Simon, count me not of your brethren. For in weakness I only shake my head and walk away, that my futile countenance might avoid the encounter with the thought of your endurance. Simon, count me not.
The phrase, ‘without music life would be an error’ really is kind of misleading, because without music there would be no life. If there was no beauty, aesthetics, good, there would be no life. Life would be an impossible existence.
You want to be a leader?
You want to change the game?
Turn your back on money
Walk away from fame
You want to be a missionary?
Got that missionary zeal?
Let a stranger change your life
How does it make you feel?
You want to be a writer
But you don’t know how or when
Find a quiet place
Use a humble pen
When speech becomes a crime, silence leads the spirit over the bridge of time
-Paul Simon
There is only hope when hope is no longer possible.
There is only faith when God turns his back on you.
There is only humility when you are the fool.
Ethics and authenticity are not objectifiable things, both arise from the well of being found in the self. The question is not does existence precede essence, but rather are the principles of existence and essence distinguishable. Is this not the great violence of the mind?
you either grow to like the pain or you grow crazy. ha-haha-hahaha …
The little known story of David and Goliath’s meeting the night before they come to battle. They debate the causes of the Israelites versus the causes of the Tribe of Goliath.
Goliath: But it’s not “great” either .. that too is just a lens.
David: But isn’t there something awful in the ambiguity?
Goliath: You mean the meaninglessness of life?
David: At least our critical role in its very generation
Goliath: What makes it critical?
David: Just that without an agent it seems like there’s no
objective meaning
Goliath: It just “is”, that’s its own explanation. Its explanation is existence.
David: I would agree, but it’s in its own self reference that I am hesitant or at least suspicious.
Goliath: Hmm. Where’s the glitch? Can it be articulated? Or maybe: Why does there need to be an external referent? Is it possible to conceive of something totally in relation to itself?
David: Definitely.
Goliath: And isn’t that sort of what we’re trying to do when we “rely on ourselves” for ground? There’s nothing to relate to BUT you, but your existence in that way…
David: Maybe it just comes down to the person and I have grown suspicious of my own trustworthiness.
Goliath: Ah, that’ll do it. But I think that, too, is supposed to happen. How would you every now to trust something if you didn’t prove it could be trusted.
David: Right.
Goliath: It’s a long road to anything that’s good. I can’t imagine just “waking up into consciousness?” I do know what you mean though, I feel that way too.
David: Mmmm for sure.
Goliath: I think for me, I just started to trust parts of myself that I knew were pure and good (and true/real), and then (and still continue to) puzzle out the rest from there.
David: Hehe I was just thinking almost the same thought.
Goliath: Yeah? Not too shabby.
David: Hehe.
Goliath: There’s some consolation in that … either we’ll both figure this out, or we’ll sink together, haha.
David: Haha, thank God.
Goliath: Haha, I’m glad you’re so cheerful about our mutual demise.
David: Haha, What greater good could come of our encounter?
Goliath: It’s probably better that way, anyway.
David: Hehe, eternity is more fearful a thought than oblivion in my opinion.
Goliath: Hmmm I feel exactly the opposite… interesting.
David: Haha, it is, it is.
Goliath: One of must be wrong. This must be decided. Haha.
David: Haha or we’re both right because were entirely creating truth from within ourselves.
Goliath: No, that’s bullshit. You know that’s not true. Nobody really believes that …
David: Hahaha.
Goliath: What’s the problem with eternity, though? Why does it feel frightening, if it can be explained, even?
David: It’s a lot to except, I mean accept.
Goliath: Haha, both are true!
David: Haha.
Goliath: Are you sure it’s something you have to understand, though? I mean, what if the mind is just not built for conceptualizing eternity?
David: I don’t think it necessarily is.
Goliath: It is itself, material, not eternal, in a sense? But if you have a sense or a need to understand it, there must be a reason for that too…
David: A tangled web of contradictions and nightmares of understanding, yet all there before the eye of God.
Goliath: I understand you. Maybe you will figure it out … just not quite yet. If you’re mind is pulling you towards it, intending on grasping it, I don’t think it could deceive you? I would hope your instincts wouldn’t desire something unknowable - TRULY unknowable. So many people say things are “unknowable,” but I think that’s just because they give up trying to understand?
David: I think the unknown must have a reason of its own… but it’s very far removed from our current state of being
—–
Some time elapses as Goliath stares into an empty glass…
—–
Goliath: David, what if “this is it?”
David: Mmm. That is the dilemma my untimely friend.
Goliath: And all those searches for more than this were not because it really was out there, but because we needed it do be. Ah, maybe not too big a dilemma though: i mean, what have you really got to lose? (Other than sanity, haha, by getting your mind tangled all sorts of ways)
David: Maybe the pleasures of simple life and ignorance.
Goliath: But you would never become that. The simple life is never simple for the deep feeling individual. You already are not ignorant. How could you become ignorant, now? You’d have to “recede” to a point of knowing you’ve already passed.
David: Oh, I totally agree. Short of a lobotomy there’s no turning back really.
Goliath: Haha, not, there definitely is not! Maybe that’s the “solid ground?”, “It just is, now.”
David: Hmmm, there’s definitely a good sense of resignation.
Goliath: You mean resigning from needing that answer and leaving it up to God?
David: In one sense definitely.
Goliath: Though you let on that there’s another sense…
David: In another resigning to the answers that do come.
Goliath: Ah, I see. Do you mean sort of like if you “turn off the questioner; you’ll turn off the possibilities of all answers?” Maybe I’m wrong in interpretation though. I think it depends on whether you’re using resignation as something peaceful or deadened.
David: I’m not sure how that lineage works out exactly.
Goliath: Do you think maybe it’s that, the “stillness” that’s
troubling, the calm in a dying man’s eyes?
David: Maybe on occasions, but I also see its great relief.
Goliath: Yeah, I think that’s the irony of stillness (and of death): it’s both painfully frightening because of its absolutism, and relieving because of its absolutism.
David: Mmmm. For sure.
Goliath: But maybe it’s just supposed to feel that way? Maybe life is always supposed to rattle up our nerves, AND bring us incredible peace? Like a process of interchanging the two? And anything other than that can exist, but maybe can’t be called “human life.”
David: I would totally agree, it’s in that tension that life gets its mobility.
Goliath: What if that’s your answer?
David: Well here we two are and it’s just tricky to swallow.
Goliath: “Keep seeking eternity,” and the understanding of it … but let it creep into your bones too, the thought that you actually do understand it, right now. If that makes any sense. Haha, it is, it is. It sounds like you’ve already got it half way down though? I think if it makes sense, there must be a reason. You must already be chewing on it, as it is.
David: Haha one can only hope it doesn’t come back up.
Goliath: Haha, well, regurgitation is a pretty natural process for humanity too, haha. It’s okay, I’ll clean it up for you.
David: Haha the great ontology of regurgitation coming from my sworn enemy.
Goliath: I’ve had a lot of experience with philosophical regurgitation. Haha, definitely. It’s a fascinating process! I’m not sure if I still do, but growing up I had a terrible, terrible phobia of vomiting. I’m pretty sure I’m over it now, but I haven’t thrown up since I was in the fourth grade?
David: It’s an awful thing to experience.
Goliath: I think it’s “mind over body” for me, haha. Now my stomach is like an iron vault: what goes in stays in. period. It is. It’s absolutely terrifying.
David: It really is.
Goliath: The last time I remember it happening, I think it was probably the “first time” I ever had that feeling of complete isolation and despair. I think that’s why I developed such a revulsion to it … it always reminded me of that horror.
David: I believe it.
Goliath: But things are different now. It’s amazing how that all works. How sensitive you are when you’re a child. You just feel things — you don’[t know why, or what you’re running from. You just sort of run.
David: Mmm, Its funny how often childhood is looked at as true enlightenment.
Goliath: It is! I don’t understand that … ? A weak child is not enlightened, I’m certain of it.
David: The mysteries abound haha.
Goliath: Haha, they always seem to, don’t they?
David: Mmmm. Indeed.
Goliath: Are you tired from being?
David: I didn’t have much to be fortunately
Goliath: Ah, that’s good.
David: I am kind of beat though, maybe I’ll turn in for the night.
Goliath: Haha, I am glad you said it. My eyes are closing.
David: Mmmm. Indeed.
Goliath: Good night David, it was nice talking to you.
David: Definitely you as well.
Goliath: Sleep well, for tomorrow we meet one last time!
David: Thank you sir.
Ultimately reason and passions fall short of producing satisfactory meaning. What remains are aesthetics and the sum formations of free will. Of these aesthetics holds a key feature. The meaning of aesthetic being is found in the communion of self with environment. In this communion it is not the self referencing of pure freedom that generates meaning but rather the true co-extension of ones being into reality of the other. True grounding and basis for meaning is therefore to be found in those experiences of the self which promote communion and the aesthetic experience of such.