writing for the last 15 years, there are some things that seem to stand true. My insight into what the spiritual discipline of writing was beginning to do back then when I was first getting started holds true:
Writing has become a way for me to find my voice
and to give voice to my questions;
a journey from dogmatism and certainty
to inquiry and dialogue,
from a quest from knowing
to embracing mystery and wonder,
from living with clenched fists to living with open hands.
A journey through the dark night of my soul
to a deeper understanding,
from seeing with my eyes,
to Seeing with my heart.
Life is unfolding before us each and every moment.
For so many years I missed it.
Life kept sliding by as I slept.
Life is a journey, a process we must live out.
No one but you can experience what life has for you.
And writing, for me, is a critical, crucial, compelling, and central part of that process.
A MYTHIC JOURNEY
“Only by exploring and sharing my autobiography can I witness my discoveries of the sacred. My story is not normative. I am under no illusions that I am a saint, a hero, or a model for anyone. I do not write in order to say: Here is the map for you to follow. I only share some of the twists and turns of my journey in order to encourage you to take your own story seriously. Examine the sacred text of your own experience, reconstruct the events and relationships that went into the creation of your being, re-collect memories, and form them into a narrative that makes your life a once-told tale.” (Sam Keen)
“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life, and you will call it fate.” (Carl Jung)
“Don’t be satisfied with stories, how things have gone with others. Unfold your own myth.” (Rumi)
“It’s hard being a human being. Not only is our external world often demanding, but inside we’re a confusing mix of conflicting emotions and competing desires. “Complicated creatures, we are each a mix of light and dark. For those of us on a spiritual path, it is essential that we explore this inner territory, for what lies outside our awareness exerts a powerful control over it.” (Leia Marie Faith)
“I asked myself, ‘What is the myth you are living?’ and found that I did not know. So… I took it upon myself to get to know my myth, and I regarded this as the task of tasks… I simply had to know what unconscious or preconscious myth was forming me.” (Carl Jung)
A HISTORY OF THE HEART
“Even the longest, most detailed, and most expressive obituaries always omit the essence of a life: the history of a person’s heart. How many of us wish we had asked more questions of someone we loved, not about what happened and when but about the inner experience of being that person? About hopes and fulfillments, failures and regrets? About moments of despair and moments of meaning?” (Parker Palmer, Healing the Heart of Democracy)
"My writing is of a very different kind from anything I've heard about. All this mythological material is out there, a big gathering of stuff, and I have been reading it for some forty- or fifty-odd years. There are various ways of handling that. The most common is to put the material together and publish a scholarly book about it. But when I'm writing, I try to get a sense of an experiential relationship to the material. In fact, I can't write unless that happens … I don't write unless the stuff is really working on me, and my selection of material depends on what works."
Joseph Campbell, A Joseph Campbell Companion: Reflections on the Art of Living
"When I wrote about the Call forty years ago, I was writing out of what I had read. Now that I've lived it, I know it's correct. And that's how it turned out. I mean, it's valid. These mythic clues work."
Joseph Campbell, An Open Life (with Michael Toms) p. 26.
Don't believe everything you see.
Don't believe everything you hear.
Don't believe everything you say.
Don't believe everything you think.
"The unexamined life is not worth living" (Socrates)
Rejecting All Authority: Outer and Inner
"Having realized that we can depend on no outside authority in bringing about a total revolution within the structure of our own psyche, there is the immensely greater difficulty of rejecting our own inward authority, the authority of our own particular little experiences and accumulated opinions, knowledge, ideas and ideals." (Krishnamurti, Freedom from the Known)
As I have deepened and intensified my journey toward what is real, daily letting go of comfort, security, and certainty, I have felt a need to discern that which I have downloaded from society (cultural conditioning) from that which is sort of an ancient knowing, that is innate... profound truth.
Am I a second hand person that lives my life based on what I have been told, based on a truth that comes from the experiences and certainties of others?
Or do I embrace the need to do the innerwork to discern truth from within; original and authentic?
But this inner authority is a tricky bedfellow. “Thought creates the world and then says ‘I didn’t do it.’” (David Bohm). What is the source of my truth. Is it the conditioned thinking that Bohm, Jung, and Krishnamurti are referring to? Or can I discern inner truth beyond this duality and see reality, not based on thought, but based on nondual awareness and on a deep resonance; an ancient knowing that comes alive as we awaken?
"If we indulge the human propensity to understate, exaggerate, and alter facts for whatever comfort or false security a lie might accord us, we forfeit our capacity to see reality clearly, and see only a world of our own invention."
—Lin Jensen, "Right Lying"
What is Belief?
"We create the world that we perceive, not because there is no reality outside our heads, but because we select and edit the reality we see to conform to our beliefs about what sort of world we live in. The man who believes that the resources of the world are infinite, for example, or that if something is good for you then the more of it the better, will not be able to see his errors, because he will not look for evidence of them. For a man to change the basic beliefs that determine his perception - his epistemological premises - he must first become aware that reality is not necessarily as he believes it to be. Sometimes the dissonance between reality and false beliefs reaches a point when it becomes impossible to avoid the awareness that the world no longer makes sense. Only then is it possible for the mind to consider radically different ideas and perceptions."
(Gregory Bateson, Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology) The following is from an online conversation on social media with Rajiv, a friend from India that sees things very similarly as I do even though he grew up in such a different culture and religious context.
Rajiv PandeOur beliefs precede the evidence for them. Belief is what happens to you when you are not looking. An imperceptible and yet powerful current that carries you away, and sometimes so far off track that you wonder how and why you ended up being where you are.
Ron IrvineRajiv Pande I've spent my first 50 years being carried away by beliefs, both imperceptible and powerful and the last 10 years making the imperceptible perceptible so I can sort through the trash and the treasures that are left still powerfully trying to define my life.
Rajiv PandeI think what was once instinct in the animal world transformed to belief at the human level of evolution. Belief is a kind of substitute for the real or natural thing - a rationalized, narrated thing that envelopes and encloses one almost as completely as animals are immersed in instinct. We think we have an opinion or that we've made a choice but actually we have been drowned, our individuality and freedom dissolved in something seemingly greater than us. Belief systems can be so powerful that they are almost as effective as the formation of species in the animal world. Tribes, communities, nations, religions are the end result of this emotional intensity carried over from what was once animal instinct. Our task as humans is to be rational, to not be swayed by the seething and bubbling hot lava of emotion just below the outer layer of civilization and to keep it contained at all times.
My response was, "Wow!" He really nailed it for me.
Our similarities in perspective have been remarkable as we have grown to know each other over the past 10 years, often reflecting on each other's social media posts and blog posts. How does a person see through, see past, and grow beyond our conditioned upbringing; our cultural instincts that we so automatically believe.
What is Myth?
In this context, I use myth in the same way that Joseph Campbell developed myth in his book, The Power of Myth, as foundational to culture and individuals . Myths are the stories in our heads that we use to create meaning in our lives. Whether a myth is a true story or not is not at all the point. Myths shape our thinking, values, beliefs, and actions in both positive and negative ways. For instance, myths are created and broadcast in the news everyday; sometimes to tell the truth and sometimes to spin political beliefs. Myths also create assumptions, preconceived ideas, judgmental stances, and unfounded fears upon which we are building our democracy. The point is not if myths are true. The point is the impact they have on us; individually or collectively. How do they shape us? But an even bigger question is this, are we aware of our own myths that we have adopted, or that we have been told? Cultural conditioning is a powerful thing. It happens to all of us but not all of us are aware of this. We simply download ideas, mostly unaware, and go on living our lives with very little consciousness about how we became the person that we are; why we think what we think, why we feel what we feel, why we say what we say, and why we do what we do. Why DO we react, act, and interact in the ways that we do?
“Until you make the unconscious conscious,
it will direct your life,
and you will call it fate.”
(Carl Jung)
"It’s hard being a human being. Not only is our external world often demanding, but inside we’re a confusing mix of conflicting emotions and competing desires.
"Complicated creatures, we are each a mix of light and dark. For those of us on a spiritual path, it is essential that we explore this inner territory, for what lies outside our awareness exerts a powerful control over it." (Leia Marie Faith. https://www.chieftain.com/26bc3b8c-c393-11e8-a446-a7dc25b427f9.html)
Why do we sometimes surprise ourselves by saying or doing something that seems very out of character and then regret it? What is going on under the surface of our lives? What myths are swimming about in those murky waters beneath the surface of my consciousness; preconscious or subconscious surges hacking and hijacking my life.
DO I know? Of course not, because subconscious means that we are not conscious of those subtle influences, drives, and forces; sometimes not so subtle.
CAN I know? Of course I can, but it takes the hard work of doing the innerwork necessary to bring to consciousness that which is currently subconscious. It is both exhausting and exhilarating.
Do I WANT to know? Do I want to go through life as an automaton, following the herd, believing and doing what I’ve been told? Or will I do the innerwork of becoming conscious of the myths within and the power and influence they have? We cannot be free until we do the work of seeing our myths, understanding their power over us (their impact on us), and then carefully choosing the myths that we live by while letting go of those that are no longer helpful or inspiring; that no longer show me the truth within.
“All religions have been true for their time. If you can recognize the enduring aspect of their truth and separate it from the temporal applications, you’ve got it… Myths grab you somewhere down inside. As a boy, you go at it one way, as I did reading my Indian stories. Later on, myths tell you more, and more, and still more. I think that anyone who has ever dealt seriously with religious or mythic ideas will tell you that we learn them as a child on one level, but then many different levels are revealed. Myths are infinite in their revelation.”
― Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth
I think what Campbell means by this is that:
First, we must do the inner work necessary to first SEE the myths that we have adopted whether consciously or subconsciously.
Second, we must learn to DISCERN the veracity and impact of those myths that have gripped us over the years.
Third, we must revive or recreate a new world of myths, a mythology of meaning, that we can live by; with others and with integrity… a sustainable world and life view. We do this by sorting through the trash and treasures and reweaving the fabric of our underlying personal and collective plane of existence from which all of life unfolds; individual and collective. At the same time, aligning this with the universal plane of existence from which the whole universe unfolds.
What is the source of our values and beliefs; of our myths? Love or Fear?
Why do I follow the politics that I follow?
Why do I follow the religion that I follow? What defines my love and hate? What defines my hopes and fears?
Do I do these things automatically,
Because of my family?
Because of my zip code?
Because of my peer group?
Because it is easier to follow the herd???
Am I a second hand person
or am I an original individual
... the real deal?
A New Organizing Myth
But what happens when our organizing, sustaining myth, or story, or drama is no longer meaningful. We have grown beyond the stories of 2000 or 4000 years ago.
We need to create a new myth
about a people that are envisioning and creating
a world that works for ALL,
where ALL means ALL,
that includes each and every person,
that believes in each and every person,
that believes that each person comes here as a gift and full of gifts,
and that for every gift there is a place that needs that gift;
an organizing myth that teaches that
when each person uses the simplest of gifts
in a context that accepts and appreciates those gifts,
then THAT is a meaningful life.
A myth that knows we are all
connected, nurtured, and sustained
by that which is greater than me.
But knows that this sustaining reality
is beyond understanding; full of mystery,
boundless and limitless, immanent and transcendent.
A myth that acknowledges that
being right and making others wrong
is not what life is about.
It is not a matter of being right
but rather living right
so that the life we lead
makes an impact and
leaves this world better.
Underlying all of perceived, material reality is a deeper reality that supports what we see and experience. This deeper level is what David Bohm (Physicist) refers to as the implicate order of the universe, enfolded reality that then unfolds into the explicate order that which we perceive and then enfolds back into itself, containing like a hologram the whole universe. In this sense, the enfolded universe contains all of 'what is' while unfolding as needed into a physical reality. In this way, everything has its place in its time and then enfolds back into the underlying implicate order. This is similar to what quantum physics is telling us about the universe.
Did you know?
4% of the universe is physical matter.
23% is dark matter.
73% is empty space that is not empty but is teeming with creative energy and apparent intelligence. Possibly that "stuff" that holds the universe together, keeping it from flying apart or collapsing on itself. Is this emptiness the implicate order?
Scientists are struggling to name this "emptiness" but have theories that describe it as a matrix, web, ether, and even the "'strong force' that literally holds existence together."
"Here's what makes the 'strong force' so fascinating: unlike an electromagnetic force, which decreases as you pull the two charged particles apart, the strong force actually gets stronger the further apart the particles go. It gets so strong that it limits how far two quarks can separate. Once they hit that limit, that's when the magic happens: the huge amount of energy it took for them to separate is converted to mass, following Einstein's famous equation E = mc2. That's right—the strongest force in the universe is strong enough to turn energy into matter, the thing that makes up existence as you know it." https://curiosity.com/topics/the-strong-force-is-whats-holding-the-entire-universe-together-curiosity/
What resonates with me about this way of seeing the universe, this possible new organizing myth, is that it shows that:
There is a unified source from which we all spring.
There is a unifying force by which we (and all of existence) are all connected.
There is a sustaining force that nurtures all of existence.
There is a creative force, the source that brings matter into existence from energy.
There is an intentional force that keeps us growing and evolving forward.
And I see this power of intention being individual and collective and universal.
I also see this as parallel to consciousness; individual, collective, and universal.
All connected, all the same essence, all the same source.
David Bohm's Implicate and Explicate Order
"Implicate order and explicate order are ontological concepts for quantum theory coined by theoretical physicistDavid Bohm during the early 1980s. They are used to describe two different frameworks for understanding the same phenomenon or aspect of reality. In particular, the concepts were developed in order to explain the bizarre behavior of subatomic particles which quantum physics struggles to explain. "The implicate (also referred to as the "enfolded") order is seen as a deeper and more fundamental order of reality. In contrast, the explicate or "unfolded" order include the abstractions that humans normally perceive. As he wrote,
In the enfolded [or implicate] order, space and time are no longer the dominant factors determining the relationships of dependence or independence of different elements. Rather, an entirely different sort of basic connection of elements is possible, from which our ordinary notions of space and time, along with those of separately existent material particles, are abstracted as forms derived from the deeper order.
"The notion of implicate and explicate orders emphasizes the primacy of structure and process over individual objects. The latter are seen as mere approximations of an underlying process. In this approach, quantum particles and other objects are understood to have only a limited degree of stability and autonomy.[2]
"Bohm believes that the weirdness of the behavior of quantum particles is caused by unobserved forces, maintaining that space and time might actually be derived from an even deeper level of objective reality. In the words of F. David Peat, Bohm considers that what we take for reality are "surface phenomena, explicate forms that have temporarily unfolded out of an underlying implicate order". That is, the implicate order is the ground from which reality emerges.[3]
In other words, the implicate order is the source or ground of being.
Joseph Campbell's Underlying Plane of Existence
Invisible versus Visible, Nondual versus Dual All peoples, all tribes, all civilizations throughout history have developed mythologies to describe their understanding of their own existence. Similar themes run throughout history going back to drawings on cave walls.
"All of mythology is summed up with this: There is a plane of existence where we live. It is tangible, visible, temporal. But behind it is a plane of existence that is invisible, eternal, intangible. This plane supports the temporal plane.
"A shaman crosses between the two planes. But the myths, stories, and religion is created from the invisible plane. This plane is nondual. This is from where the religions of the First Peoples were created; from this eternal plane of existence. Or from where both planes are touching; the “thin” places.
"Christianity, Judaism, and Islam are created out of the plane of duality through books, words of the prophets. The male warrior gods (Yahweh and Allah) are jealous, angry, vengeful, full of hate, say one thing and do another, but say they are gods of love and peace.
"The holy grail is brought down by the neutral angels. All of our actions cause both good and bad results. We must balance between dualities. And yet lean toward the light. The grail represents the purest human motivation and consciousness; that which is not influenced by duality but only by our own inner intentions; not what we are told but what we determine.
"Jesus’ teachings and parables are a combination of stories based in the eternal and stories based in the temporal. There are many parallels between the Jesus and the Buddha.
“Every god, every mythology, every religion is true in this sense: it is true as metaphorical of the human and cosmic mystery. He who thinks he knows doesn’t know. He who knows that he doesn’t know knows.”
“In the East, the gods are much more elemental. Less human and more like the power of nature.”
“In oriental thinking, the god is the vehicle of the energy, not its source.”
"The gospel of Thomas: “The kingdom of the father will not come by expectation. The kingdom of the father is spread upon the face of the earth and you do not see it.”
"What is religion? Religion comes from 'religio' which means 'linking back.' From the phenomenal person, we link back to the source.
"That’s the essence of burial. You put back into the earth for rebirth.
"Creating a Mandala for oneself is a matter of graphically illustrating all of the energies of your life and then finding the source, the center of all of the aspects of oneself. So you are trying to coordinate your circle with the universal circle.
"Jung’s archetypes refer to the similar ideas that arise in different cultures without any connection between them. There are certain motifs that appear among different people in different places in different times."
(The Power of Myth)
Only Love
When Gregg Braden studied under some Tibetan Monks, he described that essence of the ether that
permeates the universe, that which he calls the Divine Matrix, he asked the master what is it that fills, sustains, and nurtures the universe. The monk looked at the interpreter and interacted trying to boil it down to the essence. Then he looked at Gregg and said, "Love."
“Love is the whole thing.We are only pieces.” (Rumi)
"Oh Love that fires the sun, keep me burning." (Bruce Cockburn, song lyrics)
external (gods, holy books, prophets and priests, kings and queens, etc)
"For centuries, humans believed that the real source of authority in the world is not their imagination, is not their collective power, but most human beings thought that authority actually comes from outside, authority comes from above the clouds, from the heavens; authority comes from the gods. The most important source of authority in politics, in economics, in ethics were the great gods, their sacred books and their representatives on earth; the priests, the rabbis, the shamans, the kalis, the popes, and so forth." (Yuval Noah Harrari, Homo Sapiens: A Brief History of Tomorrow)
"Then in the last two or three centuries, we have seen a tremendous political, ethical, and religious evolution which brought down authority from the heavens down to the earth, down to humans, and said that the most important source of authority, the supreme source of authority in all fields of life is the human being and in particular it is the feelings and the free choices of individuals. What humanism told humans is that when you have some problem in your life, whether it is in your personal life or whether it is a problem in the collective life of the whole society or the nation, you don't need to look for the answer from gods or from the Bible or from big brother, you need to look for the answer within yourself, in your feelings, in your free choices. And we've all heard thousands of times these slogans which tell us, listen to yourself, connect to yourself, follow your heart, do what feels good to you.
"And these are really the most important ideas or advices about authority for the last two or three centuries. In almost all fields of life, if we start with politics, in a humanist world that believes that we start with human feelings, politics manifests itself in the idea that the voter is the supreme authority, the voter knows best. When we have some big political decision like who should rule the country, who should be president, you don't ask god, you don't ask the pope, and you don't ask the council of Nobel Laureates, you go to each and every homo sapien and you ask, what do you think, what do you feel about this question? And most of the time it is about what you feel about the issue. It is not rational thinking, it is human feelings and the common assumption in humanist politics is that there is no higher authority than human feelings. You cannot come to humans and say, yes you think like that, you feel like that, but there is some higher authority that tells you that you are wrong. This was, of course, the case in middle ages but not in modern humanistic politics and certainly not in a democracy." (Yuval Noah Harrari, Homo Sapiens: A Brief History of Tomorrow) Another example that he uses is that beauty is ultimately in the eyes of the beholder. The human being, the human eye is the ultimate authority when it comes to aesthetics. He goes on to list example after example.
Future Authority
algorithms (that know us better than we know ourselves)
The direction that authority is moving is away from human beings. We have all sensed that human feelings are not the ultimate test of "rightness" or truth. And yet we have been making decisions based on free choice and human feelings. As time moves forward and there is this merging of infotech with biotech, technology is gradually knowing human beings better we know ourselves. A perfect example is in the medical field. We don't vote on getting a surgery. We rely on test after test that measures so many things and then the decision is made by medical science through the doctor. I'm sure we could never get away with submitting a bill for a medical procedure to a health insurance provider for payment with the rationale that it is what I feel I need.
Yuval Noah Harari: the future of authority and reality versus the fictions we tell ourselves (religion, politics, nations, organizations, hierarchy, power, money, being right or wrong, etc)
The most powerful things on earth are fictions, stories in our minds, myths. This is how we now rule the earth. It is our stories that organize us into the collective powers that control the earth. (corporations, governments, religions)
Our Source of Authority
So often, we are not aware of our source of authority or our source of truth. Often it is something we have been told, something that has been conditioned into us by culture, something we have unconsciously downloaded from the myriad of powers and influences around us. It is not very often that we do the inner work necessary to discern the competing voices within and come to know what we "know". See, How Do We Know That We Know What We Know?
Jiddu Krishnamurti says that we must deny all external authority in order to follow inner truth. He also talks extensively about how confusing the inner voice is and the need for discernment between a deep resonating truth and conditioning (the “truth” we have been told).
"If we can understand the compulsion behind our desire to dominate or to be dominated, then perhaps we can be free from the crippling effects of authority. We crave to be certain, to be right, to be successful, to know; and this desire for certainty, for permanence, builds up within ourselves the authority of personal experience, while outwardly it creates the authority of society, of the family, of religion, and so on. But merely to ignore authority, to shake off its outward symbols, is of very little significance. To break away from one tradition and conform to another, to leave this leader and follow that, is but a superficial gesture. If we are to be aware of the whole process of authority, if we are to see the inwardness of it, if we are to understand and transcend the desire for certainty, then we must have extensive awareness and insight, we must be free, not at the end, but at the beginning."
"Why do we accept, why do we follow? We follow another’s authority, another’s experience, and then doubt it; this search for authority and its sequel, disillusionment, is a painful process for most of us. We blame or criticize the once accepted authority, the leader, the teacher, but we do not examine our own craving for an authority who can direct our conduct. Once we understand this craving we shall comprehend the significance of doubt." - Krishnamurti, J. The Book of Life
"The world accepts and follows the traditional approach. The primary cause of disorder in ourselves is the seeking of reality promised by another; we mechanically follow somebody who will assure us a comfortable spiritual life. It is a most extraordinary thing that although most of us are opposed to political tyranny and dictatorship, we inwardly accept the authority, the tyranny, of another to twist our minds and our way of life. So if we completely reject, not intellectually but actually, all so-called spiritual authority, all ceremonies, rituals and dogmas, it means that we stand alone and are already in conflict with society; we cease to be respectable human beings. A respectable human being cannot possibly come near to that infinite, immeasurable, reality."
- Krishnamurti, Freedom from the Known
Reality: Mediated vs. Unmediated
I’ve come to see that religion falls within a spectrum of mediated versus unmediated. This is really a matter of their belief in where true authority lies; within or without. Catholic and Orthodoxy tends to be highly mediated where a person finds meaning through symbols and rituals. The rituals mediate meaning. The order of service, the sacraments, holy days, the priests, the saints (and on and on) mediate meaning for some people. On the other end of the spectrum are the mystics and the quakers where symbols are not used, holy days are internal and practiced everyday throughout the year, priests and pastors are not needed, and truth is spoken from within by anyone as they are inspired.
I’m seeing now that there is another way of seeing. Reality itself can be mediated or unmediated. Some people need stories and myths and books and preachers to mediate the truth from external sources. But some of us must experience reality directly through personal relationships and through direct experience. Truth is something that comes from within, resonating deeply, as if we are remembering what we already know.
The Importance of Discernment
Conflicting authority is a huge problem in our society. People believe what they believe and often do not know why they believe what they believe. I fairly recent mantra for my life has been this: "There is no authentic 'knowing' outside of the context of direct experience and relationships." There are so many influences and competing voices inside us and outside us. All of our lives we are told what to think, what to believe, how to think, what to do, and on and on. If we don't know better, we might end up just following the herd and eventually becoming the herd. Life is all about being me! But if I don't step away and rise above to observe what is going on, I'll never be anything but lost in the crowd, another sheep in the flock. Actually, that is what much of society would like to see, especially the powers that be. Power and control, conformity and submission.
“Keep growing quietly and seriously throughout your whole development; you cannot disturb it more rudely than by looking outward and expecting from outside replies to questions that only your inmost feeling in your most hushed hour can perhaps answer.” ― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet
Discerning all authority; outer and inner:
"Having realized that we can depend on no outside authority in bringing about a total revolution within the structure of our own psyche, there is the immensely greater difficulty of rejecting our own inward authority, the authority of our own particular little experiences and accumulated opinions, knowledge, ideas and ideals." (Krishnamurti, Freedom from the Known)
The Quakers have a great example of how to discern truth communally, realizing that life is much too complex to navigate on our own: Quakers use a process called the Clearness Committee to assist a person to discern a truth, or a leading since there is no "authority" or pastor or hierarchy in many Quaker gatherings. When a person seeks guidance, they turn to the community, a group of trusted Friends gather around a “focus” person and ask honest, open ended questions. No convincing, no leading statements are allowed. The purpose is to help a person access and assess their inner teacher, inner light, and draw out the person’s truth. “No fixing, no saving, no advising, no setting each other straight.”
