Universal stability
September 20th
Ain’t that what we all search for? The underlying principle or principles that are universal in their meaning and permanency? And if they are hard to find, and I think we all know how hellishly hard it was to find any stability over the last few past years and still is the same today, then we look for an escape into fantasy or dogmatism. Both of those mental exercises are in principle the same. Both provide a foundation set for applying arbitrary made-up rules to give meaning to events that surround us. I guess fantasy is less dangerous as it pertains to making up the environment in our minds, but of course, that can lead to losing touch with reality and creating behavior that can cause long-term problems. Dogmatism (or fundamentalism) seems much worse — when the fantasy expectations are applied to rules that affect other people and their behavior and thoughts and freedom of choice.
Fantasy and dogmatism bring emotional and mental relief in the same way. They can make us no longer worry about thinking and seeing the real reality. Just an artificial set of subjective rules to bend and adjust the reality that surrounds us to something palpable for a normal life. There is also something very innocent in all that —innocence in looking for certainty in the random facts of current life events that we experience every day. We search for the ease of having the answers and explanations we had in childhood — then whatever the adult figures in our lives had said, we had to take for granted. Then growing up we found numerous gods, in the form of power or money or hedonism or piety or in actual religion — in something stable and unchangeable and within reach if only we would follow the already known plan that was set and blazed by many others before us. Now those gods are either lost or no longer caring or not enough for the stability of emotions and a mind.
Facing reality and taking responsibility for our actions and decisions seems hard when so many details, big and small, are beyond our control. But that actually might be the challenge worth doing — for the betterment of each person who will make a decision to live a conscious life.
