Curiouser and Curiouser

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There are parallel experiences that I keep coming back to think on lately. One is the personal thoughts and emotions that make up a large part of consciousness. The other is its social equivalent, the news, what's going on in the world as delivered to us by the neighbor over the fence, the local newspaper, the mass media and the other information sources we encounter.

Personal Consciousness

Eckhart Tolle, in his book The Power of Now, describes an exercise in consiciousness cultivation. He suggests closing your eyes..., taking a breath..., letting it out... and watching for the first thought to cross your mind. What you are witnessing is mind-chatter and ego. He goes on to share a mind-bending thought; that mind-stream, those thoughts and the emotions they often trigger are NOT you. You are the observer of that happening. So instead of getting entangled in those thoughts, mistaking them for who you are, becoming the observer frees you from the constant demands of the ego, to criticize, to judge, to worry, to fantasize, to dwell on past accomplishments or failures, to puff up one's status and self-importance. And it connects you to the basic intelligence permeating reality, a far surer guide than ego with its narrow concern to feel superior at all costs. Consider just one instance of that intelligence – the miracle of eyesight. You don't do it, it happens.

Social Consciousness

So, parallel to this personal idea, of becoming the observer, is to extend it to the array of world happenings, as delivered, like the thoughts that cross your mind. And then to avoid identifying and becoming entangled in a self-destructive orgy of anger, desire and judgement. Just as on the personal level you resist the lure of volatile emotions and thoughts, letting them go on by, so on the social level you see it, it is what it is, but you are detached. In detachment you are connected to that above-mentioned intelligence and you know what to do. Freed of thought-obsession, Tolle claims, one enters the natural state which is a feeling of ever deepening joy at the wonder of being, joie de vivre; and sooner or later a creative impulse strikes. That is knowing what to do. And since the impulse is aligned with said intelligence, the doing is unpredictable, ethical and life-affirming. That makes this effort the ultimate activism. Instead of persuading others to adopt your political view you shift a part of the frequency array, yours, away from ego, the root of personal and social dysfunction. The fruit of this dysfunction - injustice, hatred, greed, war... dissolves in the light of consciousness. It dissolves in you and your activism then affects others, not via persuasion but by way of presence.

Image: based on an Emory University, Carlos Museum mosaic, figured out and drawn/colored on MAC