Tag: consciousness

Consumerism and spirituality

 

There is a popular meme in the new spirituality movement according to which we are destroying the planet due to an unspiritual desire for more and more goods, often driven by an ego need for status. If we were to live more simply, the argument goes, we wouldn’t have all these problems. So shift consciousness in this direction and there you have your solution.

I need to blow a few holes in this beguilingly appealing theory. It may well of course be true in the aggregate that we are consuming resources at an unsustainable rate, as it certainly is true that we in the developed countries are incentivising people who are not yet consuming resources at this unsustainable rate (and there are fewer and fewer of them) to start doing so in order to create markets for our stuff (in other words, to get hold of their stuff in order that we can have even more stuff, because otherwise they would have no money with which to pay us).

Nevertheless I do not think this has much to do with status, it is essentially driven by a desire to enjoy life. Holidays, good food, comfortable accommodation, education, transport, culture, nightlife and similar major expenditure items in the budgets of households in developed countries dwarf the contribution of goods like personal electronics and discretionary luxury spending on cars and clothing. The idea that the demand for any of this first class of consumables, which is dominated by spending on services, is to any appreciable extent motivated by a desire simply to impress others I personally find extremely strange and at best highly anachronistic. For items like healthcare and related services such a hypothesis is even more outlandish.

So no, there is no excessive ego component in the demand function for most discretionary expenditure in developed countries and my hypothesis is that spiritual growth is going to have little to no impact on the demand side of the macroeconomy. It might be that some people adopt a radically different lifestyle which really impacts macrodemand, but most people are simply going to consume differently, or the mechanism of reduction in macrodemand is going to be a consequence of decisions which impact earnings thereby strengthening budget constraints, rather than any enlightened attitude to consumption. But the capitalist system will find its workers; as mechanization plays an ever greater role it does not need many of them and it will not struggle to seduce those it does. Changing attitudes to consumption will affect the structure of demand, as we already see, but not its overall level.

By castigating consumer behavior, we are really missing the target; we are failing to think in systems terms. What we really need is political action on inequality; we need to catalyse innovation and empower people rather than reducing vast masses of the population to this peculiarly post-modern form of serfdom in which the product of their labor is not even really needed, but simply exacted in order to obtain acquiescence to a political and economic order which serves the interests of a small elite which is no longer constrained even by the need to create social value. In this way, it can be obtained that the dominated classes pay ever more to obtain ever less, thereby maintaining and extenuating disparities and reconciling the system to its increasing inability to produce net wealth. By imagining the problem to be ourselves, and more specifically our own consumer behavior, we merely disempower ourselves by generating guilt. This discourse does not undermine the capitalist order as it presently functions, but concords with it.

In other words, we will not be free as long as the system is in place and there remain persons unscrupulous enough, or simply unenlightened enough, to operate it. Nothing will happen unless we take power into our own hands.

Luckily, in democratic countries, we still have some reasonable prospect of doing so even if the odds may be stacked against it. We need to seize this opportunity through social and political engagement, cultivating righteous anger and not merely organic cabbage. We need economic growth, even if we may need to define, frame and measure it differently, because it is synonymous with the liberation of creative energies that are today enslaved. The call to live within our means becomes too easily a call to acquiescence in the present disastrous order of things in which it matters little what people think or say, because money is in charge, not us.

I do not dispute that there is great spiritual value in cultivating simplicity and in doing our part to send the right price signals to the economy by buying what has intrinsic value rather than what does not. Nevertheless, our very ability to buy anything at all depends on a system which is not only inherently unjust but also tremendously inefficient. Under the paradigm of austerity, reducing personal consumption has become an accommodation to this system, in most cases involuntary: not a revolutionary act against it.

Telling The Truth

 

Neil Strauss, who wrote The Game, an account of the pick-up artist (PUA) subculture which I discussed in an earlier post has just published his new book, The Truth. The book describes, as I understand it, with a great deal of candour and personal courage, his process of transitioning from what we might call an obsessively promiscuous lifestyle to a committed open (or at least, not fully closed) relationship with his wife Ingrid. It’s Strauss’s journey, but also – certainly by the provocative title – seems to purport to be more than that.

I should say that these remarks are not based on a reading of the new book, but mostly just on what he said in his recent podcast with Daniel Vitalis. It may be, therefore, that I misrepresent Strauss to a certain extent (which I’ll gladly correct if I can be convinced of it); but in any case, what I will go on to describe and then criticize in this article is a position, I think, that many men are adopting, from whatever angle they come at it, in response to certain obvious facts of our social biology, namely our non-monogamous nature and our desire nevertheless to form deep and intimate bonds with members of the opposite sex, combined with the cultural reality they encounter. This is therefore not a book review, but a critique of that position. It isn’t necessary to listen to the podcast to understand my comments, though I do encourage you to.

Many of Strauss’s erstwhile PUA fans will no doubt be ready to poo-poo the book as a cave-in, and Strauss himself states in the podcast that some have seen it as a defense of monogamy, even a repudiation of his earlier persona, which he insists it is not. That’s fair, though he does bear responsibility for this inevitable media spin (which he doesn’t seem to have been too concerned to avoid). Strauss’s point seems to be that obsessive promiscuity is unsatisfying and successful polyamory hard to pull off, polyamory itself being, in a certain number of cases, a lifestyle choice or label which covers up an inability or unwillingness to go deep in relationships. This being so, Strauss might best be seen as a “pragmatic monogamist” who construes the term not as prohibiting extra-dyadic sex but as requiring, as I understand it, such sex to take place, if it does, on terms which are mutually agreed within the couple and transparent. He puts this forward in the discussion simply as the position to which he has come, not as a universal model, though given this his marketing seems disingenuous. I interpret him as not being opposed to polyamory, but simply skeptical of it in practice.

It might seem that Strauss and I share a lot in common; I too have written about some important misgivings related to the way polyamory is conceptualized and lived in practice (or, let us say, some of the practices which the word is used to cover) and I agree with him on the importance of commitment, communication, transparency etc, at least in that ideal world in which we decidedly do not live.

There is, however, something rather unexamined, it seems to me, in Strauss’s discourse. Vitalis illustrates this in the podcast when he speaks of his sense of shame at hiding extra-dyadic dalliances from his partner, a position he is very uncomfortable being in because he feels it lacks integrity. I would certainly agree with this, but even if we have to live our life as best we can within the constraints we have inherited, it still behoves us to examine this sense of shame critically, something neither Strauss nor Vitalis in the podcast hints at doing. Vitalis, however, offers himself a clue as to the origin of his sentiments in describing his attitude as a child towards his mother: ever fearful she would fly into a rage at the slightest provocation, he was very careful to avoid doing anything which might provoke such an overreaction. As children, of course, we seek to please our mothers because we need their love. Our mothers, on the other hand, often simply take from us what they want, being far more skilled and better placed to obtain it due to being adults and in a monopolistic position of authority. We need to be very careful to avoid the widespread error of reproducing this asymmetry in our adult relationships, and especially of doing so unconsciously, failing to recognize this as a cultural construct rather than an innate difference of social biology.

It will inevitably happen from time to time, in a dyadic relationship, that some courses of action in which the man is inclined to engage may cause discomfort to the woman. This should (ideally) be discussed, of course, and it also needs to be recognized that the woman may have insights into this situation which the man lacks; these should be listened to. However, it cannot be that the man simply does not engage in actions which make his partner uncomfortable; that she has some kind of veto on his behavior (or he on hers). The position of discomfort has a lot to teach us, and ensuring the comfort of the other at all times is a very unrealistic demand to place on oneself. This applies no less in matters sexual than in any other sphere of life. If one backs off from confrontation simply because one fears it, then one loses an essential part of ones freedom and ability to live an authentic life. We cannot rescue monogamy with the artifice of imposing upon it unhealed parent-child patterns of behavior.

In my life, I have seen that it is important to listen and communicate, but it is also important to be brave: not only important for oneself, but also for the relationship and the other. An implicit and festering situation of subordination strikes me as a major risk factor for relationship longevity. I share their desire to be open, though I do not think this is an ethical commandment; indeed, sometimes (as Dan Savage never tires from pointing out) exactly the opposite may be true. However, I am also going to do things which make my partner uncomfortable if those are things which I am convinced I need to do. I will take into account her vulnerabilities and the long run, but they are only factors among others.

There is no inherent reason to be ashamed of ones interest in pursuing any kind of relationship with another person, nor of actually doing so where this does not constitute a material and real (rather than unilaterally imagined) threat to the investment each partner has made in the primary or reference relationship. In this regard, it is irrelevant whether this behavior causes discomfort and even whether it brings about the end of the primary relationship entirely. One may certainly refrain from a course of action in order to avoid those outcomes: but consciously, not based on shame. One must, at the same time, also understand that change and challenge brings growth and new opportunities. If one shies away from this out of fear, the relationship will stagnate and may anyway eventually perish. One would want to be quite confident that in the long run the asymmetry in the relationship is not going to give rise to resentment, the rising tide of which may – and I think often does – pass unperceived under the radar of ones social identity until it is too late.

Strauss argues that we have neuroplasticity and our biology is not the last word. Of course this is correct. But any ability we may have to pursue any sort of relationship which may loosely be called monogamous still begs the question of why we should do so. There may be pragmatic grounds – including that it is a better personal choice than a life of obsessive-compulsive unsatisfying sexual liaisons and that it is a socially stable reference point, an available (if adaptable) paradigm: the path, in other words, that it sounds like Strauss has trodden. But such grounds are no more than that; they are not “The Truth”.

Proof of Heaven?

pohOn a recent trip to Germany, I picked up a copy of Eben Alexander’s bestselling book Proof of Heaven, an account of what he claims was a near-death experience which he underwent while in coma. It turns out the book has been more than controversial: he has not only been roundly criticized by materialists (masquerading as scientists) but also (surprise, surprise) by a bunch of Christian fundamentalist zealots, disturbed that the picture Alexander paints of the afterlife does not fully accord with their biblicist preconceptions.

This is a book which certainly has its faults. Trivially, it is not a proof of anything: Alexander’s experience cannot be repeated nor can it be falsified; it can only be taken on trust. Hence the precipitation to impugn his character. I find these attempts (which will cost you $1.99 just to read) unconvincing and beside the point. Alexader’s experiences, in so far as they are laid out in the book, are of limited intrinsic interest and scope – what is of interest is the fact that he had them, and not, beyond some general features, what they were. He had to make a book out of it, and accordingly most of the book is more of a dramatic retelling of the facts surrounding his falling into coma and emerging from it, rather than what he experienced when he was there. Apart from the fact that the end is preannounced, he makes a fair job of it: it is quite readable, and this is hardly a flaw. Towards the end of the book, he starts unfortunately to belabor endlessly his rather simple message, and this becomes irritating. But so much for the literary critique.

What Alexander describes is hardly surprising to anyone with a knowledge of the literature on near-death experiences (what he elsewhere calls “non-local consciousness”) and on reincarnation. If the purpose is to get a feel for what these experiences look like, other sources would offer a much better comparative overview. Indeed, Alexander’s own account is rather obviously colored by his cultural and religious environment; this is perhaps inevitable but underlines that a cross-cultural approach would be more scientifically interesting.

Alexander goes to inadequate lengths to avoid giving the impression that what was surprising to him necessarily should be to anyone else. I did not find his account surprising in the least. Nor do I lay much importance by the question of whether his neo-cortex was or was not incapacitated throughout the experience. I do not at all see why this should be critical and I believe experiences that multitudes of people have had under the influence of entheogenic substances – or for that matter in dreams, shamanic journeys or waking reality – have plenty in common with his own. This hardly invalidates his experience, rather the reverse. I do not think there is any “scientific” explanation for the content, or even fact, of any of these other experiences either. All such “explanations” fall well short of capturing the subjective intensity of the experiences in question.

Ultimately, I see little reason why someone disinclined to believe in the possibility of consciousness existing apart from the brain, and not knowing him personally, would be swayed by Alexander’s account. Nevertheless, I certainly wish him well in trying to move mentalities in that direction. His story, in isolation, is hardly the dynamite for the materialist worldview which he makes it out to be.

Its true power, which he does not mention at all, lies elsewhere. Even if it features pastors and prayer groups, even if he is moved to tears by the eucharist, it still does not accord with the primitive, brutalist worldview of Christian (or any other) fundamentalists. Imagine this: God is unconditional love. Yes, you read that right: unconditional. It doesn’t matter if you are Muslim, Christian or Jew, it doesn’t matter if you believe in a salvation history or do good works, you are loved unconditionally.

That sort of puts a spanner in the business model of all those whose value proposition depends on helping you negotiate God’s favor in the afterlife.

And on this key point, anyone whatsoever who has ever had any genuine spiritual experience – including those who would rather avoid the term of God like me – knows that Alexander is absolutely right.

I guess it’s just a technicality that this is not a proof of heaven.

The neuroscience of fear

Continuing my interest in the neuroscience of emotion, I recently finished reading neuroscientist Joseph LeDoux’s book “The Emotional Brain”(*). This is a quick review and synopsis, in particular of those points relevant to psychotherapy.

LeDoux is one of the best known figures in the field, alongside Antonio Damasio, whose work I have also delved into, but found rather indigestible. Although I found Ledoux more readable than Damasio, I have two major gripes with the book. The main one is the title: there is not a lot in the book about emotions in general; Ledoux rapidly zeroes in on the single emotion of fear, which is his area of specialism. On this subject he is relatively enlightening, but it wasn’t what I expected or hoped for. In addition, some of the statements he does make about emotions in general, even if they may apply to fear are not obviously true of all emotions.

Additionally, the blurb suggests a book which is highly readable, but I did not find this to be really the case. It’s fairly readable, but has a tendency, especially in the later chapters, to get lost in detail. I would say it is not ideally pitched to the non-specialist reader (though likely at the same time to be oversimplified for a specialist), and does not belong to the best in science writing. Having been written in 1998, it is of course also somewhat dated by now, though I have not come across anything more recent.

LeDoux argues convincingly – but it is not very surprising – that there is no single “emotional system” in the brain, but we have to look at each emotion separately. As i said, he focuses on fear, which presumably is one of the easier emotions to study because it has a much longer evolutionary history than some of the “higher” emotions like love and joy which seem more particularly to relate to human experience. It is quite hard to read any conclusions across from fear to these other emotions.

LeDoux argues that we typically have little reliable insight into the factors which trigger our emotions, but a great tendency to make up stories about them and to believe in these stories. Indeed, we are unreliable in our reports of our emotional states as such. Emotions, unlike cognition, are intrinsically linked to the body and prompt bodily response; they evolved as “behavioral and physiological specializations” (p.40). The characteristic “feel” of emotions  reflect their different physiological signatures.

Emotions operate below the level of consciousness. This is illustrated by the phenomenon of “emotional priming” whereby the response to an explicit stimulus is influenced by a preceding stimulus the duration of which is too short for it to be captured in conscious memory (p.59). Mere exposure is sufficient; there is no need for any logical connection between the two stimuli.

The study of fear has, of course, a particular relevance to psychotherapy and some of LeDoux’s arguments bear consideration in this context, as he himself notes, though does little to develop. LeDoux argues that fear, and comparable emotions, are registered in the amygdala from where they govern programmed physiological reactions; at the same time there is a feedback loop to cognition which passes via the hippocampus. This latter circuit is obviously much more developed in humans than in lower mammals, but in all species it is notably asymmetric: the hippocampus, which is where new memories are created, has the equivalent of a broadband connection to the medial prefrontal cortex, but the available bandwidth is much less in the opposite direction. This, LeDoux argues, makes it difficult to reprogram the association made in the hippocampus between certain remembered events and the fear response. This sounds plausible, and may reflect experimental observations on the persistence of conditioned fear responses in rodents as well as the observed difficulties of therapy, but it is no more than suggestive of the conclusion which LeDoux draws.

Fear conditioning is the process which “turns meaningless stimuli into warning signs” (p.141). Some stimuli are preprogrammed: “laboratory-bred rats who have never seen a cat will freeze if they encounter one” (p.143). But most, of course, are learned. The simultaneous presence of two stimuli of which only one, the “unconditioned stimulus” (US) is intrinsically unpleasant is sufficient to form a link between them, on the basis of which the second or conditioned stimulus (CS) is subsequently sufficient to evoke the fear response, regardless of its intrinsic link to the US. This link is highly persistent and may indeed be impossible to forget completely even if, subsequently, no link between the stimuli is observed for a protracted period. The best that can be done is to extinguish it by presenting the CS repeatedly in the absence of the US, but there is always the risk of recurrence if relevant circumstances, such as re-exposure to the unconditioned stimulus, or simply a high level of ambient unrelated stress, arise. A CS may be almost anything: a place, a gesture, an expression, a tone of voice… Of course, the atomicity of these candidate stimuli is hard to determine : is being in exactly the same place necessary to evoke the conditioned response, or is it sufficient that a place bear some resemblance and, if so, in what respects?

In stressful situations, memory formation by the hippocampus is impaired. This would imply that traumatic events might not leave a memory trace, but still result in fear conditioning. In such cases, there may be no way to “reverse-engineer” the event out of the conditioned reaction. This has the clear implication that going after memories of traumatic events may be a fruitless strategy, and that resolution of trauma might happen without those underlying events ever being recalled, even if they occurred past the stage of childhood amnesia. However, the stress hormone cortisol has the opposite effect on the amygdala. Thus it is “completely possible that one might have poor conscious memory of a traumatic experience, but at the same time form very powerful implicit, unconscious emotional memories” (p.245). At the same time, recreating the emotional state conditioned does facilitate recall of explicit memories (p.212).

LeDoux’s analysis of conditioning and memory therefore sheds some light on problems encountered in therapy and on effective therapeutic strategies. I learnt something from  this book, but I suspect that a general book on recent contributions of neuroscience to psychotherapy might have gotten me more rapidly to my goal.

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(*) References are to the 1999 paperback edition published by Orion books.

The Will to Power

I have recently been thinking about what Nietzsche referred to as the Will to Power.

Nietzsche’s concept expresses, glossed in modern terms, the intuition that there is, in our biological constitution, a source of self-becoming which is identifiably and subjectively moral and yet individual and innate.

Nietzsche was dissatisfied with Schopenhauer’s concept of the will to live and with the Darwinian concept of the survival of the fittest. For all that he challenged in German moral philosophy, he remained convinced that man had an innate, if often latent, moral drive and that this was biological in nature. Had Nietzsche lived later, he would surely have found Freud’s “pleasure principle” just as reductionist. The Will to Power itself is amoral in nature and its biological foundations are not really explored: morality is a second order effect that Nietzsche expects to emerge from affirming this basic drive rather than repressing it. What a world would look like in which people lived in accordance with the will to power is not Nietzsche’s concern, and at first sight the notion seems as compatible with altruism and benevolence as it does with despotism and misanthropy. On closer reflection though, the charge of misanthropy must be a misunderstanding, because the superman derives no benefit or pleasure from subjugation of others; he speaks “badly of man but not ill of him”. As for subjugation of nature, Nietzsche views it as an intrinsic folly.

So the question is, what is the biological basis of the will to power? It seems to me that Nietzsche misunderstood Darwin in imputing to him a necessary dependence on utilitarian notions. From at least a modern perspective, this seems not really to underlie Darwin’s discoveries. All that really would seem to matter is that I pass my genes on, and not that I am happy with my life.

Nietzsche posits that vitality is the root of man’s creativity and the best of which he is capable. As such, the will to power seems to rest, biologically speaking, upon the drive to procreate. It is this, seemingly so basic, drive, and which can undeniably also be experienced as entirely trivial, that at the same time is so inextricably linked to our most compelling experiences of dissolution and ecstasy. Whereas Freud thought that moral effort was needed to channel sexual energy into the achievements of civilization, Nietzsche is much more trusting in the natural propensity of this creative energy to overflow into the entirety of man’s social and inner experience: it does not need to be directed, it only needs to be unleashed.

The will to power and the drive to procreate or to experience dissolution are not, however, precisely the same thing. If this were so, the will to power would be everywhere; it is hard to imagine how societal forces would keep it in check. Descriptively however, few people seem to embark on the journey to which their vitality invites. For those people, and I count myself among them, allowing societal forces to prevail over ones inner sense is simply an impossibility; it is inherently immoral, however noble might be that to which one is exhorted.  The only moral being one possibly can be is the one that one is. Of course one exercises judgment, discernment, in practical action but this is really not very difficult because one is not at war with the outer order of things, one is simply awake to the opportunities to change it that may arise. All else is tension, and counter-reactions to it are assured. If morality arises from the natural state of man, moral crusades can never lead anywhere. All I need to do and all I can do is to take you, if you are ready, by the hand and lead you to places which can trigger your own awakening. Force is available to me, but it is useless. As I have written before, meditation is my only moral imperative.

But, you may protest, if I see injustices of which I am not the author, do I not have to act?

No. But at least I may. If I embrace the will to power, I am no longer powerless, no longer trapped in knee-jerk reactions to external events, reactions which are almost entirely determined by my own inner struggles. I am serene. I can act. My power is available to me and I have clarity as to the potential rewards of my action. And as such, I am finally a moral subject. Certainly, good deeds may contribute to mankind’s well-being, but they do so proportionately to the inner serenity of their authors.

Ultimately, it remains a mystery why most of mankind, like the animals from which we are descended, is in a state of more or less deep sleep. The will to power, in conscious form, seems to characterize only the few and at this stage of our social and perhaps biological evolution it is a pure leap of faith to imagine it as potentially characterizing the many. We are left with the mystery of consciousness, this quality which suffuses nature and yet is distinct from it, seemingly, in an evasive sense, superordinate to it; which erupts into human minds and human history more as a messenger from another realm than as an expected basis for our being. It is alien to us, yet our deepest nature; we long for it, but have mostly no idea where to look. Humanity as animal plus consciousness is an aspirational equation, even a self-delusion at times. Grounded in our biological nature, the will to power necessarily impels us not simply to recreate the conditions of a more natural life, although this is a precondition, but to be something which, so far and with rare exceptions, humanity has not been.

Why eschewing religion is a prerequisite of spirituality

It is a glorious spring day in Brussels today, inviting to indulge a certain melancholy over the passage of time and the meaninglessness of existence.

In melancholy we sense, simultaneously, the beauty of both life and death; it may, if we let it, overwhelm us. But usually we are too frightened to let go.

This fear of being our mortal selves and clinging on to our misperception of separateness finds its origin in the survival instinct of animals. But although our biological nature impels us to seek to survive, it does not mandate fear when that survival is not threatened or simply because, ultimately, we all will die. Mortality anxiety takes root in a misformation of the ego.

Consciousness is not life without fear, but it is life without fear of fear. We know fear to be instinctive and survival to be a basic drive, but we also know that whether or not we survive, existence will go on. We know ourselves to be a tiny part of existence and this only now; and yet, if we are aware, a vital part, in a sense, however, which transcends vastly our self-identification.

Such awareness is the goal of spiritual practice; it is embodied spirituality. But our spiritual drive and our mortality anxiety are expertly captured and deviated by religion. Theistic religion promises an absurdity, namely the survival of the soul as a differentiated entity. In order to achieve this absurdity, devotees are ready to accept the most insane of sacrifices. Living is fully subordinate to an illusory survival. Even the Eastern doctrines of karma and reincarnation are not much different. Indeed they are possibly worse, since existence is seen as a chore which colossal efforts are required to escape.

Religion is not only the opium of the people; it is predatory on their enslavement and the sworn enemy of their emancipation. Today, take time to live, to experience one exquisite moment fully. The ecstatic character of life in which we partake is our birthright and the sole immensity there is.

Jealousy

Today I took my little boy to the childminding service at the school which is organized before classes start.

By way of background, I am probably the most obsessed person in the known universe on the subject of the attitudes of adults towards my children (and in fact all children). I am infinitely sensitive to the frequent occasions when those adults project their own neuroses and unresolved emotions onto the kids. When I see or feel it, there is no room for compromise. I am also in love with my little boy. I rely on him for most of the spiritual enlightenment I am ever likely to obtain. He is amazingly charming, almost always happy and playful and he has a really tender side also. He’s three (nearly).

Despite being impossible to please, I am pretty happy with the school. It’s not perfect of course, but it could be a lot worse. We feel comfortable sending him there.

The lady in charge of the childminding service seems to love him particularly. Whenever he arrives, he is greeted with open arms and a warm heart. As I love him and care for his wellbeing, what more could I want?

So, where I stand on this is pretty clear.

To my surprise, though, this morning, how I feel about it apparently is not. Continue reading “Jealousy”

Humanity’s one sole moral imperative

I am not someone who uses the word “morality” with any degree of comfort. Nietzsche is my hero, and Nietzsche believed that all that was good proceeded from vitality, not moralistic prescriptions.

However, I have recently discovered that I have, and believe in, one true moral imperative, one thing that is forever, irreducibly, beyond esthetics.

That thing is, simply put, meditation.

Up until now, I guess I had been working with the assumption that the spiritual path, the path of healing and self-discovery, was a sort of optional extra for people thus inclined. Not really indispensable. Nothing I could really exhort others to follow, however much I believe in and value it myself.

I now see that this is not so.

Indeed, evil and suffering have, it seems to me, only one source: our eternal propensity to flee our inner conflicts by projecting them on other people. And thus self-examination is the sole moral imperative to which the human race is called, the sole choice which is not purely esthetic.

This has, I guess, a worthy pedigree in moral philosophy, from Socrates’ exhortation to “know thyself” through Kierkegaard’s fevered piety to the esthetics of the post-structuralists. This notwithstanding, meditation has somehow, for me at least, stayed off the map. Perhaps it is the immobilism of the hierarchical cultures – India, Japan, China – which give most place to meditation in their spiritual practices which explains this unhelpful connotation. And yet, meditation responds most holistically to the Socratic call – not through the sole medium of the mind which the Greeks elevated out of all proportion, but through the media of the body, spirit and soul, the instincts, longings and pleasures which inhabit them, and the quintessential encounter with the other. Indeed, it is not only a question of knowing oneself, in some abstract and theoretical way, but of truly becoming oneself.

It has an equally worthy pedigree in sociology and social theory, with its roots in Marx, Durkheim, Freud and Reich, developed in the psychology of Erich Fromm, and is discussed in extenso in the present day discipline of psychohistory – the study of how childhood trauma relates to war and social upheaval. And indeed it has long been clear to me that I had no choice than to pursue my spiritual path because I owed it to my children. Still, I was reluctant to prescribe it to others.

No longer, then.

If you are reading this, know: your sole moral imperative on this earth is self-examination and meditation.

Conscious depression

These days, I am slowly, but it seems surely, slipping into a deep depression. It has been going on for some months and I do not know when or how it will end.

I was clinically depressed in early puberty and so the feeling is eerily familiar. This time round, I am trying a new approach. I am trying to let it be, to respect my body’s decision or need to shut down, physically and emotionally, to withdraw itself and me from those around me and wrap me in a dark cocoon. It is not easy to function like this – indeed in my teens it was impossible. One must accept that others will observe your darkness, the ebbing away of your lifeforce, or at least its retreat into hibernation. That others will in turn shun you, afraid of being captured within your event horizon. This is normal, and as it should be.

This experience, though unsought, is not, I believe, to be feared; not at least any more. I can observe it and write about it and I can believe in, in some mode, its resolution.

Depression is quite fascinating. It is fascinating to see this wall coming up, in the same instinctive way that a shellfish will close inside itself when touched. It is fascinating to see connections to the world dropped, one by one, like the arrival of winter or a foretaste of death. The shutting down of peripheral sensation, slowing of the central nervous system, the feeling of emptiness in chest and belly. To observe what passes and what remains. Where, for instance, is anger? It is there, but quiet; in no way ruffles the deep inner silence. And love? No, there is no love. Love is remembered, but coldly; it is not felt.

I can look at my limbs and it is as if they are not mine; as if no effort, however great, could ever move them from their inertia. The bottle of water across the desk could as easily be a thousand miles away.

Libido shuts down. No pleasures of any kind move me to enthusiasm. They may be, I do not hate them, but I am beside them, they are for others, not for me.

As I retreat within, on this path as infinite as the one outside, there is surely something to be learned of meditation and encounters to be made with myself, with my history and the many psychic scars I bear which never healed. In a way, it is a luxury and a choice. At least for now.

The first time round, I doubtless lost count of the number of people whose advice was to “snap out” of it. But I feel I want to go in, deeper, to understand it, accept it and yes, even be proud of it.

You see, as relative engagement with the world lessens, one may understand how relative it was to start with. The starting point was not a norm, it was a paralyzed coping, hidden and afraid to say its name. It was, itself, a degree of depression, just a degree to which I had become used, which I accepted, with which I even identified, and certainly within which, behind which, I took refuge.

To see this accommodation for the temporary and fragile equilibrium it was is, perhaps, to be freed to move beyond it. When the way forward is blocked, then one can make progress only by going into reverse. I want to know what it really feels like in this unknown country inside me. What lies behind all the mists, the horrors I experienced but perhaps also other forgotten things, precious things abandoned and left behind in the rush to escape and find safety. Cold things, treasures covered in slime or cobwebs, but still there. I have, writing this, little inkling of what they may be – their existence is as pure an intellectual construct as that of some subatomic particles. Be it so.

To recap, I know already a lot. About love, spirituality, childhood traumas and their aftermath and what it is to live as an adult, fully, joyfully. I know exactly how things should have been in my life. But I am not able to realize this journey any further at this point in time, I am quite blocked. I do not blame external circumstance, I just know that I must now dive back within. With my eyes open, an oxygen supply and a line to the surface. Consciously.

Friends, I may be a while, but I am safe this time. That place inside feels dark and numb only because it has not been allowed to be a part of me, has not dared to integrate the surface. But I know it is me, too. It is the feeling, flowing, primal me that has not been allowed to be.

Man muss noch Chaos in sich haben, um einen tanzenden Stern gebären zu können.