Tag: spirituality

What Now

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Words are the vehicles of thought. Some new ones, like “blog,” “influencer,” or “covid,” are lexical fast-food. Others have a more self-important sound, only vaguely defined. “Postmodern,” for example. This is meant to be a comparison of what is now (“post-,”) with what was modern some time ago. When? The Enlightenment? Darwin? Betty Crocker? How can there be a time after what is new?

Henri Bergson and Albert Einstein debated the nature of time in 1922. By all accounts Einstein, representing the new atomistic school, scored a TKO. Bergson, from the philosophic-metaphysical school, could not convince the audience that the passage of time (what he called durée,) was better understood in an emotional, spiritual context. Einstein stood for the currently accepted view and, like the electric toaster, his ideas sold.

A hundred years later Bergson’s version of time is more appealing. Time is development, an unfolding continuation of reality, every moment presenting differences in the essence and attributes of the universe. Now is not post-modern, it’s post-everything. The way we relate to the world is not the way our parents or our ancestors did; not the way our kids do. The conditions, the conscious reality of passing time is different to every person, every moment, every day, presenting new ideas, requiring new responses, new directions. Change may bring improvement; it may beckon a desire to return to the past. It may also make lessons of the past seem obsolete. Lessons like the finality of the atom or the wisdom of electric vehicles will become the new “Let there be light,” Noah’s ark, Jonah’s whale.

Humanity needs God. Otherwise we choose things, diversions, false gods. You can see it in our adulation of powerful leaders. To reassure humanity, to guarantee our future something has to happen to make religion a thing. Some way to make faith rational. Our materialistic, scientific ways of thinking have made sacred writings, the messages of myths and creeds seem quaint antiques or, worse, “articles of faith” which can hide ignorance or, worse, perpetuate hatred. It now seems to be a test of one’s intelligence whether to believe ancient human stories of creation, miracles or claims about the meaning of life from our sacred books. We live in a world without certainty. We need to explore what comes after post-modern.

How are we to conceptualize God in this new world? Not by going back to the old superstitions but to give the sacred old words a new context: to understand not with our intellects but with our emotional centers. To redefine intelligence. We have to think with our hearts. The time is now.

Dharma and The College Senior

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A while ago a student about to graduate sat in our store waiting while his friend was being fitted in a suit for upcoming job interviews. To break the silence I asked him what he was planning to do after college. He replied, “No idea,” without looking up, as if he’d been asking himself the same question. His laconic answer suggested not confusion as much as sadness. “I had an interview with Goldman,” he added, “but I don’t wanna be in finance really.”

I asked what he’d majored in. “Philosophy,” he said.

I am sure this young man was familiar with the Sanskrit word dharma. This concept from ancient Vedic tradition can be found in western philosophies, in the writing of Arthur Schopenhauer, for example, and Friedrich Nietzsche. A precise definition of this term seems to elude western thinkers however, as it seems to have two different meanings. Dharma is the spirit within all of creation, a blessed, universal “will.” It also alludes to one’s personal destiny, the path one follows in life. These may seem to be two different things.

The word actually conveys these two definitions in one unified concept. That is, there is a sacred “way” in the nature of the universe, and each of us has the responsibility to follow it, to live our lives accordingly. Dharma is universal and personal. There is force for good within existence which each of our lives is meant to personify. This is confusing to the modern, western mind because we have been taught to think of fulfillment as a material matter. We are generally not aware that the gift of life comes with a personal, moral responsibility and that fulfillment is the ultimate reward for carrying it out.

I felt for the young man sitting in my shop that evening. He was dispirited, not just by confusion about his career, but by an unconscious, heartfelt awareness that he did not know who he was, how or even why he would live out his dharma.

I might have helped him by sharing my story. Years after graduating from college I was led by the brutal futility of living by self-will to practice a spiritual, contemplative lifestyle. After having developed a daily routine of prayer and meditation I found myself on the right path. I got a message, delivered to my heart, to my spiritual subconscious: “This is the way, the truth, and the life.” My life’s goal was not what I thought; fulfillment came from within.

The awareness of our path is communicated by spirit to our heart, not to our intellect. Sensing and living out one’s dharma offers a sense of purpose, confidence and peace not included in your typical employee benefit package.

Creation

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Curiosity is the wellspring of creativity. The human desire to explore, to seek answers and to uncover secrets is the source of every invention and every technology, all of art, and all of religion. We have always been curious, for example, about the origin of the universe. What started this? How did we get here? Every tribe has invented and passed down a creation story. No matter how exhaustively studied, no matter what science may propose, no matter the evidence, the source of universal creation will never be more than a theory, never anything more than a myth dressed up in equations and so-called proofs.

Creation is not something that happened; it is perpetual, ongoing. The next moment in time does not exist yet. Universal conception is taking place now, constantly. The world and everything in it is continuing to take shape, to be formed, to become reality with every moment that arrives. The quaint idea that some supreme being initiated eternity and infinity does not pass the simplest test of logic. The supreme being is the mystery itself, always prompting our curiosity.

Lately the “Let there be light” story was replaced by a “Big Bang” hypothesis. Doubtless in ages hence, as the finality of the atom was replaced by string theory, the Big Bang will have become a cute antiquity. Maybe people will go back to believing in a mysterious deific force waving it all into being. It is certain that we’ll never know for certain. Human curiosity will doubtless persist, but it is hopeful that we will focus our curiosity not on the “How” but turn instead to a more important, personal question. “Why?”

Why are we here? Why am I here? What is our purpose, our significance? What can I make of this life I’ve been given? How will I honor my own creation? A desire for value in one’s own life prompts fundamental, existential questions: What is my purpose? How can I be of value? How shall I be satisfied with my life? These questions may never be answered but must be asked. The meaning of our creation is our responsibility to find, and the result of our curiosity will simply be a more rewarding search.

Simone and M. Sartre

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They met in college in Paris in 1929 and remained together until Jean-Paul’s death, in 1980, their relationship a unique kind of amorous companionship founded in mutual intellectual curiosity, not based on nor requiring exclusivity in sexual partners, a kind of romantic stoicism, an attitude that said, “Our life together is what it is, perfect and whole, not affected by what we may do when we’re apart.” More significant than sexual independence, though, was de Beauvoir’s liberation from convention generally.

Jean-Paul and Albert Camus and other, lesser lights in the post-religious, European philosophical era, commonly known as Existentialists, made history expressing their belief in the observation that human life was inherently meaningless, that the cradle-to-grave experience was in fact, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. Not a new idea by any means, but easy to sell amid the meaninglessness of life that humanity experienced in the age of plague, world-wars, global genocide and economic depression.

Simone apparently agreed with this sad outlook. However it was she who articulated the solution. In “The Ethics of Ambiguity,” and elsewhere, she wrote about the opportunity – in fact the obligation – each of us has to recognize that the meaning of life, the path to fulfillment in our minds and our souls, was our responsibility to find and to follow. Happiness a decision to be made. She proposed that the requirements for eudaimonia, Aristotle’s term for fulfillment or true success, was for each of us to realize. This was the statement of the new existentialist featuring a new, nurturing feminine spirit that said, “Mes amis, c’est vrais. Your happiness is up to you.” The prescription for meaning in life is first to find out who you really are meant to be, then to be that person.

M. Sartre saw the problem. Simone had the solution.