Thursday, June 28, 2007

I may be paranoid

Once our brains become capable of retaining and evaluating input, each of us begin generating our own distinct versions of the truth. We receive input from our sensory organs, interpret the incoming data, and store this data according to past experience. Much like the observational effect that presents itself in quantum physics experiments, the very process of interpreting and storing alters truth. If our minds and bodies are healthy and fully functional, the distortion is minimal, but still inevitable. If we are ill, the distortion grows and can ultimately become so pervasive that reality is completely eschewed in favor of a totally fabricated existence.

None of us can intelligently know reality in its purest form. So long as we are cognitively processing reality, we can only know existence as a cerebral process. As such, what is real and what is significant becomes a totally subjective experience. And that intelligent subjectivity holds the power to imprison us, or to set us free.

I think I have written about this before, but the idea that our understanding of reality is an illusory construct bears repeated exploration. Buddhists, and to a certain degree Taoists, see proclamations of Truth and the idea of fundamental laws as being something between amusing and dangerous. Amusing, in that using one's mind to formulate an objective understanding of one's subjective reality is something like a dog chasing its tail. Dangerous, because the subjugation of the spirit to the mind can lead to all sorts of dangers. Imprisoning the spirit's potential within the mind's limitations is what ultimately leads to fear, greed, hatred, violence, and the multitude of ills that have beset humankind throughout the entirety of our short time on this planet.

So then, our minds distort reality to some degree, which means we cannot rely on our conscious awareness to lead us toward a path of absolute truth. This is where dantien, which I also remember having written about before, comes into play. By tapping into dantien, we are doing the equivalent of listening to our "gut", which is said to be a stream of consciousness that originates in the spiritual, rather than physical, aspect of our nature.

And right now, my gut is telling me that human interaction is highly overrated. Honestly, I could not count the number of humans I interact with through the course of any given day, and amongst all of those people, I have no way of being certain a single one of them is relaying their inherently distorted truths in a totally honest fashion. With that in mind, does it make sense to believe anything you are told with 100% certainty? The best we can do is place our faith in others, in hopes that they might provide a completely honest version of their perceived reality, but that in and of itself is the very best we can hope for.

All of which leads me to believe that truth and the search for it have to be unique, internal journeys, and that we must each be our own allies, mentors, and support systems. In this all too brief march toward life's greatest question, we can only ever be certain of our own experience. Everything else is faith and hearsay. We will have family, friends, lovers, and acquaintances, but our trust in them will always be a matter of faith, not of certainty. That’s not to say that we cannot or should not have that faith, we have to, otherwise I think we would all go mad, but it is a reminder that caution is always advisable when dealing with our fellow humans.

Labels:

Posted by Erik @ 6/28/2007 02:42:00 PM