A little introspection

I was thinking.

Bad thing, I know, but I couldn’t help myself.

I was thinking about the mind, and about illusion. About how we have a whole world of holographic 3D inside ourselves, a sphere that is very mysterious.

It can heal, it can sicken.

It can be science, it can be madness, it can be clairvoyance.

And how to tell the difference…

In my view it all begins with the illusion of the self. That thing that we are not, this complete view of ourselves in holographic 3D that we construct in order to ‘know’ who we are.

From there, I guess it’s easy to see how the mind grows. This ‘me’ sets off a collection of self-objects: my mom, my dad, my house, my dog, my shoes, my town, my country… The mind expands and ‘I’ is the center of all the attention.

I don’t know.

For in the end, I must remember how I was denied my degree in Human Ecology, even though I scored over 90% on the exams, only because I called scientists narcissists.

I am still thinking about it.

Is the mind a narcissistic thing? Is it all about the illusion of the self?

For the mind, I guess there is more than the seeing things. There is a voice too. A voice that guides us to float through the pictures and landscapes inside. There is this, and then there is that, and this makes that…

I think we should not only see, we should also hear the voice.

Is it just describing, is it perhaps prescribing?

Limiting the surprises we might meet?

Is it warning, giving us expectations to fear?

What is the nature of the mind?

Does it help us, or does it keep us stale and dead?

Does it serve to secure safe predictability because of terrifying connections we envision?

Psychoanalysis has, from the start, been weary of the inner landscape. It has concentrated on the voice, on telling what we see, on manifesting the voice that accompanies the visions. Psychoanalysis says in this way we can advance and process things, in the end to let the mind bleed to death in our words.

Perhaps the mind will bleed to death, perhaps all this knowing which is perhaps egocentric and only some kind of historical baggage.

But if psychoanalysis wants this sphere of knowledge to end, does it then seek the end of science? For what else is science but a collection of descriptions of the elements of the world and the laws of their movements and interactions?

A modern ego, a modern self-image would not only contain the image of the nose and the butt and the back and the lips and such perhaps, but as well a view of the intestines, the heart, the stomach, and the voice could tell us that when food is chewed and swallowed it descends into the stomach we ‘see’, where it is digested before descending further into the bowels and being excreted into the toilet, where it flushes further to…

Where is the end of our imagination?

And do we have to be scientific?

And what when surprise happens?

What if the food is not digested in the stomach, but we vomit everything out?

I guess then the voice was wrong?

Shouldn’t we vomit?

Should the voice always be right?

Is the voice, describing things, some kind of law to follow, prescribing things?

And what with the surprises?

Perhaps surprises can save us from the law, no?

From believing everything is known and predictable.

Like quantum physics…

Big surprise!

And before we start obeying the voice that is telling us how things are, or should be, perhaps even like a gambling voice, betting on how they’re gonna be, even assigning chances and probabilities to events happening or not, before we start depending on our lawful minds, predicting everything and guiding us by these predictions, we are perhaps egocentric, as children, but we are also full of magic.

The impossible can happen, the unlikely is possible.

Surprises are real.

And we love it!

We love magic.

Perhaps when we have listened to the voice in our heads long enough, listening, just listening, not therefore obeying but just observing, perhaps the old predictable mind can bleed to death, as psychoanalysis would have it, and perhaps we can be surprised again.

Surprised by a beautiful sunrise, surprised by a lovely bird singing to us, surprised by a kiss out of nowhere, surprised by breakfast in bed and valentine chocolate every day, straight from the heart of creation.

I think it is wise to be mindful of our minds, of the voice and the holographic sphere of representations inside. To be mindful of our theories and our personal science.

I believe becoming aware of our mind’s functioning is the road to magic. It is where the shamanic takes over, where we can find the trance that comes with heightened awareness, with a return to innocence and naivety. Why not could you descend into a lower world through the roots of a tree and find a dolphin there who is your best friend at first sight? Why not could you feel your wings and move your tail flying high like an eagle or devour your worst enemy with the jaws of a wolf?

Because the voice in your head tells you you can’t?

Because it shows you what horrible things will happen?

In your mind?

Do you believe, do you really still believe?

Like a child?

Do you have power and do you have a say in your reality, or is it all just prescribed and described, fixed and unchanging day after day after day?

Your science.

Wouldn’t you prefer a little magic?

Wouldn’t you like to start meditating, try making a shamanic journey?

Bringing some life into your life?

Mixing some colors with the dark?

I guess the thing is, everything needs to be known. Everything needs to be predictable. That is safe. You need to know. And then you can live. When science will be further evolved… we will know everything and we will be safe.

Every day will be the same and no unwanted events will ever surprise us again.

If only science… evolves?

Grows?

I don’t know.

I guess we like to predict things, the voice in our head likes to believe it knows what will come, and when it wins another bet, it becomes ever more certain of itself.

But this is not life, this is not living.

Life is surprise.

Life, you don’t know.

You can’t predict the future.

That’s what chaos theories and quantum behavior is showing us.

There are just too many possibilities.

Perhaps you should start believing once again in the magic.

That pumpkin that turns into a chariot.

Perhaps you should meet the dolphin inside, and fly with the eagle up high, and tear your foes apart like a whole pack of wolves.

Perhaps you should reclaim your inner power.

For this voice which is the law of your science, the voice that tells you what is good and what is bad, it can be questioned, it can be doubted.

A friend of mine wrote a book ‘the benefit of doubt’, and although I have not read it, I think I can see something in that title. Doubt can be a force, doubt can be a rebellion, it can bring you to question the voice of law.

But don’t fight it, just observe.

Observe deeper and deeper.

And you may find the music in it, you may yet discover its poetry.

And you may envision things much more satisfying than your laws and science.

And you may end up living a life far more enchanting than your predictions of everyday.

It may take you a while, to take these powers back, and to let the magic grow.

It is a road, it is a way, but I know that it is there.

And I know we need it.

We need to speak from a belief in the unbelievable.

We need to see that which cannot be pictured.

And we must realize that which is impossible to realize.

Attain the unattainable.

We must talk to the man in the moon and marry his sister. We must fly through the stars and respond to their winks, we must sit at the bottom of the ocean and breathe calmly, we must burn like fire and rise like the flames.

There is so much potential in our spirits, in our beings, in our lives, that it is just a pity to let all of it just go by unnoticed, untapped. Just for the sake of everyday certainty of the laws we live by in the science in our head.

Why not try something different?

What is the voice telling you?

Did you notice the voice?

Did you listen?

Did you see?

We must come to lose our minds, and come to our senses, is what I am trying to say. We must sleep no more. We must awaken.

Alive!

There is no limit to what you can do, there is no limit to what you can experience.

But first you have to experience. You have to experience your inner reality. The voice, the sphere of holograms it paints. It is like you are hypnotized, and you are always listening, but you never hear it. You just obey and think you are thinking.

But you are not thinking, really, you are not mindful, you are not awake.

I do not have the solution, I am not mister know-it-all, I cannot wake you up and show you the magic.

But I can try to show you a way.

A way of listening, a way of seeing, a way of awakening to your senses and opening up to the unpredictable and the surprise.

And I know that even though the current you may be a little bit in doubt and even a little bit afraid, the child inside you will love it.

And as for that ‘egocentric’, well…

You may still find ‘your’ eagle, and ‘your’ dolphin, and for sure ‘your’ pack of wolves.

I have no doubt.

And you know what, even Lacan has said that if we don’t follow the law of science in our minds, we will start drifting.

I disagree, and moreover, I believe a little struggle is a price worth paying for getting from under the hypnosis of everyday life and finding your way to all the chances and magic that I know life is full of.

If only you would believe it, if only you would wake up and start to use fate to your advantage.

And no longer be a victim of the ones who would have you obey, and have you asleep, and have you dying without ever knowing what life was all about anyway.

You cannot question science, is what Lacan is saying, yet that is exactly what psychoanalysis is all about. Changing the laws, questioning them, and becoming creative, becoming a sheep no more, but a whole big bad wolf of your own.

Go for it!