Following the Path ...

Hello all,

I linked the title of this post to another blogsite "Waiter Rant" that has a particular posting that is enormously connected to what I've been putting out there, and it's also really well written ... I recommend a read ... and while you're there take a look at some of the replies as well ... good stuff.

A friend of mine on another list I operate - MythoSelf(tm) at Yahoo Groups - posted this link there and I read it this morning myself. I was touched and especially so by some of the replies. What touched me was the same as what touched many who are obviously reading this (based on the replies) and that was the "humanness" of this story. Yet what was also present and obvious to me is how it's contextualized, how it's associated with the larger form this writer also holds.

This is the essence of what I've been pointing at regarding "social ontology" as an application. The ability to contextualize our lives. I could say it, "Our lives are contained in the context." Now this of course would go against so many, many things.

It would seem to refute the entire Western myth of individualism, and yet I don't think it does at all. It might seem a blasphemy in that it suggests that the "context" not G-d holds our lives in his hands. It could seem offensive to a practicing Buddhist or Hindu in that the "context" I seem to be pointing to is externalized and not about connecting to the G-d(s) within. Yet I don't actually think any of this is true if you'll go out far enough from the source. That the context is infinite ... and we experience only a small part of it in an intimate and unfolded way.

Yet the "small part" of the infinitie that we personally experience is a microcosom of the totality.

Our "little world" is actually a reflection of the whole thing, the entire cosmos, and as we interact with it we are in fact interacting with the totality. The ripples we make locally have no boundaries. This is almost an overwhelming thought ... that everything you do is felt everywhere by everyone. What's overwhelming is to retain any sense of the privilege of personal comfort when you get this.

I have a conversation with one of my long time students on Tuesday ... we've been engaged in a little social ontology experiment of our own. At one point in that conversation he said ... "This becomes overwhelming when you think of it in this way." referring to exactly the point I've made above. In essence how do we as Americans (he and I) assume the right to drive cars as we do, using the resources that we do in so doing? Does this mean we should all be buying hybrid vehicles? Does it mean I have to change my whole life and find the "right" rules to abide by?

I get these questions, even this concern ... and the answer is both "Yes!" and "No!" equally ... as there is both a "right" way and simultaneously "no wrong way" to do such things. This is the magic ... this is the place of the quantum leap ... beyond paradox. This is not the "genius" of simultaneously holding two thoughts at one time, this is the simultaneity of resolving the conflict between all thoughts ... so that there is no conflict ... the paradox dissolves. This is G-d's view.

There is in any given moment an opportunity to act ... to respond if you prefer. The Universe just keeps unfolding ... endlessly ... and that's enough for most folks to overload them and ... yes even overwhelm them. A billion, billion events happening ... all right now. And, unfortunately we're privy to more of them than we've ever been before ... as they are happening. The "war" doesn't happen "over there" ... it happens in our living rooms and now. We know ... and we do basically nothing. Yet we feel like we should ...

... we want to respond ... to engage ... to do our part ...

but there's nothing we can do ... and there's nothing to do ... about that. Our nervous systems aren't really up to all this input ... we are designed as a "local" species ... and we've gone global. We become globally aware. We've developed a sense of responsibility for the entirety of the planet ... all it's people ... maybe even all it's inhabitants ... and there's essentially nothing we can do ... on that scale. Yet it keeps showing up ... even if we don't watch the "news" we hear about it from others. The social world keeps flooding in ... and it's not about the neighbors. It's not the story you hear about "what happened over there" it's the story you hear about,

What's happening over there ...RIGHT NOW!

And, there's absolutely nothing you can do. You'll be "operated" by others to send money to help the 'victims' but little of what you send will make it to those you see on television or read about in the newspapers ... and there will be thousands more who you'll never hear about and who will never get your 'gifts' regardless of how heartfelt or genuine they are. And, nonetheless these gifts do help.

However, you'll pass the hungry, homeless vagrant on the street and feel better about it when you do ... because you'll know you're a fundamentally good person 'who has helped' - in the least painful possible way for you of course - but you have "helped." This is all part of the manipulation, part of the coercion. To reach into your need to connect, to be altruistic, to acknowledge your "tribal" ties which have now become "global" ... and yet that's still not enough.

The only hope may be "getting" the idea of "context" the endless, infinite, intertwined web ... what if instead of contributing to the next tsumami fund, or the next hurricane money raising drive ... you simply fed three folks in your own town. What if everyone did just that ... made sure their own towns were all together ... and maybe the one just next to them? Then what if you got that there aren't really any towns ... that that's all made up? Go and find the "lines on the ground" that prove your where you are ... in the town you're in, in the county, state, country .. it's all made up ... this is what the astronauts get when they see the earth from orbit ... that it's all made up!!! All everyone would ever have to do is take care of their own, and "get" that there's no one who isn't included. This would appeal to our deepest "tribal" instincts. Then this ripple would begin to cascade and become a tsunami itself ... overwhelming the sense of helplessness that engulfs the average individual.

This is not about getting you to do your part ... it's instead a wake up call to just get that you have no other choice.

You are part of the "context" ... there's no way out.

So next time you read about ... that other guy or gal ... remember for whom the bell tolls ...

Until tomorrow and we'll talk some Graves ...

Best regards from NJ - The Garden State,

Joseph