Talking about experiences

 

Who really wants to listen to someone else experience? Practically no one.
In general we can't wait to talk about our own experience and hardly listen to what the other is saying.
And we finished talking and the other person is not even listening, in the same way we don't listen.
It is a peculiar exercise on monologues.
Not often it happens that we can actually exchange experiences.
Not often and it only happens if we are very open to really listen.
I would like to really minimize my talking about myself.
I found it not very interesting and it doesn't help my internal process.
I rather listen and ask a lot of questions.
It makes the other person happier and I feel more connected.
It is a backward way to treat others as I would like to be treated.

PHOTO BY RAFAEL EDWARDS

Reconciliation

 

The theme of violence and vengeance is a fairly heavy one, but at the same time it creates the space for me to ask myself, “How do I get out of this mess?” No matter how much I’d like to offer the other cheek, I am not completely convinced of the effectiveness or enduring validity of that approach. And after ending up without cheeks from offering them so often, how can I really overcome those forces that keep being generated within me?

Going deeper, I have to recognize that sometimes my worst enemy is inside me. If I am my worst enemy, offering my cheeks won’t help me much.

Then I see more clearly the need to reconcile with myself, and with everyone who has harmed me. The path of reconciliation is arduous, but demands sincerity; and it is the only path that offers a way out of the vicious cycle of internal violence and resentment - the same cycle that makes others mistreat me and makes me mistreat myself.

So, considering all this, there arises within me the natural impulse of forgiveness. But forgiveness, while still important, is not enough. It is not enough because it obliges me to put myself in those totally unexpected situations where I pardon my aggressor and they don’t realize I’ve done so, and just go on being aggressive. Now, humiliated on top of being hurt, I decide that forgiveness isn’t very effective, since I find myself again resentful, but now doubly so because my forgiveness has not been gracefully welcomed. And even if, as in the best of cases, my forgiveness is accepted, I feel morally superior, and that’s the end of all my efforts toward a more interesting transformation. Besides, there remains an unanswered question: how do I forgive myself?

I need to go a little deeper inside… and unfortunately I can’t do that just by forgetting what happened. Forgetting doesn’t work very well, because the painful memory is still there, and no matter how hard I try to push it down, it surfaces and keeps bringing that situation back into my present awareness, even though I’ve tried to forget it. Sometimes just a scent or a color brings back all those memories I thought I’d forgotten, and again I find myself in a situation of resentment.

Little by little, and almost without any other options, I begin to reflect that the only way to overcome all this is through a deep and sincere reconciliation that begins specifically with myself. As has been said, this process begins when I accept that I have a problem, when I can admit that I don’t like myself as much as I believed, and sometimes don’t really like myself at all. This lack of affection for myself is complicated and makes me suffer, and its causes and origins are hardly important. What is important is that it exists, and is continually begging to be recognized and resolved. There I am with this burden that gets lighter only when I begin to treat myself differently, when I begin to see myself in a different way, when there appears within me a desire for a kind of transformation not linked to any feeling of guilt or desire to “improve” myself, or any requirements of that sort. A transformation where I simply see myself as someone with a lot of positive and negative attributes, with longings and hopes, failures and successes - a truly human being with all kinds of needs, and also someone who’s interested in others and in coexisting with them and loving them - and also in loving myself. When I can see myself that way, my future opens and I feel I can escape the trap of resentment.

Then I recognize the validity of not judging myself or anyone else. I recognize the need to transform my life and the lives of those around me, but not compulsively, or for any other reason than to overcome myself. Because I understand, although not always very deeply and not always completely, that this is an effort that is made without concern for retribution or reciprocity. In other words, it’s neither necessary nor important for others to respond in kind. It’s a kind of “unilateral disarmament” that I experience as internal liberation, as a sensation of lightness and coherence, something that fits internally.

Finally I can perceive that when, as I strive to reconcile with myself, I begin to achieve this unilateral disarmament, it reinforces in me the feeling of reconciliation with others. Now I can sometimes see how all those individuals who have wounded me are exactly the same as me. I can perceive them in their humanity, and this is possible because I am humanizing myself. So after going around and around on this issue, I realize that everything begins to transform when I make the decision to reconcile with myself.

It is that effort, and no other, that allows me to escape from the closed circle of violence and vengeance. The best thing about this whole process is the silent joy that begins to accumulate within me, and I feel a profound gratitude for all these teachings that we have received.

Portland, Oregon February 18, 2021


EDITED & TRANSLATED BY TRUDI RICHARDS

ILLUSTRATION BY RAFAEL EDWARDS

Trust

When the institutions that are a society’s pillars are not perceived as such, that is the beginning of that society’s disintegration. Science is no longer credible, education is doubtful, religion is uninspiring, justice is no longer blind, politicians no longer represent any truth.

Trust is a key ingredient in a correctly functioning society. Generally trust is lost when the keepers of the trust fail in their actions. Normally trust is never recuperated when it breaks down. Doubt and mistrust poison everything they touch, and unfortunately the antidote has not yet been found for this enormous problem.

When there is trust, there is tolerance and respect, because it is understood that errors can be correctable. That is not the case when trust evaporates. Then all tolerance and respect disappear in a whirlwind of mutual recriminations, and finally everything gives way to violence and total disintegration. This happens in human relationships and in human societies. So we ask ourselves, what can be done? How can we emerge from this situation?

Will we again give our trust to those who have betrayed us? Will we pardon all their mistakes? Will we exchange some for others without any certainty that things will get any better? Will we listen to new promises made without the slightest conviction? Such promises do not inspire trust no matter how great an effort we or anyone else makes. They do not sound sincere because they are not.

The sincerity we need is intimately linked to the recognition that this society has failed at every level. This failure cannot be repaired with promises and declarations, nor by a tough nor a soft approach. It doesn’t matter which individual or individuals have declared themselves the saviors, because they do not inspire trust. Maybe by now we are at last completely fed up with what we’ve been seeing for thousands of years.

Really recognizing our social failure would put us in an extraordinary situation, tremendously painful for a few and liberating for the rest. Such a recognition implies being able to admit our ignorance at all levels. It implies being able to look at all our mistakes without prejudice, without cowardice and without blaming anyone. We gain nothing by blaming anyone because if we’re really being sincere, we’d better share the blame. But I do not believe that is the best approach, nor that it is what we aspire to. True justice has little to do with guilt and blame.

If we as a society can experience our failure, perhaps we can move on to a new stage where a new way of organizing ourselves and of looking at things is possible.

Inevitably at this first stage of recognition, fear is the first thing we need to accept, see, and abandon. Fear is exactly what is keeping us from advancing as a society toward a more coherent form of relationship and government. Fear of losing what we do not have or what we believe we have, fear of not achieving what we believe we need to achieve, fear of what we remember having had or what we believed we had have always led us to destruction and violence as individuals and as societies. This fear exists at every level of our lives and that is why our social structures are in decline and disintegrating. “Each clinging to their own gods…” as the famous and true song goes. Without even realizing that those “gods” that we cling to are the same that all the enemies we keep creating cling to.

The truth is, it’s a sad situation for all humanity, and like it or not, we are all immersed in this system that is now global and we have no possible way to escape this reality.

Like all “realities” we need to start seeing it for what is, and the sooner the better. If there is any possibility of change, it is now and not tomorrow, and that change will only be possible if each of us has a strong desire for change. This change has to begin with the individual who becomes fully aware of the situation of failure at an individual and social level. If we naively believe that the individual and the social are separate and that it’s the society that is messed up and we are fine, we won’t go anywhere very interesting. The opposite idea, where society is fine and the individual is messed up, is equally mistaken.

What I am suggesting is one of the most difficult things to do, and at the same time the most effective. When change begins in an individual it is because an internal recognition has put them in a situation of “truth” that can be reached in no other way. How I would love to take a pill and have everything be fine when I wake up, or drink a glass of something that would make me feel better. Or maybe take some drugs. Nothing very strong, just enough to make me forget this reality that I have not created and that has nothing to do with me. I could also surround myself with people like me and therefore not feel my miscalculations or my internal failure, and I could calmly blame everyone else. I have to admit that sometimes this works for a while but the moment inexorably passes and something happens that breaks that artifice and I am again violated internally by the facts and by what I do not want to admit.

The false doors for ending our internal violence and the social disintegration that comes with it are many, but the only important thing is that they are false. Truth is always felt as such, and its main characteristic is that it does not bring violence. The violence we are talking about is physical, racial, sexual, gender, religious, economic, etc. – all the known forms of violence. The truth is felt as an inner liberation, an expansion, a soft joy, peacefulness, and a certainty that the other is as important as oneself. If we have to justify and explain what we call “the truth” because we cannot feel it, then all those explanations are useless, because they do not touch the human heart, which is where the real possibility of transformation begins.

Maybe I don’t feel this thing that holds the truth all the time, but it’s enough to feel it a few times in order to orient our lives in that direction that is human and, why not say it, transcendent. Transcendent in that it truly transcends the personal, the individual trivialities, and puts us in resonance with life itself, a life that keeps being built from inner realities and not from slogans and great economic, political, or moral declarations.

This ascending direction brings me to a situation of trust in the other and in myself that can be experienced without any doubt, because I can feel in the other the same thing I feel in myself. When this happens, when I can put myself in the other’s shoes, that is when my position in the world changes, and therefore everything changes. To want and to be able to treat the other as I want to be treated is the golden rule for a real society. It is the foundational pillar for building something that is true.

When the human being is divorced from their deepest feelings, that is when meaning is lost or fades. When I separate myself from what is true in me, that is when the society I belong to no longer reflects a meaningful direction. That is when all the “enemies” appear, ready to snatch what I believe I have. That is when the indefensible appears, when all the countries flags are raised signaling that what is most important is the individual, the family, private property, religion, and the fatherland.

And maybe that is the way it is, but all of it is tinged with fear and violence. It does not inspire trust, quite the contrary. It causes internal disintegration and makes me betray what I believe I believe in. On one hand I am ready to do the impossible for my loved ones, and at the same time everything that is not part of that small circle is my enemy. Of course I am going to justify that a thousand different ways. That justification will keep growing and suddenly I will find that war, killing, and control by fear are “necessary” because they are the enemies of “my fatherland” and my “beliefs” and everything that exists.

If anyone dares ask me how it is possible for all that to be justified, for the religion I profess to be one of “love and not hate,” or any other question that reveals my deep inner contradiction, I will respond with insults and more violence.

Curiously there is no religion on the planet that promotes hate in its original teachings; nevertheless, here we are, with the defenders of the faith armed to the teeth to protect something that was never even said.

One could say that this is all an absurdity, and of course it is. But we have gone past the limits of what can be said, and what we are facing is a disintegration that will not respond to anything anyone can say, or to any brainy analysis. This is something that is growing like a cancer and will keep weakening the social body until it destroys it. I am not exaggerating in the least. This social breakdown began decades ago, and we are now in the midst of one of the greatest crisis humanity has ever faced.

All the alarms in our short memory of history are going off and even the most cynical and the most optimistic silently know that we are going in the wrong direction.

I do not believe that anyone will be very happy with this quite brutal and apparently negative analysis, but unfortunately we find ourselves at a historical crossroads of immense proportions. This is not the moment for soft words or for denying what exists and where it is taking us. Nor is this the moment for statistics and intellectual justifications.

We need to observe and understand that this environment we live in that we call social has a lot to do with us. In reality it is almost impossible to separate the individual from society. The two are a structure, and must be understood structurally. It is in the structure itself that the problem of lack of truth, lack of faith is being generated. The individual and their environment feed each other and cannot be conceived separately, no matter how hard we try to separate that fact.

I think and also want to believe that we can transform ourselves and transform our environment. I think and believe that it is possible to move in a unitive and growing direction. I’ve had internal flashes of recognition that push me strongly toward believing that it is possible not only to live with internal unity but also to act in the world as a transformative force.

To learn to treat others as I want to be treated is the most coherent way I can be in the world. It is something that gives me meaning and an ascending direction.

Then to learn to overcome suffering in myself, in those close to me, and in society.
To learn to resist the violence that is within me and outside of me.
Finally, to learn to recognize the signs of the sacred within me and around me.

In this way we can be in the world, in society, and learn to develop ourselves internally. It is important to understand that it is necessary to “learn.” This is not just a word, but carries within it a way of being in the world where learning is the key, where every day I ask myself what is important, where every day I try to learn as much as possible about myself and those around me. In some way I believe that this is a “path” that will lead us to a different society, one that is human, profound, and much truer.

Trust is the basis of all human relationships. If trust is lost, it is like losing the doors and windows of a house. If trust is built, then the future opens wide.



EDITED & TRANSLATED BY TRUDI RICHARDS

The guilty ones

Guilt is a topic that has always caught my attention. Probably because it has been part of my life since my childhood. Born in a Catholic society and educated in a Catholic school, I had no choice but to learn to feel guilty starting in “tender infancy,” as they used to say…

It's good to have a direct experience of this phenomenon. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, not even on myself, but at least I'm talking about something that I have experienced and have "suffered" for a long time. This has made me think a lot about it - about where it came from, how it developed, and how it's managed to permeate societies for millennia. I use the word “suffered” intentionally and not as a figure of speech, because guilt is something we experience as mental suffering.

Since this is a serious topic, I think it is best to approach it without any seriousness. That way I can see it better, and can begin by saying that my childhood had little to do with my guilt. In other words, I've met people who never went to a Catholic school and never heard anyone talk about “guilt,” who still feel as guilty as I do... I've met people from other places, other cultures, who speak different languages, and we all feel guilty.

We feel guilty about what we do and what we don't do. About what we think and feel, and about what we don't think and what we don't feel. In other words, when it comes to guilt, we are all stuck in an internal labyrinth without much way out.

The most curious thing about all this is that no one wants to admit it. And if anybody does naively admit their guilt, they'll have at least six people around them trying to convince them that they're not at all guilty of anything. Which is quite comforting but not remotely helpful. It doesn't help because in spite of everyone's good intentions, it's fake. Guilt does not disappear because someone reasons with you, tells you're wrong, tries to convince you, scolds you, etc. I think we have to go deeper, to the root of the problem of guilt. And that root is like the roots of an oak tree, deep and long…

According to the stories we're told, we were expelled from paradise because of Eve's fault after she ate an apple from the tree of good and evil, seduced by a snake. Who knows where Adam stood in all this, but the story already starts off pretty badly. One of the first historical “judgments” begins with someone being found guilty, and goes on with their punishment. Both Eve and Adam are kicked out of paradise for eating those forbidden apples and for wanting to be like the gods - that is, for having more interesting aspirations than just to exist. Not to mention that the guilty party was a woman, and “God” was always “the father.”

From that point on it's a series of gruesome hardships and tragedies for all human beings, who generally come into the world innocently, without knowing anything about its history, who arrive without choosing, and end up in this strange predicament... guilty even before being born. On top of all this, which is already plenty strange, an intermediary appears part way through the whole story. He shows up at a key moment in history, intending to redeem all human beings, since they arrived already carrying the burden of “original sin." This redeemer brings a message of love and compassion but doesn't even make it to age 40 and ends up being crucified by the empire on duty in cahoots with the reigning religion in the chosen spot.

Which brings us back to guilt. Now the human being is not only expelled from paradise, but also guilty of crucifying the redeemer. Of course, it's explained that he died for our “sins,” but that doesn't help in the least, but only adds one more link to the long chain of guilt that is the basic substrate of an entire belief system, of a faith and a way of life.

I want to clarify that I'm not at all trying to ridicule the Catholic religion or, in fact, any religion. On the contrary, I am trying to explain to myself how we've been indoctrinated. Even though I'm obviously giving very few details and am speaking in a way that might seem sarcastic (but is not), I'm talking about something I see first of all in myself. I will try to explain below.

This story of guilt is complicated and has endured in this form for thousands of years. It is important, at least from this perspective, to understand that guilt in general is rooted in our civilization, and that its presence is completely independent of its perceived religious origins considering that the code of Hammurabi existed long before Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Guilt broke away from its origins a long time ago, but remains embedded in our social rules, in our legal concepts, in our ideas of “right” and “wrong,” and in the most common and practical applications of the laws that rule humanity.

The so-called “law” is all about administering “justice,” and there is no justice without finding someone “guilty.” Those accused by the law are tried and convicted (or acquitted) by the judge, who is sometimes a magistrate and sometimes a jury made up of a number of people, and who decides whether the accused is guilty or innocent. In all societies the objective of all of this is to administer justice according to the laws of the land. The laws change but the justice system does not change. No matter how much the laws change, the guilty continue to be convicted. In other words, there is no system of justice without guilt.

This is what I am saying, and it doesn't matter if we agree or don't agree. Without guilt, without punishment, without trials and without confessions, the entire judicial and civic system immediately collapses. This is really food for thought considering all the ramifications and consequences of all these entanglements. But without getting into all that, which would entail quite a lengthy detour, it is clear that all justice systems in general are based on innocence or guilt according to what is considered good and evil in the historical moment in which one lives.

I don't think it's possible to change this system, and it doesn't seem to be in need of change, but I think it's interesting to see how it operates in us. How my guilt, which I don't even know where it comes from, begins to dictate my behavior, and now I feel guilty, and not satisfied with feeling my own guilt, I begin to find others guilty as well. We share the guilt, but that changes nothing important in us.

I believe the only antidote for all this guilt is responsibility. That's another long and complicated topic because of all the interpretations of what it means to "be responsible.” To keep things simple, I am referring only to the responsibility we have to ourselves regarding guilt. In Sri Lanka in 1981, Silo said the following: “For the first time in history, let us stop looking for people to blame. Everyone is responsible for what they have done, but no one is to blame for what has happened. If only with this universal judgment we could declare: 'No one is to blame,' and with this establish a moral obligation that every human reconciles with his or her own past."

This proposal is a profound and simple one that can actually be carried out if the suggested line of action is followed.

If I look inside me for what makes me feel guilty and try to reconcile with myself, with what has happened and with whoever was present in that conflict, that is a step forward, a step that opens my future. Such reconciliation is a responsible and internally integrative response that is aimed toward overcoming revenge, resentment, retribution and self-degradation. In true reconciliation there is no forgiving or forgetting. In this kind of reconciliation it is important to get to the root of revenge, fear, guilt and violence. This root is not personal but cultural, and as we have already said, has its origins in the remote past. In fact, the code of Hammurabi, which predates Judaism, Christianity and Islam, is the beginning of this whole story. That is why the root we are considering here is so long, and why it is a good idea to study it carefully, based on the universal principle that says: "You will make your conflicts disappear not when you want to resolve them, but when you understand them in their ultimate root.”


EDITED & TRANSLATED BY TRUDI RICHARDS
ILLUSTRATION BY RAFAEL EDWARDS

About Art

I am interested in art. Yes. I'm interested in art, but from a perspective or point of view that can be summarized as follows:

"Art as a means of human expression and social development."
I'm not interested in defining "Art."
I am certainly not interested in anything remotely connected with "artistic creativity" or with the "creative process" in art.
The fact that I'm not interested in those aspects doesn't make them any less important or worthwhile. They have their value and their meaning, but it would not be honest for me to say that I can embrace them.
Insomuch as art contributes to human expression, it is worthwhile and meaningful for me.
Insomuch as art contributes to social development, it is worthwhile and meaningful for me.
Why am I interested in human expression and why am I interested in social development?
Because I am a human being immersed in a world of other human beings. Our temporal and spatial existence is known to me as "experience." I am alive (apparently) and what I do with my life is important. My existence, as well as the existence of others, is strongly conditioned by a multiplicity of factors that I will not analyze in this writing but about which it will probably be enough to say the following:

We all come into this world without the ability to choose. We do not choose where we are born, or under what conditions. We do not choose our city, town, or region; we do not choose the social and cultural context we grow up in. We do not choose our parents, and we do not choose the name our parents give us. In short, we are born conditioned to the max by unchosen temporal and material circumstances, and by the particular historical/cultural moment in which those circumstances exist.

Every human being is said to be unique. But my existence is not unique - it is an experience shared with others. Nor am I, personally, particularly unique, except for slight differences in physical features as compared with other human beings. Outside of that, outside of my enormous illusion of being unique, I'm just like everyone else.

No longer perceiving myself as unique, I've lost my belief in “uniqueness,” especially in the context of Art.

Before the Renaissance, most of the artistic production was an anonymous endeavor, a social rather than individual undertaking. Neither signatures nor names were associated with artistic production. Art was a collective activity that had a different expression and intention than it has today.

I don't have enough understanding or data to explain why, but I perceive that since then, our architecture, painting, music, etc. have gone from being an expression of society as a whole to being a personal expression that highlights the individual and individualism kept growing stronger and stronger over the centuries, anonymity was degraded and all social effort was rechanneled toward the individual. Now we have arrived at the 21st century and much of what I perceive in art is clearly produced within the context of individual self-expression.

I understand that individualism is as strong as it is because we are all born into an individualistic system that subjects us to individualistic conditioning on all levels - social, cultural, regional, and planetary. All contemporary societies are characterized by individualism and a belief in individuals. Bathed in this individualism from the time we are born, every one of us absorbs a thoroughly individualistic approach to living.

In my personal process I value joint efforts. They leave me with a very special register of a soft joy, a register of complementation. Of course I can conceive of artistic productions that are not within the realm of the collective; but I am interested everything collective because of that direction. Perhaps in the not too distant future, work in the arts will be increasingly developed through joint activities.

In certain artistic productions we can see the best human intentions reflected. Often these intentions coincide with supra-personal searches, with intuitions of other spaces and other times, with conceptions that sometimes move dramatically away from what is imposed by the historical moment, with elaborations that have resonance with the collective rather than the individual. This is more or less what I am attempting to convey when I speak of the co-operative social direction that can be taken by the arts.

Several years ago, at the beginning of this century, I was part of a group of friends who created a cultural and artistic collective we called “Antoja.” Over the span of a few years we organized numerous presentations, retreats, conversations, joint productions, etc., until the image of the collective complicated things, and we decided to dissolve it. I have always had the impression that despite that dissolution in 2005, much of what we did collectively in Antoja, and many of our more interesting attempts to take the "artistic" to a level beyond the personal without "depersonalizing" it, were unique and important efforts that were much loved.

What we were striving for, in a nutshell, was to produce art as individuals within a group context, all of us moving in a similar direction that included a global perspective and a deep humanist sentiment. I believe our attempts were not in vain, but constituted an important step toward liberating the arts from the individualistic framework within which they had been confined for centuries - a step toward incorporating them within a communal, collective way of being in which the spiritual and the social clearly complement each other.

Here I am speaking of the spiritual in a very broad sense, one that is not necessarily religious. When one looks at the arts in this way, it is almost impossible not to experience moments of great inspiration, and it is also almost impossible to deny that a great deal of art down through history has been born out of states of inspiration. Such inspiration takes the artist out of the conventional world, into a different space and time where profound inner revelations can appear, connected as they are with the intuitive, and with that which goes beyond what we perceive with our sensory apparatus. Such inspiration is expressed in what we know as poetry, painting, music, theater, essay, sculpture, etc.

I would almost say that the sacred can be expressed through art that is conceived beyond the individual, and that such art in turn paradoxically transforms the individual.

Maybe the most important thing in all this talk about art can be synthesized in one simple question and answer:
Question: "And why all this?"
Answer: "It's just one more attempt to establish communication..."


EDITED & TRANSLATED BY TRUDI RICHARDS

PHOTOS BY RAFAEL EDWARDS

Unity

 

When approached intellectually, the theme of unity - of /what is unitive - is vast, and it's much easier to just experience it. But how can I experience an internal unity that sometimes seems so elusive?
I can try to define certain aspects of unity that allow us to experience it.
What we perceive as unity has characteristics that give us a feeling of tranquility, order, peace, oneness, harmony, a whole, originality (sometimes), etc. At the same time, unity has another aspect that has to do with our relationship with our social environment. Those feelings can’t exist separated from our interaction with the world.
In simpler words, it is when we act that we either feel or don't feel inner unity. It is in acting, in doing, that we become aware of what we feel. It is in interacting with other human beings and the world that we can really register internal unity or lack thereof. We consider an action "valid" if it manages to produce a register of unity whose validity has nothing to do with obeying any kind of moral, religious, ethical, or social rule. The unity we are speaking of here has little to do with the conventions of the times we live in, despite the enormous influence of the historic moment on each of us.

What we experience as unitive is the register of valid action. How do we know if an action is valid? A valid action gives us a feeling that we are growing internally, and we want to repeat it because it has the flavor of continuity over time. Viewed from another angle, valid action is neither circumstantial nor temporal. It works through repetition, through enjoyment, and is projected into the future. And this, besides producing internal unity, allows me to accumulate valid actions within me.

On the flip side, we have what is not unitive. When we do something that is not unitive, it feels very much like we are dividing ourselves, going against ourselves internally. This division between internal poles of tension produces the experience of contradiction, an experience that can make us feel confused, out of balance, irritable, disappointed, stressed out, and so on. Note that all these registers are much easier to experience than registers of unity.

We could also say that contradiction often makes us feel like we are "missing something." This feeling is expressed in phrases or silent thoughts like "I don't have enough..."; "If I had…"; “I don't like being treated this way…”; “It's not my fault…”; etc. Lack, or what "is not," is almost always part of contradiction. In other words, the point of view from which we perceive ourselves, others and the world is negative or lacks something. Worse still, when I finally "get" what I've always dreamed of having, that long-sought happiness turns out to be ephemeral, and very soon I start chasing a new desire. Contradiction feeds on desire and on what I imagine I do not have.

A life of unity, full of a "growing happiness" (static happiness does not seem to exist) where I feel like I'm in agreement with myself, becomes possible when I have less desire, less suffering, and above all when my actions in the world end in others and not in myself.

I think it is important to point out that while desire produces contradiction and suffering, this does not mean that we do not have desires but we can diminish, elevate and purify our desires. Many of our impulses can move in a unitive direction if we nudge them in that direction, if we convert and refine them. After all, we'd better start with what we have, otherwise we'll get trapped between seeking success and failing to achieve it.

Even though these reflections keep going back to the idea of taking a positive attitude towards what the world offers me (or just throws at me), the ability to say "yes" is an essential key in producing internal unity. Saying "yes" automatically (or semi-automatically) puts me in the unique situation of looking for the best in whatever has been thrown at me. Whereas if I say "no," I'm allowing my personal tendencies, fears, and habits to decide for me. Then, almost without realizing it, I put myself in a situation that I register as contradictory.

There's a kind of saying that pretty much sums up what happens when we decide to take a positive approach. It goes like this: “Do not harm others. Otherwise, do what you want..." This saying begins with a "no," but obviously, by simply asking myself whether what I'm doing "will harm anyone," I put myself in the situation of evaluating my actions, and in that evaluation a "positive" behavior almost always emerges as a unitive or valid response.

And if we want to look at all this from a positive point of view, we can complement this saying with the principle of solidarity, which says: "When you treat others as you want to be treated, you liberate yourself." This is the best combination for registering internal unity.

EDITED & TRANSLATED BY TRUDI RICHARDS

PHOTO BY RAFAEL EDWARDS

Money is everything

In 1998 I wrote a fairly autobiographical novel that was undoubtedly boring for almost the entire public, since my greatest interest at that time was not in writing, but in trying to better understand what had happened to me in my life. I think I managed that in a way, because I did obtain a different perspective on the events of my life, and that is always good.

One of the chapters in that book was titled "Money is Everything" and when I re-read that chapter, I really did not see why I gave it that name, since I only suggested the concept of money and did not make it explicit. And we know how suggestions work… mostly pretty poorly.

Anyway, a few weeks ago that title came back to haunt me, but in a different way from 25 years ago. Now the idea was not so vague, but began to explicitly appear every day in conversations, in what I read, in exchanges, and especially when I contemplated the deplorable spectacle of our global system in crisis. A system that has almost completely abandoned the human being and whose indisputable and perversely accepted central value is money.

They say "money is everything and money destroys everything." Now, instead of being just a kind of half-leftist political slogan that is "liberal" to the more "conservative," this phrase has become a suffocating, disastrous reality for everyone. This reality brings with it the deterioration of the social fabric, a phenomenon we are only now discovering and of which we are only seeing the tip of the iceberg.

The most significant thing is that this has nothing to do with anything political or apolitical, but is strictly an ethical issue. We may not recognize it as such because we have been taught to think of ethics as almost religious, and therefore we never see the roots of problems. We stay on the surface, which only allows labels, dubious descriptions, or shallow but correctly accepted phrases.

There is no valid ethics that does not take the human being into account. It is only the human being who can create, aspire, and build an ethics at the service of the human, not the other way around. Despite every effort to impose an ethics down through history, those efforts have all been in vain. Because the ethical cannot be imposed. It can come neither from above nor from below, but only from human beings in reciprocal relationship with each other.

What I am trying to say is that an ethics only works when it grows out of the simple understanding that the human being is what is most important. I registered this truly when I treat others the way I want to be treated. This valuing of the other as if they were myself is the foundation of an ethics at the service of humanity.

That the ethical has given birth to "human rights" with all their complications and virtues is meaningful only if those "rights" begin and end with individuals. Unfortunately this is not the case. Our socio-economic system considers people's “rights” much less important than the rights of corporations or businesses. Our whole "free market," based on the concept of "competition" and giving free reign to those with capital and resources who wish to exploit others, is clearly deteriorating, especially for the new generations.

Now this whole economic system is about to disintegrate because it does not respond to today's social problems. If it once offered some benefits, today those benefits do not exist. I cannot go on for pages and pages explaining how this economic building is collapsing, but I think it's obvious to everyone in our supposedly "advanced" societies that the growing unemployment, physical violence, drug addiction, homelessness and lack of healthcare, the constant sense of instability and danger, the impossibility of caring for the environment, and the chasm of inequality between rich and poor all show that this system has resoundingly failed.

Failures are positive when they are recognized as such - then they open up the possibility of beginning a new stage. When they are not recognized, then they are destructive and generate all kinds of violence.

It remains to be seen how we will face this crisis, but without a doubt, and following the mechanics of history so brilliantly presented by the philosopher Ortega y Gasset, it will be the generations who are currently without access to power who will decide these issues.

It is possible that then a new paradigm will appear, and a new ethics will emerge to replace competition with collaboration. It is possible that my rights begin and end with the rights of the other. It is possible that community has a deeper value than the individual. It is possible that corporations will disappear and give way to cooperatives. It is possible that we will begin to treat others the way we want to be treated.

In fact, everything is absolutely possible if individuals go through an internal transformation and if our society is rebuilt out of that which makes us truly human.

But none of this can be imposed. This kind of transformation needs to be born, to grow and develop out of the internal center of gravity with which every human being is endowed. And the core value - or ethics - of this center of gravity is to treat others as one wants to be treated.

It is only in truly registering this ethics and in acting accordingly that we understand the divine, the sacred, the ethical and everything we tend to seek outside ourselves before we realize that it is actually inside us and inside every individual born on this planet. When we are able to recognize all this, that is when an historical rupture can take place and a new world can be built based on everything that makes us truly human.

This recognition is available to everyone, without distinction of any kind, and if we can enjoy a little internal silence, we can express it in the world we live in.

Money is just an instrument and as such can be used in many ways. The way it has been used and abused, especially in this century and the last, has led us into crisis. Although many neither see nor wish to see this crisis, it is obviously manifesting itself and will continue to manifest itself until we come to the historical rupture we mentioned - that rupture in which all power held by one or more human beings over other human beings is abolished: "When the possibility for one man to have power over another is socially eliminated, then the generations will cease their millennial struggles in order to exercise power only over nature. That will be the moment we break our historical enchainment.”

And that will be the moment we see a new “form” of relationship that will become the center of gravity for a new civilization.

It seems important to me to clarify that this “power over nature” will be the power of protection and not of extraction. Since the environment -- or nature -- is an intrinsic part of us, it needs the same care our bodies need. If up to now we have contemplated an incomprehensible suicide with anguish, that anguish is not much different than what we feel when we look at the environment. And this is so because the humanity-environment structure is one and indivisible. As are the humanity-planet structure, the sun-planetary system structure, and so on.

Nothing exists in a vacuum, nothing exists by itself. Every existence is in dynamic relationship with other existences of different constitution and magnitude. Achieving harmony among existences produces the best conditions for any development, but this is a topic for another digression. For now, "money is everything" - but any effort toward a different situation, starting with ourselves and the way we treat others, has the potential of ultimately changing the disproportionate equation in which we find ourselves. This simple concept, which we call true Solidarity, is the counterbalance to selfishness, isolation, competition, exploitation, mistrust, discrimination and abuse.


We will see…


EDITED & TRANSLATED BY TRUDI RICHARDS
ILLUSTRATION BY RAFAEL EDWARDS