THE CURSE OF TECHNOLOGY (IN TWO PARAGRAPHS)

Technology moves us ever closer to the machine of ourselves, that is, to ourselves as machines, albeit fleshy and organic ones, as beings to be fixed and repaired, as cogs in a still greater technological framework. Technology moves us ever further from the soul and the spirit of ourselves as human beings. In its movement for control, which may be seen as improved and better physical and perhaps mental function, technology leads away from the heart of ourselves. Many might say that technology, like guns, is used as the possessor sees fit, for better or for worse social function; that technology is innocent of any blame by those Luddites who cannot fathom it. But this is not so true at all, for loaded guns are not to be put in the hands of infants; not that they will do evil with them, but that they might inadvertently pull the trigger and hurt themselves or others. “Forgive them Father, for they know now what they do.”

But that is not the essence of this conversation. Humans now have technology as a great convenience and as an improvement in many fields, such a medicine and statistics of all kinds. Technology “crunches numbers” far faster than any human mind could do so in lifetimes. And it promotes both the notion while creating the reality that we are human machines. But technology aims outward and expands; it does not lead us inward in order to discover just who and what we are in this order of human being. Worse than being loaded guns in the hands of infants, it is a distraction from our discovery of ourselves, of ourselves as far more inner (or greater) beings which we must find if we are ever to be truly human and be able to live accordingly. Our inability to live accordingly makes us as infants—with no understanding of our world or mastery or control of ourselves. Humanity still lives in utter ignorance of itself, though now possessing the technological means to destroy itself.  Technology wonderfully leads us away from ourselves as human beings into a cyborg reality in which we are as machines. And most people LOVE that this is happening.

ONE MUST HAVE "FAITH IN HUMANITY" AND IN ONESELF

I see that we are “occupied by our thoughts” and, depending on where they “come from,” we are just this side of absolutely insane, having created and now living in a world which is seen as “normal.” If I were a “proper Christian” with a particular Christian point of view, I would rightfully say that “the world is evil and the devil rules.” It would even seem, given the ground of being of a President who uses mind control by constantly interjecting his own sick and insane thoughts to create a mindset and a direction and a confusion (a “direction of confusion and divisiveness”) and instructs his circle also to do this, that what the Christians call Antichrist is quite alive and well and very active in the minds of the masses and the elite in this country and also throughout the world. The sane and the holy are diminished, while the insane and the unholy are becoming rampant. Witness not only Trump’s followers but 92% of the Republican Party itself at a recent count. Minds—and souls—are being subverted by evil. People have not learned as children how to be humane and sane in their humanness, and to behave with a sense of self-respect and respect of others, with a self-controlling sense of basic morality. Michael Novak, in Belief and Unbelief, touches on this: “As Aristotle remarks, unless a man is in his youth taught to feel correctly pleasure and pain, and shame and pride, he will not even have the data for correct moral judgment of the noble and the ignoble; he will never have tasted the one, nor have been taught to recognize the other” (64).          

          Stupidity-as-normal and hate-as-normal are a most dangerous mix, and not specific to either right-wing or left-wing. The normalizing of such ignorance and its repetition that acts to brainwash whole populations is most dangerous indeed. And propagandists both feed and fan fires of stupidity and hatred, unleashing violence upon us through both the masses and the elite. It has probably always been like this throughout human history with the difference being that now we have instant worldwide web and instant technological weaponry, the perfect mix for profound destruction and death.

          I don’t see that great numbers of people will necessarily “come around” at this point; this is surely not the norm. After the social fabric was all but destroyed in “the Terror” of the French Revolution, after the best were guillotined, most realized that it was again time for national order and safety for all. I hope Americans have enough basic sanity to realize what is going on and make the necessary changes without resorting to extremes that escalate, creating their own infernos that burn everything to the ground. I don’t see that “public education” will affect those who make themselves “blind followers.” However, I am of the belief that large number of people are capable of “seeing the light,” as it were, of having the cover pulled from their eyes. In the meantime, I for one can do what I can do. For me that translates as writing and sharing what I write as best I can, but perhaps more to the point, observing myself and the “thoughts that occupy me and thus direct my actions” through my personal practice of zazen. To be able to see oneself is to be able to see how oneself is in the world, and what one contributes to or detracts from existence as a whole on the planet. We each make it better or worse—for ourselves and everyone else.

          

WHY LIFE IS BEST SEEN AS "FRAGMENTS" WITHOUT LABEL OR INTERPRETATION

I previously noted that life should rightfully be seen and experienced as “fragmentary,” as pieces of existence experienced by each of us. We humans tend to be afflicted with a “need for meaning,” a need to understand everything in terms of ourselves, our beliefs, and what we think we “know.” This is considered to be quite normal. However, it presents the profound problem of creating ourselves as false identities, and, as such false identities, merging with other larger forces of false identity, and proceeding to oppose other false identities whom we identify as enemies, to the point that we do our best to destroy and massacre with the permission of our “divine sources.”

          Let me give a prime example. One has a sudden sense of clarity or of feeling a sense of joy and peace, or of seeing the “beauty of nature” in its myriad forms, or feeling a “close bonding” with another person or even oneself, or of “understanding” an abstraction of mathematics or physics in which there seems to be an “expansion of insight or awareness.” Such occurrences do happen to us, but the problem arises instantly when we feel compelled to interpret what such experiences “mean,” for, when we do this, as we all do, we infect and corrupt the original experience with our cultural and social beliefs in which we have been raised and have come to identify as consisting of our “own” beliefs. Depending on the culture and society in which one lives and whose beliefs have been informed, it may be a “message from God” and that God may be Jesus, Allah, Vishnu, Satan, etc., or a “message from the ancestors,” and it could therefore be telling us whatever the prevailing beliefs or messages of that particular religious perspective may be. Or, one may take it as a message that one is the Avatar, or world savior, or, at the very least, has attained enlightenment. Or, if one is not particularly religious, but is more of a psychological or medical or philosophical bent, it may be taken to be a sign that one is becoming senile or perhaps wise or has a chemical imbalance in the brain or a disease of the eyes. In all honesty, I would give some of the latter medical and psychological and philosophical approaches some attention since medicine could possibly though not necessarily explain such experiences. I know people who were delusional and paranoid and who were “cured” by taking an antipsychotic med. So I seem to argue against my own point at least on the physical level of being.

          When one believes, one naturally interprets one’s experiences in ways that will affirm that belief, so that the belief becomes more and more “real” in one’s life. We have an insecure need to affirm ourselves, to prove that we exist, as it were. In this same manner we create ourselves, our own personality and other various traits, including appearance. But, in our interpretation of our experiences as proof that our beliefs are not only right but true, we create a tautology, which is to say, a circular loop of self-deceit, of falseness. And this enforces what can become a deadly matrix of difference between us—as individuals, as clans, as nations. So naturally, a believer in God and/or religion sees “divine messages” or perhaps devilish ones, thus also creating a dilemma of belief and trust in oneself, perhaps then leading one to external authorities for “proper interpretation.” A similar process often occurs in the vast field of psychology; there are numerous “specialists” and “priests” to tell us “what it all means,” and further, what to do to solve the problem.

          What if we had our experience, which might be “transcendent” in the sense that it brings us beyond a normal awareness of ourselves and/or our world, and just were able to be with it as it is, without having to instantly label it and determine what it “means”? As I say this, I become aware that I have been practicing this process of “non-identification” in the practice of zazen over the last forty plus years. This is exactly what zazen is about: non-identification with one’s self-defined notion of oneself. But that has been my own path; each finds his or her own way, as I see it.

          What if we could simply experience ourselves, with our thoughts and our feelings and bodily sensations, without having to instantly react with self-serving or self-loathing, for that matter, interpretations? What if we just let all interpretations go? And what if we went a step further and even let the experience itself go, no matter how great and profound the insight or understanding it might bring? What if we didn’t go down that rabbit hole of the self? What if we just let even the notion of “myself” go? Interestingly, if the thought of self or “me” vanishes from our mind, “I” cease to exist. At that point I do not get in my way, though at this point I think I am going beyond my original intent in being able to see “reality” as fragmentary rather than as “solid and full of meaning.”

          If we do not have to add our “personal veneer” of belief to that which we experience in its pure form and are able to just “be with it as it is,” we come closer to ourselves as “we are,” that is, without preconceived notions of who we are “supposed” to be, both socially and in our own minds. I’ve been reading, Novak’s Belief and Unbelief: a Philosophy of Self-Knowledge, in which he states: “For when a man (or woman, I add) knows that he (or she) knows, and knows better what his (or her) knowing is, then there is every likelihood that he (or she) will avoid many mistakes in what he (or she) claims to know; his (or her) epistemology, metaphysics, philosophy of science, art, and politics, and his (or her) ethics flow from a clearer stream” (29).

         

          

TELEPATHY, INTUITION AND INSTINCT

In my experience, people don’t have to be particularly close or even known to be telepathic. One is just “that way” with various other people who are also telepathic; people may share a similar “frequency.” My definition of telepathy is knowing what the other person is thinking, at least in the current moment. It is a kind of “mind reading,” of knowing another’s thoughts, and feelings as well. Much of what we call “telepathy” is present in intuition and instinct as well. To intuit is to be aware of the reality or of what is occurring on a deeper mental and emotional level with others. This requires a level of being able to intuit oneself. One not only “reads thoughts” but is also attentive enough to “read faces,” and “read eyes” and body language as well. If one is intuitive like that, it seems to me that this would include telepathy. A more basic, more physical, body-oriented, level of intuition is instinct, which precedes intuition from an evolutionary perspective. Thus, we “sense fear,” and we are instinctively aware of danger, or, for that matter, sexual attraction. It is part and parcel of the human pleasure-seeking and pain-avoidance. Of course, the mind with its thoughts and feelings enhance instinct, and probably intuition as well.

          Life occurrences bring about the development of telepathy and intuition and instinct in us. I refer to my own life experiences, the progression of nature, and logic or common sense here. I intentionally try not to make too many connections though, since that puts all the fragmentary memories into a too convenient and conclusive story. Being born premature and installed in an incubator away from human touch for the most part for the first few months of my life deprived me of an adequate sense of human bonding, both physically and emotionally. It may have diminished the intuitive sense of connection with others while increasing the instinctive sense of having to survive on my own. Since there was no or very little verbal communication with me, I may have had to develop more telepathic skills as well. Then later, as a young child, I was physically abused, which also had the effect of giving me an increased instinctual sense of danger and ability to not only see it in the eyes and the body language, but also telepathically to read it in the thoughts. On occasion, during the times of abuse, I “saw” scenes of battle and carnage, and felt emotions of absolute fear and confusion within such dangerous chaos. I believe I could literally see the thoughts of the abuser who was on Normandy Beach and in the Battle of the Bulge and other places in the European Theater of WWII. It took me a while but I was able to realize that these thoughts were not “mine.”

          My first wife and I were telepathic, though we hardly even conversed with each other. I tended to go on very long hikes in the mountains and enjoyed literally getting lost and then finding my way back to civilization. At such times I sent her “messages” which she apparently got because she noted the time as did I, which was later corroborated. My wife, Amy, and I are absolutely telepathic. She often says what I’m thinking and vice-versa. I naturally respond even to her mentally unspoken needs, such as when her feet are hot and she needs her sock removed. I took care of my daughter who is disabled for many years and possessed a kind of “mother’s intuition,” knowing when she needed something or was having a seizure in the middle of the night (from a different room). Then there is the most recent occurrence in which I asked her a “yes” or “no” question while I was dreaming, at which I was startled awake by her as she lay next to me sleeping, saying loudly “Yes” as she slept. It was 7AM, she did not waken, I went to the bathroom, climbed back into bed and went back to sleep. Now THAT is telepathy.

          Let me add a bit to this. I have literally seen “ghosts” and even conversed with one of them. It may be that one requires a certain type of sensitivity to “see ghosts,” though it may or may not be an indication of intuition. To be brief, a man hung himself in what was to be my bedroom six months before my father got a “good deal” and bought the house. The hanged man appeared to me only once but hung around (as it were) for another couple of years; we conversed regularly when he would “appear” only with slight physical indications in my room. Then there were the group of Victorian ghosts who haunted the children for whom I was houseparent at a state institution for “emotionally unstable” children. The children, with my exorcizing directions, were able to dispel this group of Victorian Episcopalian teachers who died of cholera or smallpox around 1900. There are other similar occasions but this is most sufficient in my estimation.

         

          

FRAGMENTS IN A FIELD AFAR

                                          THIS MUCH IS "TRUE"

In my dream (of two nights ago) I ask Amy (my wife) a question requiring a “yes” or “no” answer. At that very moment, I am literally awakened by her saying “Yes” loudly as she lay sleeping right beside me. Amazed at what just happened, I check the time (7AM), get up, relieve myself (as it were), and go back to bed and back to sleep. In the dream that follows, again with her in it, she looks at me intently and says, “I am the Queen. You think my thoughts.”  

                                                        *

As time progresses, or perhaps from the beginning, life becomes a bad habit.

                                                        *

The “second wind” may come at great cost; the cure may in fact be worse than the disease. But nevertheless one undertakes to breathe as best one can in the circumstances. One hopes the blindness will pass, that they eyeballs will no longer stick to the eyelids. One finds oneself praying for deliverance from the bottom of the abyss which, by its nature, offers no way out, no escape, though one can be rescued by God alone, but one must be able to find such a God, the reality and presence of such a God. Otherwise one is held down by one’s own weight, one’s own history, even simply gravity itself. Falling to the bottom “knocks the wind out” of one. As one lies there unable to breathe, in that interlude in which one sees oneself, a reckoning may be made. The next breath comes, and then the next, and the next. But one must deliver oneself from such darkness in which one finds oneself. And this is possibly but most difficult because one purposely forgets and any “second winds” become fewer and much less likely. I don’t know if one “climbs out of darkness” or some miraculous light of power and agency intrudes into the prevalence and perhaps even preference of darkness. No, I do know; one must climb out, holding oneself above oneself as each rung is wrung from oneself. It is no different than this. There is no “easy way out”; it happens in the smallest of increments. It is a discipline requiring clear sight. And though very specific, it remains very enigmatic, for we are shadows unto ourselves, opaque at best, and “through the glass, darkly.” Innuendo and out the door.

                                                         *

                                      The Curse of Technology

Technology moves us ever closer to the machine of ourselves, that is, to ourselves as machines, albeit fleshy and organic ones, as beings to be fixed and repaired, as cogs in a still greater technological framework. Technology moves us ever further from the soul and the spirit of ourselves as human beings. In its movement for control, which may be seen as improved and better physical and perhaps mental function, technology leads away from the heart of ourselves. Many might say that technology, like guns, is used as the possessor sees fit, for better or for worse social function; that technology is innocent of any blame by those Luddites who cannot fathom it. But this is not so true at all, for loaded guns are not to be put in the hands of infants; not that they will do evil with them, but that they might inadvertently pull the trigger and hurt themselves or others. “Forgive them Father, for they know now what they do.”

        But that is not the essence of this conversation. Humans now have technology as a great convenience and as an improvement in many fields, such a medicine and statistics of all kinds. Technology “crunches numbers” far faster than any human mind could do so in lifetimes. And it promotes both the notion while creating the reality that we are human machines. But technology aims outward and expands; it does not lead us inward in order to discover just who and what we are in this order of human being. Worse than being loaded guns in the hands of infants, it is a distraction from our discovery of ourselves, of ourselves as far more inner (or greater) beings which we must find if we are ever to be truly human and be able to live accordingly. Our inability to live accordingly makes us as infants—with no understanding of our world or mastery or control of ourselves. Humanity still lives in utter ignorance of itself, though now possess the technological means to destroy itself.  Technology wonderfully leads us away from ourselves as human beings into a cyborg reality in which we are as machines.

                                                            *

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 some 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 so 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 enough 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.

                                                            *

Fragments, by their very nature, are problematic, for they do not "fit in" anywhere and are thus never "convenient" or able to be "pigeon-holed". Normally, it would seem that framents necessarily "fly by" without being noticed. But I notice them. Trying to "make sense of oneself" with them is rather impossible besides being absurd, but this is what we humans do. 

                                                           

THE NECESSITY OF GETTING BEYOND OURSELVES

As we age, the body's nature is to deteriorate, and, as this occurs, our self-identity begins to alter. We may identify ourselves more with our mind or our feelings or perhaps with that which we call the soul or spirit (though soul may be defined as "embodied spirit"). Though difficult to accept, such self-definition as other-than-body gets closer to the reality of things (or no-things, if you will). It is quite logical that when the physical existence ends, that, if, in fact, there is a continuation of being or consciousness, it will occur on the non-physical levels of mind, feeling, and soul or spirit. Now it could be that mind and feeling are so inclusive in body that they cease as well, though it's not logical. It is logical that, if there is such a continuation of consciousness as self, we would want to prepare ourselves for this transition. Such is the purpose of probably all the world's religions in one way or another.

Om mani padme hum, the Buddhist mantra and directive, states,
"You hold the lotus in your hand" (according to an acquaintance who has studied and translated such things). Of course, we/our nature is the lotus, borne in earth, proceeding up through water, and finally breaking the surface into the air and the sun.  

So, upon death, how are we to prepare ourselves for being in a state beyond the physical? Many would say to "put your faith in God," though I and many others would not. In fact, they would say, "Put your faith in yourself" (though I would want to be prosaic and use "yourSelf"). However it may be articulated, we do need to be able to experience that level of being that is beyond self as we have come to know it. Some claim to have found this in a kind of God-driven awareness. I haven't. I have been able in my life to find practices that allow me to disassociate from my physicalness and perhaps even "transcend" it. Once I ingested a lot of LSD for a while and this definitely got me "there," giving me quite a glimpse and experience of what is beyond the physical. I also would lay in
"isolation tanks" for extended periods, which did give me a certain experience beyond the body, as it were. Such experiences actually did provide a definite impression and memory of "transcendence," however, the most practical practicum was that of formal Buddhist meditation, which consisted of initially vipassana, and finalized in many years of zazen. This practice did not so much "get me there" as it did simply to give me a "break" from the physical identity and a kind of experience of an identity with "true nature," as it's called in Zen Buddhism (and perhaps others as well). I should note that something of this nature did occur in the years in which I practiced the theosophical meditation as presented by Alice Bailey, however, that was a very intellectual experience which I ultimately could not translate into my reality. Zazen, on the other hand, has the effect of non-mentally stripping one down to that which one is--which is essentially no-thing. It's a much more natural process which does not have to be dissected or followed or "understood." It is more a settling into one's real self, which, seemingly paradoxically (though only seemingly), is no self at all. It actually relates to the Cartesian directive, "I think, therefore I am." If you do not think (of yourself or at all, i.e. are without thought reigning in your mind), "you" cease to exist. Though I don't know if Descartes actually had this reverse-thought.

Winding up, to die adequately, we must realize such things.

THE PROBLEM WITH WRITING THINGS OR EVEN SAYING THEM

David Miller, a professor at one time at Pacifica Graduate Institute, noted that as soon as one says something, the opposite as well is instantly "true." This made much sense to me for I had always been aware that when I made a statement, it always was inherently very limited and even inherently quite "wrong" because it was most "decided." In other words, there were all the things about what I said that I didn't say, which made is therefore almost a false statement because it wasn't totally complete and could never be totally complete. Obviously, this doesn't apply to measureable things, such as one's weight or height, the color of one's eyes, whether or not one went to work today, or the horsepower of the engine in my car. Though one could accurately say that there are many other elements regarding me or my car that have not been mentioned. However, I think I'm referring to what one says about other things, like, for instance, the essay I wrote here yesterday. When one speaks of "large ideas" or concepts, how much does one assume the reader can understand? And how much does one assume one's self understands? As I speak, for instance, whole new thoughts and new directions and horizons of thought rise up into my mind, as it were. Some of them I follow, I go with, and others I leave behind and do not speak or write them. There is so much that is unsaid; it is far, far more than is said. Wittgenstein noted in the introduction of one of his books that what was far more important, in fact, most important about his book, was not what he said but rather what he didn't say. That resonates with me very much.

I have often thought that the most accurate communication we can do is to say or write absolutely nothing--simply because whatever comes out of our mouth or is written down is instantaneously erroneous; it hasn't been presented in its fullness but rather only in its partialness. I am forever having to explain myself so that others might possibly be able to understand me. My focus of my thought is usually rather abstract and obscure and of little interest to most people, and what I say seems clear enough to me. However, I have been told that I speak and write as though I were talking to myself rather than others, that my writing is "dense and intense" and can be hard to follow and understand. Part of it is that what's on my mind is simply not on other people's minds. It may have been Oscar Wilde who said something like: Those who keep their own company often fall in with the wrong crowd. My "business card" shows my name and then right after it, "Soliloquist." One who talks to himself or herself. I like that but it can create too many fawning admirers who aren't there. And then, there is also the fact that, though I write to others, I am attempting to understand myself in and through the process. I believe that writers tell their stories to themselves foremost. Nietzsche said that philosophers all present their own philosophies of life in the hope that others might agree and thus validate the philosopher's existence and reality.