July 30,
2001.
Reminding you that in any truly
objective sense:
no one knows, or can know what
is going on in this universe/reality
since we do not have another
one to compare it to;
the best you can do,
(for whatever value the word,
“best” may in this context possess),
is to make willful note of what
goes on here
from a perspective not totally
controlled by
your own mental preferences,
(to whatever degree this may
be actually possible),
but just the struggle to do
it is the pay off,
for even if you can never know
with scientific objectivity
what existence in this universe
& reality is about
you can get-to-the-bottom-of-certain-things
locally,
and realize with certainty --
what it is NOT about.
Thus, in a most real sense:
a man who might be said to,
know-what-is-going-on-around-here
does not know more than
other people -- he now knows less,
(which is to say): he is no
longer fooled by what other people
believe is going on.
Also important to remember: men
are Supposed to believe that
what is going on is what they
Think is going on.
To ever see through this is
all an uphill undertaking;
you are pushing against the
entire universe,
trying to move it into a new
position
while having nowhere Outside
of it to stand and get leverage.
The hapless, still harboring
hope in perpetual motion machines
are rational optimists in comparison;
all that the few have going
for them is their irrepressible desire,
and the fact that anybody at
anytime can bring on the state
which is the door way to what
the few want;
the trick being in recognizing
it and remembering it.
Keeping all of this in mind,
we return to our two main characters
--
the ONLY characters in this
story -- this story in YOU --
the father & son again talking:
____________
The younger came into the elder’s
library, book in hand and said:
”Papa, what say you about something
I just read that says:
‘If there is anything more to
life than enjoying yourself
and trying to stay awake
-- no one knows what it is’ --
is that possibly true, or is
it a metaphor?”
”I am sure that at first blush
it sounds intolerably crude
to those with self-proclaimed,
‘metaphysical-sensibilities,’
but you did well to take deeper
notice & find the idea of interest.
All over this mortal orb, as
any group of humans begin to feel their main orientation to life to lie
more and more in their thinking,
the less and less do they find
the idea of a life spent in the mere pursuit of sensual pleasure, acceptable,
and even if a man individually
continues to live so,
he will -- if questioned
-- denounce it.
To be even minimally civilized
is to verbally pay allegiance to the idea that there is something more
to life than simply enjoying yourself.
It matters not what culture,
race or religion is your milieu:
being civilized = being conscious,
and,
being conscious = believing
there is more to life than
just enjoying yourself -- even if you are not quite sure what
it is:
this is how consciousness operates,
and, (under routine conditions),
men are forced to put up with
it.
The most logical reaction to
this would be to say that surely
every person would like
to live a life of only seeking pleasure for themselves, but that due to
the demands of society, and their own individual, family/financial responsibilities,
such is not possible,
even if it were acceptable,
but look and you will see that
by his actions and words,
this is not how collective-man
feels,
(is made-to-feel, of
course we should say).
Yet ordinary people unwittingly
still live in accord to the idea you first presented me with --
that:
’If
there is anything more to life than enjoying yourself,
and
trying to stay awake -- no one knows what it is,’
and you would want to immediately
object and say that ordinary people have no interest at all in --
‘staying awake’ (as we call it),
but you are mistaken;
life drives all creatures to
stay alert;
it is: Stay
alert or perish,
but the matter of alertness
in an ordinary man is limited to
his external environment
-- but then,
a substantial part of his, enjoyment-of-life
is in
criticizing other men’s lack
of proper alertness to their internal one.
So here is how it stands:
ordinary people physically want
to enjoy themselves as much as their local version of man’s collective
consciousness will allow;
they also wants to stay as alert
as possible to the external world;
alert to approaching trains,
lightning, viruses & other people,
and specifically alert to other
people’s lack of proper alertness to
affairs in their own internal world -- in other words:
all men strive to be as alert
& awake to conditions in their
physical environment as they
can possibly be,
but they individually have no
conception of alertness, or lack thereof,
concerning their own mental
environment -- only other people’s!
An ordinary man passively, and
un analytically accepts whatever
passes through his own consciousness as being properly alert, awake and
insightful, and judges whatever comes from the consciousness of other men
that conflicts with his to be manifestations of other people’s lack
of adequate alertness; (thus in essence says such a man’s mind):
‘That
person over there must be mentally asleep
or else he could not disagree with me when I am so clearly correct’
--
it is always this:
'I am fully awake & alert
in my thinking,
while those who share not
my ideas are asleep and dreaming.’
Although they do not employ
such mystically laden terminology,
all men are made to live by
this unnoted design.
When it comes specifically to
the few,
here is how this situation sits
on their terrain:
they should realize that there
is nothing more to life that any man knows than to enjoy yourself and try
to stay awake,
and that in their particular
case the, trying-to-stay-awake part
refers to their mental awareness
-- and not just their physical --
and that what keeps them from
a maximum enjoyment of this alertness
is their own normal mental awareness’
concern with
the lack of same in others.
Unlike the rest of humanity,
the few’s enjoyment-of-life
is specifically & severely
hampered by their/man’s-normal state of
mental alertness --
about the goings on within man’s mental world.
That’s it -- there’s the
boulder under the saddle.
If we wanted to really get rough
and play-without-pads,
I could say that:
‘Being-asleep is nothing more
than -- believing that other people are’ --- now how do you like
that?!” --
and apparently the son really
did -- or didn’t --
cause he exploded on the spot,
and splattered himself all over
the old man’s books.
There
is one thing that keeps those of their family tree from
the
un itchy enjoyment of being alive -- and that is:
they
alone have to live with the, impossible-to-totally-forget-knowledge-that
at
any & every moment you can be more alert & awake than you normally
are --
and
can't see to do it.
The
heartbreak of being one of the few is that
even
if you physically live the life of a libertine --
the pleasures are still never enough --
you
always feel there is something lacking,
and
when you look around you to see what it could possibly be --
you
look in the wrong direction.
The
reality is, (whether understood aright or not):
If
there is more to life than enjoying yourself & trying to stay
awake --
no one knows what it is --
and anyone who tells you that
they do -- even a friend --
is not your friend.
Face it: there is only
one thing that will ever satisfy those who want to be more alert in their
mental awareness -- face it --
realizing what it is is as good
as doing it;
pretending that you don’t KNOW
what it is
is the same as death by slow
-- and extremely annoying -- strangulation.
(One
father-&-son’s family crest was a drawing of a hedonist --
never
paying any attention to what other men think --
always with his finger on his own
mental pulse.)
J
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