Although we don’t think of our lives in this way, I suggest they are reactions to the void. I see the void being simply what we discover when we question the meaning of life, ask the question I call “the last why”. The missing answer cannot be a force that acts on us; but I suggest merely being aware of the void causes us to react. If we haven’t already, we will get a sense that life is this reaction to the void when part of an ‘inheritance’ we probably didn’t even know seemed to be giving meaning to our life, is removed and we experience the emptiness most often referred to as the void. Once its effect is felt, we don’t take long reacting to the void.
We can think of our reactions to the void as weaving fabrics of existence with ‘threads’ of activity. There are only two types. Natural activity is reaching out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God. Its consequence is self-realization. Unnatural activity is trying to fill the void. I see eight ways we can try to fill the void and the consequence of each is self-destruction. (for detail see the link below)
We weave our fabrics of existence according to the law of human nature which has only two stipulations. First, we must be using some natural ‘thread’ or we will cease to exist. The law also stipulates there is a limit on the amount of ‘thread’ we can use. Thus, when we are at our limit, if we wish to add more unnatural ‘thread’ to our fabric, we must displace an equivalent amount of ‘natural’ thread. Conversely, if we wish to add natural ‘thread’, it must replace that amount of unnatural ‘thread’. Within the unnatural component we can use any amount and any number of the unnatural ‘threads’. Depending on the ratio of natural to unnatural ‘thread’ we choose to use in our weave, our fabric of existence is either dominantly self-realization or self-destruction.
Though we each weave a fabric of existence they have no boundaries. They weave together to form humanity’s fabric of existence. We become part of this fabric the moment we are conceived. When we die naturally we fall away from the edge. When we die unnaturally we leave a hole in it. We are influenced and restricted by the fabric of humanity; but at the same time we can change it and the restrictions by changing our individual fabrics.
To ‘see’ the fabric of humanity, imagine the ‘threads’ of unnatural activity are different colours and the ‘thread’ of natural activity is clear. At present the fabric is a mess of clashing colours. We can see through it quite easily but only where there are holes. If we continue to weave with our present mix of ‘threads’ the fabric of humanity will self-destruct and God will not save it. Nor can any of us alone prevent self-destruction; but together we can. By reaching out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God, the ideal reaction to the void, we can create a clear, flawless fabric of existence through which we may see “God’s Glory”.
I’ve come to accept that there are three ways to deal with the void. The third begins when we come to realize that as we are we cannot be natural. Instead of filling the void, the idea becomes keeping it open for the Holy spirit to help as “grace”. The idea here is not being concerned with “doing” this or that but with imagination. A classic from Simone Weil:
This is the trouble. Our lives are lived in imagination and this imagination is our life. It is no wonder then that we would psychologically fear its death because this imagination for all extents and purposes is us. It requires great bravery to face death. To do it requires a great need for the experience of truth beyond the satisfactions from imagination…
Life is the void becoming animated towards its own possibilities.
Consciousness is the void becoming more efficient in its search for self-realization.
Universal flux is blind self-realization. Evolution is sighted or sensual self-realization; it is self-realization in sight of its own possibilities.
As such evolution is the universal flux becoming more sophisticated in its search for completion; it is, in essence, life seeking out, and hoping for, its own end.
Self-consciousness is the void becoming aware of itself; it is an incompleteness looking back on itself by creating a false sense of separation between observed and observer (consciousness/self-consciousness).
This distance or distinction or differentiation is a natural product of consciousness; consciousness is distance – ergo space/time is a measurement of distance, produced by consciousness; it is a distance from its own self-realization.
The void, or nothingness, is freedom by another name. The emptiness, the absence of completeness and of self-realization, is the endless possibility of self manifesting itself towards a conscious being that lacks it, through infinite possibilities.
It is obvious that self-consciousness might be beneficial to a unity, in its earlier stages, as a means of focusing energies through judgment and awareness, but it results in a nihilistic pessimism in its higher forms, which either lead to self-destruction or to a joyous indifference, caused by acceptance or a resignation towards the unknown and unknowable.
Hi, kids. What is this? What is this I am reading? Does anyone know? Is this New Age? Or the plot of some sci-fi movie? Please don’t misread my tone. It’s just that three of you seem to know what each other is talking about. Is this a movement? Or just a club on this board? I’m new here.
Hi, Sat. Yes, I often know what others are talking about. Just got off the phone and I can confidently state that I knew exactly what the caller was talking about. People can write with a certain tone. I think it’s safe to infer from that that we can read that tone accurately, or not. You may think, for instance, that my tone was sarcastic - that my questions were, that is, rhetorical only. But they are not. Is english your first language? Were your questions to me merely rhetorical? Or was I misreading your tone? Is this thread populated with serious thinkers? Or is this some spoof of philosophy?
I hope you don’t mind me editing your posts. What came before and after the quote diminished its brilliance somewhat. By your tone I would guess we are possibly 2 generations apart so “kid” is not appropriate, nor is “gramps”. I only know Nick by his reputation and it is that of a serious thinker. I am guessing by his reaction to your entrance, Satyr is as well. I have been thinking seriously about life for 40 years. So unless you hear otherwise, assume we are having a serious discussion. Join in if you like but edit your comments so only the brilliance shows .
Ah, how dangerous assumptions can be! I assumed that you all must be very young. You have answered my questions in part. I guess I can extrapolate that this is not a cult. Sorry for the interruption. Ciao.
What are you trying to do to me Nick? Are you ccoming back to tell me the other two or are you just going to leave me hanging . In all seriousness, I also suggest 3 reactions to the void. I put them at the ends and middle of a continuum. At one end is the absolutely restrictive reaction of unnatural activity. At the other end is the absolutely permissive reaction of unnatural inactivity that only unravels the weave. Right at the mid point between these two is the ideal reaction of natural activity. Between the three are reactions that are blends of them. I suggest our present activities are dominated by the unnatural and since they are, we cannot as you say, “be(completely) natural”.
I don’t specifically say keep the void open for the Holy spirit but in “The Void” (which you can link to from my home page) I do say “we are not to fill the void…”: and in my poem is the line:
“A sensitivity we need to God’s spirit…”
So far I’d say we are pretty close but at this point Simon causes a temporary divergence. I suggest we experience real life with the natural activity of the ideal reaction to the void. As we move away from the ideal, life becomes less real, more imaginary and trying to fill the void with the imaginary is self-destructive. You bring us back together again perhaps unintentionally with
I suggest living at the variously less real end of the continuum is commensurately meaningless and the more meaningless our lives are, the more we fear death. However, as we move toward the ideal the more meaningful our lives become and the less we fear death. Nick, we may not be using the same dialect but it sure sounds like we are speaking the same language.
Kriswest asked us to reconcil individual with humanity. I told her this post would. She hasn’t gotten back to me. What are your thoughts?
I have spent my entire life avoiding esoteric language. I wanted to communicate my ideas with words devoid of complex connotation. I hope I have succeeded. I suspect that if you wrote to me at my level we would share many common thoughts; but I am afraid most of what you did write went over my head. If your post conveyed the meaning in your signature I would say we definitely agree. I would just expand it slightly and say, reach out to the limits of your capacities, to others and to God and thus “know thyself”.
I’d agree with that - I’ve lived it here in the last year or so, seen everything I believed as black and white and done and dusted collapse like so many playing cards. I think if there is a void we self-create it, rationally. Perhaps the challenge then, is to fill the hole we dig in ourselves through (?over?) contemplation, with a belief system equally wholly of our own making. A belief of something in spite of ourselves.
We are sort of together. Again I suggest when we ask the last why we discover the void. I still maintain trying to fill it is self-destructive and the more we try the bigger the hole seems to get because it can’t be filled. In that way we definitely dig the hole deeper and bigger ourselves.
Not entirely true. The void is for all of us. There is an ideal reaction to the void that is the same for all of us. If we choose less than the ideal then you are right. We can try to fill the void any way we want; but the consequence is the same for all of us.
No, not trying to leave you hanging but only suggesting something additional.
The additional alternative I’m adding is not reaction but conscious action.
The creation of the void free of imagination suggested by Simone Weil is the result of intentional conscious action which is not not just automatic reaction. Rather than reacting to the void, the goal is to experience it.
Could you give me an example of what you mean by "more meaningful. How do you discriminate between meaningless and meaningful?
Kriswest asked us to reconcil individual with humanity. I told her this post would. She hasn’t gotten back to me. What are your thoughts?
I’d like to use this old Eastern tale to describe what I mean because it is hard to make clear.
This same idea is in the essence of Plato’s Cave, the parable of the burning house in Buddhism, and the change of mind referered to as “metanoia” poorly translated as repentance in Christianity
The idea is that the individuality asserted to at these levels are secondary to the idea that we are all sheep. One may think themselves as an individual because they are recognized as doctors, lawyers, teachers, artists, and the like and in how they present themselves within society but as sheep lacking consciousness, we lack human individuality in contrast to culturally defined individuality.
It is the black sheep that begins to see this and naturally annoys everyone else content with the status quo. The movement towards individuality is the psychological movement towards consciousness and more specifically consciousness of self leading to “know thyself.” In the process, true individuality is the development of what exists in us now as rudimentary qualities. The spiritual qualities of faith, love, and hope, can serve as examples. They exist in us in a rudimentary form. Our love is created in us. Faith and hope are resticted to being IN something and not as developed active qualities within ourselves that are not just being created in us through external influences. At our level they are rudimentary qualities that would be mature in a real individual. It is not something we can understand now. So true individuality is the change of being at which we become our “being” potential.
our experiances are what make up our lifes progress. during these experiances we form beliefs, aspirations. all of human motive comes from our beliefs and aspirations. if i aspire to become a professional hockey player and its my lifes goal, i know theres an extremely minute chance that i will ever realize this goal. the key to having a good life is setting achivable goals, following through, and succeeding. its easier to fail than succeed. so life takes work. i’m no seamstress, lifes no quilt/
life is the progress from birth to death. i give my life meaning by valuing certain things more than others. near the top of my list is success. though its not the only motive. others are pleasure, and free time. sometimes i’d rather
do sweet (blank) all than strive for success. but i also know that the more sucessful i am the more oppurtunities i will have later in life.
To put it as politely as I can Nick, you impregnated me this morning and I’ve been in labor pains all day trying to deliver triplets. Is there any way you can restrict to one the number of ideas you send swimming up the channel to my mind?
Now you wrote
I don’t like to assume what thoughts are in your mind. However, because we are almost unified in our ideas here, I am going to suggest when I say reaction you are thinking I mean the void is the little rubber hammer the Doctor uses to hit the patellar tendon that makes our lower leg jump. This is not the meaning I wish to convey. I want you to understand my reaction is an “intentional conscious action”. My absolutely restrictive reaction is a conscious effort to fill the void with unnatural activity and my ideal reaction is a conscious effort to engage in natural activity.
You and I and Simon are united in our desire to free the void of imagination. I would just like to have imagination expanded to include the ideas of unreal, imaginary, unnatural activity. Unfortunately, if you insist on “experiencing” the void I am afraid this is where we part company for a bit. Frankly, I do not want to experience the void; and the best way to minimize its effect is to reach out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God. Now if you want to think of filling the void with the consequences of 'reaching out…" I will go along with that, but I am going to continue focusing on “reaching out…” and think of the void as little as possible.
I would really like to quit now but I have to deliver the differentiation between meaningless and meaningful because you asked. I can’t define these words for you but I hope I can tell you how to define them for yourself. I have to start by stating I believe trying to fill the void is a life devoid of meaning while reaching out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God is a life full of meaning. You will have to take my word for this until you actually do the experiment.
Now, start from where you are with your specific blend of activities and “reach out” a bit toward the limits of your capacities, learn something new. Reach out to another, begin to repair a broken relationship or help someone. Finally, reach out to God what ever you think that is even if it is just a possibility beyond humanity. From all reports you will feel somehow better then you did prior to “reaching out…” You will then say to yourself, “This might mean something” and you will thus have added a sense of meaning to your life. Repeat the process and your life will become more meaningful. If you keep “reaching out…” you will reach a point where your life is full of meaning. To complete the experiment go back to your starting point and try to fill the void more and thus “reach out…” less than you are now. You will sense a loss of meaning. If you repeat this process until you reach the limit, your life will be meaningless.
I thought delivering the last triplet was going to be a chore because the first time I read your story and your last three paragraphs I couldn’t make sense of them. After reading them a second time however, all I wanted to say to you is, "I WANT TO BE THE BLACK SHEEP".
What I take from your story is that humanity is the magician who controls, manipulates and eventually “request(s) from (us our) flesh and skins”. That is exactly what I say the fabric of humanity can do to us but with a significant difference. I suggest the fabric of humanity is the collective of our individual fabrics and that if we sense we are being restricted by the fabric of humanity it is because we are allowing it to restrict us. By changing the restrictions in our individual fabrics we can change the restrictions of humanity. As I see it your
is my reaching out to the limits of our capacities. The “faith, love and hope” and all the other “rewards of the ideal reaction to the void” are mere hints of what they could be were our existence not dominated by the unreal, imaginary unnatural activities of trying to fill the void.
You say
I say our origin is our first single cell that immediately began reaching out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God. However, when born into a fabric of existence dominated by trying to fill the void, reaching out is stifled and we lose our individuality. The only way to regain that individuality is to return to our origin, an existence of reaching out the the limits of our capacities, to others and to God. Nick, are we not now almost speaking the same dialect.
My apologies to anyone besides Nick who read this lengthy post. He made me do it.
Are you a Canadian eh? I once aspired to be a professional hockey player. The closest I got was a 2 day try out with the junior team on which Bobby Orr played. Even at your age, if you’ve followed hockey you will know of Bobby Orr.
The problem I see with aspiring to be a hockey player is that there are not enough positions to go around and the shortage generates conflict. Aspiring to win, to be first, the best or achieving any other type of preeminence you can think of generates even more conflict for there are even fewer first place positions. I think the greatest source of conflict in our lives is the goal to get more money for there is definitely not enough of that to go around. There could be if we only needed money to survive but we use it in our efforts to fill the void in our lives and for that there will never be enough for just one of us.
Trying to fill the void in any and all ways is the source of conflict in our existence. When I see the continuun of conflict that characterizes our existence I have no difficulty concluding the unnatural activity of trying to fill the void is dominant our lives. Success for me would be the elimination of all conflict. That should be our only goal. The only way to do this is with the natural activity of reaching out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God. No one in all humanity has our capacities. In “reaching out…” there will be no competition, no conflict, just unconditional cooperation.
Aspiring to anything less than unconditional cooperation is to diminish life. So young man, don’t settle for lesser successes that might bring future “opportunities”. Reach out now to the limits of your capacities, to others and to God and the “sum of (your) experiences (will equal) life.”
We may be similar but I don’t think you appreciate yet the perspective I’m coming from.
If Plato’s cave analogy, the Magician and the sheep, the Buddhist parable of the Burning House etc., are all correct, they indicate that we are asleep to reality. If this is true, what other standard for determining natural and unnatural reactions other than preconditioning is possible. There can be nothing objective about the distinction. In short, I believe you are assuming consciousness to be where it does not exist. Without it everything moves in circles and cycles giving only the illusion of progress.
The best part for me about what you call natural reactions is that it tests our will by not going with the flow. It is one thing to talk natural reactions and another thing for them to happen. Anyone that has fought the great battle of “ten pounds” knows how forcefully they hang on to our anatomy regardless of our “natural” inclination to shed them.
You and I and Simon are united in our desire to free the void of imagination. I would just like to have imagination expanded to include the ideas of unreal, imaginary, unnatural activity. Unfortunately, if you insist on “experiencing” the void I am afraid this is where we part company for a bit. Frankly, I do not want to experience the void; and the best way to minimize its effect is to reach out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God. Now if you want to think of filling the void with the consequences of 'reaching out…" I will go along with that, but I am going to continue focusing on “reaching out…” and think of the void as little as possible.
Just to let you know, I believe Simone Weil, though passing on at 34 years of age, to be the most extraordinary and brilliant female thinker with a public reputation of the twentieth century. All the pictures of philosophers on the ILP banner are men. The one woman I know equal to them all is Simone.
Even though I know of her ideas from my own path of esoteric Christianity, I use her partially to let some of the students here be aware of her for the purpose of writing new papers which professors always enjoy reading as opposed to the same recycled stuff. In this way I don’t only provide a few “Az” but contribute to her growing respect in the academic community though she is beyond classification.
Why do I stress experiencing the void? Consider what she means by what I quoted above:
Of course we don’t want to experience the void. It threatens what we value as our life. Natural and unnatural is still just reactions from within Plato’s cave. She is asserting what is asserted in all the great traditions, that we must awaken from this condition. This is what the Black Sheep begins to do. He begins to see that all these reactions have no meaning in the human sense but are defined only by cultural standards of morals and ethics.
Awakening means the experience of higher conscious reason which means connecting to something higher than our sleep and the more spiritual/conscious level. But this is not easy
To know the truth and be free necessarily implies the acceptance of death because, in truth, we are not alive in the way we think, and we must surrender this illusion of our own autonomous will and die to this illusion. The experience of reality can be “hell.” It is much easier to imagine hearts and flowers.
So it becomes a question of our goal. Do we want the experience of truth or the self importance from the belief that we are “doing” something in the objective human sense.
If the goal is “truth,” it means IMO experiencing the void.
From this perspective both what we consider natural and unnatural reactions are just reactions in accordance with man’s “sleep.”
So how to endure the void? She advises "Attention"which is a very old idea, virtually forgotten in the spiritual sense, but extremely valuable for those who have a serious need for the experience of higher meaning. She wrote in part on “attention:”
I won’t comment on this since I wouldn’t want to hurt someone else that may feel something from it that is beyond words and comments.
Actually it is mother nature that is the magician. Our life force and a quality of materiality within us necessary for the acquisition of consciousness is instead consumed through our attachment to earthly matters in the context of our psychological attachment to the duality of right and wrong. It is humanity as a whole that is the sheep and oblivious to the objective human condition…
There is nothing wrong in trying to do good things and be natural. However, if one desires the experience of higher meaning itself in the context of “awakening,” it requires developing the humility to “receive” with the goal of awakening rather than stretch from a state of sleep.
But man is dual natured. The physical body arose from the earth and returns in the cycle of dust to dust. However, there is also a spiritual seed that descended from a higher realm. It is this that can mature and return to its origin much like the acorn matures into an oak. The difference is that the spiritual maturation is conscious and as such while the acorn’s maturation is natural and mechanical in accordance with the laws of nature.
Actually Nick, I quit thinking about what you were saying and started thinking about what you are doing. Please don’t feel offended. It has been happening for years and always happens to me when I become overwhelmed with quotes , images, analogies and mountains of words.
We really must use words with great discrimination. We need words to communicate our ideas but they can also be used as an addict uses drugs. They can be used to build huge momunents to intellect we can only admire, or tiny houses of understanding we can live in. Words can be used to create cooperation or to generate conflict. We can use words to reach out to the limits of our capacities, to others and to God, or in our efforts to fill the void.
When I use words to present my phlosophy I want readers to feel an ‘acorn’ drop into their mind not an oak tree dropped on their head. I want to use my words to explain the continuum of conflict that characterizes our existence and how to eliminate it from our landscape. What are you trying to do with your words?
I understand your use of void here I believe I do anyway. I don’t see it though. A fabric of humanity yes, That I can see. Void no, The energy that is us, fills or rather bridges and infiltrates any open space Too much energy to leave a space in such a fabric. Energy flows it tends to flow into voids. Equate energy to liquid. Liquid like energy follows the path of least resistance.
This energy in us, the electric energy pulses that are us, will change as death occurs it doesn’t stop, it changes Or leaves our body to go to somewhere or something else. Physics proves that energy once started does not cease it changes. There is a formula for it I can’t recall it though.
So even should death occur that human energy still is around the fabric. It is not in the human form as we know it though. Our body is filled with energy, this is proven. It has been proven that energy changes form.
I surmise if staying with the fabric of humanity that the changed energy still is in some form or another in the fabric or in the space where the voids are, therefore no void.
Because as I stated earlier it will follow the path of least resistance, if no longer trapped in a physical body. The question is how cohesive is this energy. Pretty cohesive I would think. consider radio or Television waves. How is it that the signal which is flowing around comes out in a cohesive coherent unit? It is after all just energy. Now think on this, if we mere humans are at the stage where we can control this lowliest form of energy. How about energies do we not know or are only now tapping into?
Not just man made energies but natural energies. Nick and Deb are I think both interestingly quite close together two pieces not yet fitting, but oh so close. Yet the question still remains what are we? What is our status in the universe and beyond?
but only suggesting something additional.