the universe next door

Loneliness does not come from being alone, but from being unable to communicate the things that seem important.

The human nervous system did not evolve to apprehend reality; it evolved to interact with it, to survive within it. Everything we know or experience became available to us only because of its relevance to our relationship to the world, but there is no reason to assume our grasp of reality goes beyond our capacity to interact with it. The implication here is that we likely do not have the capacity to apprehend reality as it is, because survival has no interest in reality as it is, only in reality as it can be used, and interacted with. However, when we recognize that reality as it is does not have a direct correspondence to the reality we observe, but only a pragmatic correspondence, we have the opportunity to suspend the reality we have pragmatically habituated, in the attempt to return our sensitivity to reality as it is. It should be assumed that reality as it is, cannot ever be fully apprehended, and in fact we should never assume we can even be close to an accurate apprehension of reality, because the more certain we are of our apprehension of reality, the less we take our uncertainty seriously, the more rigid we become, and the less we are able to remain sensitive to the real world. The secret of human intelligence seems to be found in the fact that we have the ability to recognize that the world is not what it seems, and this recognition gives us the opportunity to enter more deeply into the world as it is. But when we enter more deeply into the world as it is, we should not assume that now we have arrived on the truth; relationship with reality must be progressive, continuous. Once we get stuck in a way of seeing the world, we are already dead.

I say ‘be whole’, I don’t say ‘be perfect’. And the difference is tremendous. When I say ‘be whole’, I allow you contradictions – then be wholly contradictory. When I say ‘be whole’, I don’t give you a goal, a criterion, an ideal; I don’t want to create any anxiety in you. I simply want you, in this moment, wherever, whatsoever you are doing, and whatsoever you are, to be total in it. If you are sad, be totally sad – you are whole. If you are angry, be totally angry. Go into it totally. The idea of perfection is absolutely different, diametrically opposite – not even different, opposite. The perfectionist will say ‘Never be angry; always be compassionate. Never be sad; always be happy.’ He chooses one polarity against the other. In wholeness, we accept both the polarities: the lows and the highs, the ups and the downs.