I would love (this is my conceit) to know a little more about what the future holds. I am convinced there are messages all over the place about that, in all sorts of esoteric languages I don't know. I keep looking askance, trying to see if anyone around me knows better than me. I think all the ones who know are staying out of sight somehow. This reminds me of the Taoist view on this, which is that real masters never look like masters. Most often they don't just not look like masters, but really seem to be screw ups of some kind or another. They look like no one until they suddenly shine.
I confess I wish I was one of those guys, but I really don't have it in me to do the work. I hate it that I can't save the world.
Messages
It all reads like code
and codebreaking isn't strong
in my kit of tools.
That's why I'm foolish
to be here, on this torn sod
with codified signs
telling me something
though I can't read what they say,
not even the gist.
February 9, 2009 10:52 AM
Contraction
1 week ago
If we were each able to just save one person, ourself, there would be no need for anyone to have the job to save the world.
ReplyDeleteI doubt the Taoist masters thought of themselves as going around saving the world either, though. You don't save the world by trying, you save the world (or, at least, your corner of it... like TechnoBabe said, save yourself) by being as you ought to be.
ReplyDeleteMessages are everywhere if you have courage to see them. I think you do, don't sell yourself short. :)
I can only say that the whole thing is unsettling to me and my instinct is that there is much more to it. There is not only the myth of the individual involved but the myth of the collective.
ReplyDeleteI know that for me it is a deep error to say I have only responsibility for myself, and that instead from the biological perspective the individual counts for almost nothing. Not only does the east politically tend to enact this, so also does Buddhism focus the solution in this direction. That is why I cannot really be Buddhist, that I value the idea of myself a little more than is good for Buddhism.
Yet, I understand the thrust and it's correctness. The east flourishes despite the apparent conflict between us. Saving oneself from this point of view is to miss the point of things. There really is a divide between east and west in this matter.
When you want to embrace a concept like "save the world" like I do, then you had better embrace the whole world. That means more inclusiveness. There cannot be exclusion unless you really mean "save a portion of the world". That on the face of it will never work. You do in fact have to cross the divide.
Size matters.:)
Now I am hard up against that place where the signs turn esoteric. It hardly helps to know that I am not the only one who has trouble getting large enough to embrace the signs.
Techno, you are right, we are left with the job of making our corner a better place, and that only happens when we reframe ourselves. We do not in general have sufficient power for anything else.
However "saving ourselves" in this manner is hardly going to be enough. There is a huge gap to span beyond each of us, the niche in which our civilization resides, and to which we assign the practice of politics or the grace of god or the grace of nature to make it all better. We are indeed getting ever stronger signs that a major backlash is coming.
If all we can do is "save ourselves", save our corner of things, then is there not in the center of this saving a prayer discipline to evoke the grace of God for the rest, and/or else a life of activism? That is what I think.
I am too self involved for much activism, and so my solution has been prayer.
just out of curiosity, have you ever played with a power drill and pretended it was a ray gun? ok.... really no need to answer that. it can be embarrassing and i know we've all done it....
ReplyDeletethe future will be revealed presently.... no need to rush it.... actually it won't be rushed....
I find me in a place of knowing just so much and no more. It's supposed to be like that so we don't run screaming :)
ReplyDeletexxx
GD, just last week :) Thanks for the Lady of Swords.
ReplyDeleteMichelle, I know. Sometimes not knowing what is coming is a blessing. I really, really wish I had been more of a man at a critical point in my marriage, but perhaps what happened to us was destined. I know the story we lived has mythic dimension to it. It was such a fucking mythical disaster.
I don't know about the signs and portents, but I just feel that way about life anyway.
ReplyDeleteBut I love Michelle's 'It's supposed to be like that so we don't run screaming'!