Coming Back Home ...

G'day all,

Some of our compatriots here at home in the U.S. don't have a home any more thanks to Katrina, which at various times was a category 1-5 hurricane and at this moment downgraded to a tropical storm. It landed in Florida, then crossed the Gulf of Mexico to hit Louisiana and Mississippi. There's been loss of life and the most material damage ever caused by a storm in the U.S. in recent times (since insurance companies have been tracking the cost of damages). We're talking about a significant death toll and costs in the billions (U.S.D.). This was one serious storm! So for everyone sake down there south of NJ I wish you the best in the recovery from Katrina and prayers go out to all those who have been hurt or have lost someone in the last few days.

These kinds of events imprint themselves on people, vitually absolutely on those immediately impacted and often on those at the next level out from there as well - family, friends, co-workers, rescue teams ... however it's also possible that such events imprint themselves on a much larger audience as the tsunami in Southeast Asia did to the world recently. These events are what become our personal and cultural histories.

These histories become the "ground" that we perceive the world in relation to.

This is a significant, I'd even say "essential," factor in the construction of social realities. It's this simple, when you look at a cut out of a white circle dropped on a sheet of white paper you may or may not even see it, if you do the image will be one of very low contrast - low "signal to noise" ratio, where the circle is the signal and the sheet of paper is the noise. In other words it will be hard to see clearly. This is the effect of the ground being virtually indistinguishable from the figure, so we perceive the figure in the way we do, which in this example is indistinctly.

Now move that white circle to a sheet of dark paper - black, dark green, dark blue ... and it jumps off the page - what you see is "WHITE CIRCLE" and the ground, while present becomes highly secondary. However put that white circle on a sheet of highly contrasting paper ... red or orange ... and you'll see a "WHITE CIRCLE ON A RED SHEET OF PAPER" - both "read" in your perceptual evaluation. Put it on a much lower, but "brightly" colored paper ... yellow ... and the signal to noise ratio drop percipitously AND you'll still "read" the white circle but this time you'll likely read the yellow sheet of paper first, seeing "YELLOW PAPER WITH WHITE CIRCLE."

This is the essence of the "Figure/Ground" equation:

The personal and shared histories we have become in every case the ground of our perception - unless we learn to specifically operate differently. However, regardless of this kind of specialized training the histories will be included in the ground of our experience.

In the case of those in Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi who've just felt directly the wrath of Katrina this will always be included in the ground of their experience. When ever the wind blows or the rains fall they will recall these past days ... those most personally affected will recall most profoundly ... and all will think "Is she coming back?"

Yet this is how it is for each of us ... each or our perceptions, each act of intentionality are enacted on the ground of personal experience. And, as I've said, unless one has "specialized" training and/or learning this ground will largely if not wholly be comprised of personal and shared histories.

So what is the option, what is the alternative to this historical orientation and 'ground'? The option is the "teleological orientation." This simply means to include the intention as it's projected forward through time to the future in the ground of one's personal experience. Literally including what hasn't happened as though it has ... just not yet. This will most surely shift the ground of your personal experience deeply.

The other unavoidable aspect of the 'ground' of personal experience is the shared experience we have of and with others. This is the basis for what I've been calling "Social Ontology" - this shared experience. The shared experience, or the inter-subjective position is the fundamental ground of our experience as I've been saying. We make sense of the world through this sharing, through what we've learned something "is."

It doesn't fundamentally matter if the something is a storm like Katrina or the tsunami that hit Southeast Asia ... or any other event in our lives, we know what it "is" in part by what others think it "is" and tell us it "is." In this way the "is-ness" of things comes about for us. Yet to change this "is-ness" requires that we become "Masters of Reality" - learning how to shift our positions like the shapeshifter changes form.

This blog as always is committed to the continual exploration of this process of constructing our realities ... and offering the promise of freedom to those who are both interested and willing to become the Masters of their own realities ...

Best regards for today,

Joseph