That
which has been most important to me in the living of my life is that I am
“focused upon and engaged in that which is true, that which is real.” In so
many words, that I do not waste my life. How does one measure the “value” of
one’s self? I seem to think that a life spent in seclusion, “without
distraction,” as a “focused spiritual being,” is best. I did spend time in a
Buddhist monastery as a Zen Buddhist monk and also spent much time at a
Benedictine hermitage in Big Sur once upon a time. I was not impressed with
either. And I was especially not impressed with myself, for after a few days, I
was not “peaceful and focused” at all but absolutely distracted. I had to face
the fact that life itself, that living in itself, is distraction; that being in
a physical body that is meant to survive and having to survive in it is a
distraction; that thinking and thoughts and emotions are a distraction: a
distraction from the “higher being,” the “spiritual being” which is the essence
of life. I have often questioned my attitude towards existence in this body
here and now; it would seem that I think I’m “above it all” in some way. I do
somehow think this, however, I have also “made it in the world” by being
successful in business once and making plenty of money, taking care of my
familial and social responsibilities, and so on. While it may be true that I
was a bit of a sanyassin in my 20s, I did find success by my 30’s and retired
by 40 to take care of my children, one who was disabled and required active
caregiving. Now, in my 70s, I am again an active caregiver (to my wife) but
also see myself, appropriately, as a sanyassin, more or less, though I have to
wonder rather than wander. I am glad I have responsibilities that are other
than myself, for, to be honest, I am utterly boring and just about that bored
with myself.
I see my role as one of not only
“finding context” for myself, but also being able to convey such context to those
in need of it. “Knowing oneself” consists in knowing who you are, what you are,
where you are, and perhaps even why you are. Of course, such knowing is
probably impossible; we are as moving targets even as we ourselves move—there
is no nailing anything down at all. I think the most we can do is take all
these fragments and make some kind of interesting mosaic with them. We are an
undulating jigsaw puzzle with unlimited pieces of no particular shapes that do
not fit into each other. So we make these fragments into a fragmentary story of
ourselves as best we can—which seems fine and good in itself but is actually
detrimental to us because “our story” really isn’t like how we have put it
together. We have created something that has taken on its own life and is now
“me” as I see myself and believe myself to be. Upon death, all the pixels of
seeming solidity and reality, dissolve into something else. But, even while
alive, we do not quite live because we are only our (and our culture’s and our
society’s) version of ourselves and not really who we are. We just don’t know
who we are and, for the most part, would rather not know, instead using our
opposable thumbs to send tweets about what we had for lunch, and taking selfies
to prove to ourselves and others that we actually do exist and are not just
figments of our own imaginations (which are actually no longer our own since we
see only what we want to see and what is trending in the moment). Descartes
proclaimed, “I think, therefore I am.” But once we are no longer able to think
as ourselves, we no longer exist as ourselves but as units in the matrix, as it
were. People now prefer to be cyborgs. Living is much more convenient and
without real choices, much less consciousness.
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