May
24, 2001.
PRISON: EXPANSION
BY
REQUEST
____________________________
Even while complaining of the
restrictions on their lives,
men exert continual effort to
put themselves under even more.
Everyone says that they are
being “held back” creatively,
yet they willingly join activities
which participation therein requires
that they subject themselves
to additional prohibitions.
Those who denounce established
political parties as too repressive, flee to join The Anarchists, who have
their own requirements of proscriptive conduct for membership;
those seeking escape from the
tyranny of evil submit their lives to
the additional rules of a religion
to deliver them there from;
the examples are endless,
but if all you see is irony
-- you miss the lesson.
All creatures look for leadership,
and man too, wants to be told,
“What
to do;”
for that reason, (not patriotism),
do they join the military,
and to fulfill that need do
men become sure-to-get-caught-criminals
cum “professional prisoners,”
and for the purpose of having
further regimentation in their lives
are men members of all manner
of organizations & clubs.
By physical instinct do both
men and wolves in a pack long to be
pushed around, kept-in-line,
and told what to do.
Therein lies no problem-to-be-solved,
it is simply how life is at
that level.
Above that however, the situation
is thus:
man’s younger, frontal lobe
neurons claim they want to be free,
and not
told
what-to-do, (what to think, in this case),
while his older hormones, and
their essential, though silent,
neural associates are still
programmed to live restrictive, safe lives.
Part of man’s brain/mind cries:
“Freedom!” while the rest of his nervous system still wants to live
by strict rules.
It gets even more interesting:
even the vocal part of the brain responsible for men’s pleas to be free
to think whatever they please,
is not being truthful;
it too wants to be told, what-to-do,
and fulfills the need so slyly
that few men ever realize what
is taking place inside their own head.
A mind of partisan thought is
asking to be told what to think even when it is confronted with ideas it
opposes:
that is what eludes all but
the keenest of eyes:
if you believe that some ideas
regarding man’s exclusive, non tangible
world are true and some not
-- you are a total captive of a world that has no substance
-- that has no ultimate meaning.
There is no correct, or incorrect
address for Snow White’s house,
and spending your life trying
to determine the right one,
is to spend your life not that
differently from your six billion neighbors,
but do understand this:
there is no right combination
to an imaginary safe --
much less a wrong one, and searching
for the real one while dismissing the phonies will certainly fill up the
time of seventy years in the dark.
Even if you come to see all
of this for yourself, and no longer have any interest in what other people
think -- not for or against what they think, and not angry, sarcastic,
or cynical about what they think,
but simply & totally
-- un interested, there
is a final challenge,
(more like an exhilarating ,
thoroughly enjoyable game, but, “challenge” sounds more serious & mystical,
anyway),
a final challenge: that of seeing
thru the illusion that
you are telling yourself
what to think.
He who believes he teaches himself
has a fool for a student.
Honest observation easily &
clearly shows that men
want to be told what to do;
want to live by rules &
regulations,
and want their behavior controlled
& restricted,
and that in spite of their protests
to the contrary,
they want to be told what to
think, either for or against, first, This,
then, That, now
on to, The Other;
and not really “What to think”
specifically about this or that matter,
but, "what matters"
to think ABOUT.
With every book you read; movie
you see, person you talk to,
you extend the invitation: "Tell
me what to think about."
As long as you allow your mental
menu to be chosen for you --
-- it doesn’t make any difference what you order.
If you are of ordinary mind --
you are a prisoner, and never aware of it;
if you think about the things
& problems that everyone else does –
-- you do not THINK,
not in the way of which the brain is capable,
not in the way that is the reality
behind what drives you to
read these words each day.
Knowingly, or not: the potential
of your brain that you are trying to reach/ignite/get-in-touch-with has
the most distinguishing characteristic of being neither in favor of, nor
against
any ideas relating to the intangible
world;
it knows that it made that whole
world up;
how could it sanely now have
opinions as to which statements
about specific subjects therein
are true, and which are not
when it is all a dream world;
there is no meaningful debate
over whether
Prince Charming had black or
brown hair:
that is all that all intellectual
conflict amounts to.
That is all.
To see the reality of this outside
yourself
is freedom from the general
prison population;
to realize its final implications
inside of you
is to have your own personal
cell, swept clean,
and it instantly expand to the
size of the universe;
no room left for anything to
hide;
no dust remaining to get in
your eyes, and make you sleepy.
He who wants to know the secret,
and seeks instruction from others,
lives the life of a dunce;
and he who gets beyond that,
but who never gets over thinking that
the voice in his own head is
instructing him in the matter,
dies, still a dunce.
Listen closely: The secret is
not “this” -- and the secret is not “that” --
-- the secret is what was just said.
Jan
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