For the New Year
From Rob Brezsny’s Facebook and his book Pronoia:
My old philosophy professor Norman O. Brown would periodically interrupt his lectures, tilt his head upward as if tuning in to the whisper of some heavenly voice, and announce in a puckish tone, “It’s time for your irregular reminder: We’re already living after the end of the world. No need to fret anymore.”
The implication was that the worst had already happened. We had lost much of the cultural riches that had given humans meaning for centuries. All that was going to be taken from us had already been taken.
On the bright side, that meant we were utterly free to reinvent ourselves. Living amidst the emptiness, we had nowhere to go but up. What remained was alienating, but it was also fresh.
Working from the hypothesis that you’re living after the end of the world, what are you free to do that you weren’t able to do before? Who are you free to be?
It’s been a rough year. I think we can all use a little pronoia.
Is there a non-circular version of that quote, or a command to unspiral text (just kidding on that one!)? It looks wonderful but makes me dizzy trying to suss it out. Checked the web site and couldn’t find it……..
Anyone who feels (such a person doesn’t actually think) that “All of creation is conspiring to shower us with blessings” has never met a chigger.
But what would life be like if you practiced believing the universe is conspiring to shower you with blessings? It’s certainly as true as believing the universe is conspiring against you, which is what most people seem to think.
It would be living in a fantasy. The universe is neutral. It doesn’t think, feel or intend to do anything. It only follows the laws that govern it.
Yes, there are many created things that are huge blessings, but there are many others that literally are “out to get us”, like chiggers, intestinal worms and other parasites – including the bipedal variety.
It’s up to us to maximize the blessings and avoid, or otherwise minimize the damage done by, the things that are “out to get us”.
Pretending that bad people – for example – desire to bless us doesn’t make life any more pleasant. In fact, it makes things worse, because nothing’s easier than taking advantage of a gullible person.
So? We Buddhists say everyone is living in a fantasy. What would happen if you picked one that was favorable?
Oh, I don’t know. What would happen if you chose to live in the fantasy that eating nothing but pasta and ice cream sundaes was healthy?
It’ll never work, we’re doomed. Eeyore was an optimist.
The above graphic is very reminiscent of Roy Eugene Davis’s, “Let Life Be Like This.” (Davis studied under Paramahansa Yogananda, the author of “Autobiography of a Yogi,” and was eventually ordained into Yogananda’s spiritual lineage as a minister.)
The opening lines give you an idea of the flavor of the piece:
”There is a benevolent Power nourishing the universe, and us, and we can learn to cooperate with it. There is no lack in the universe, there is only the fullness of Reality. To the degree that we are open to life, life is responsive to us….”
I enjoy reading it at this time of year, when the long, tough slog to spring must be borne, if not mastered, by those of us living in the SAD Belt.