Continuum Estate, Pritchard Hill Appellation, Napa Valley,
California, USA
June 24, 2023
"Lots of people have talked about taking that step into the unknown.
Taking that step into the unknown is actually a lot less courageous
than taking a step from the unknown."
...
"At some point,
safety
is just pure waste. I mean, if you just want to be
safe,
don't get out of bed. Don't get in
your car.
Don't do anything."
... Stockton Rush, co-founder / CEO OceanGate, Titan submersible
pilot
"We didn't start the fire, it was always burning since
the world's
been turning."
... Billy Joel
What are our lives? I mean, what is living really?
In the matter of what our lives really are ie in the matter of what
living really is, we've substituted the symbols of living,
for living. With this
cardinal error
in effect, what our lives and living have come to be
misconstrued
as, is dealing with the circumstances around us. Our lives have become
it ie dealing with the circumstances of our lives as symbols (more on
this later) defines and measures what our lives are. That there's no
end to the circumstances, is not what is under the microscope here.
What's under the microscope here is we interchange dealing with the
circumstances as symbols, with our lives / with living itself.
We've made winning a symbol of purpose. We've made
wealth a symbol of self-worth. We've made
opinionated
righteousness
a symbol of
integrity.
We've made accumulating and amassing, the symbols
of
fullness
and being complete. We live our lives in symbolic
substitution mode (if you will) which leaves us regarding
living as a kind of symbolic representation in which
dealing with and managing the symbols of the circumstances of our
lives, comes to represent what our lives are ie in which dealing with
and managing the symbols of the circumstances of our lives has come to
represent what living is. So Q: What are our lives? What is
living? A: Dealing with the circumstances as symbols. It's an
unexamined axiom, one we've held as
self-evident
for years if not centuries.
Now, I have a
question:
how did we get this way ie when did we make
this cardinal error
of substituting the symbols of our lives, for our lives? When did we
start living lives of symbolic representation in which dealing with and
managing the symbols of our lives has come to represent what our lives
actually are? Try this on for size (as one of a plethora of possible
answers): we didn't "get this way", we didn't "make any
cardinal error",
we didn't "start living this way". No, it was none of the above.
Rather, what if it were that we just
inherited
being this way ie that we simply
inherited
living lives of symbolic substitution?
To be clear about what I'm saying here: circumstances are, and
they must be dealt with and managed. Our lives and living are clearly
never pretty when the circumstances aren't dealt with and managed ie
when we ignore or neglect them. This isn't about that. This is about
differentiating between what our lives really are ie what living really
is, and dealing with the circumstances. Mostly we are that
dealing with and managing what the symbols of our circumstances
represent, is our lives / is living. It's a costly way to be, an
expensive costly way to be, an
inherited
expensive costly way to be. The cost? It is
authenticity.
I am transformed (it could be said) once I differentiate between living
my real life, and my faux life - which I
consider
to be dealing with / managing what the circumstances of my life as
symbols, represent. Differentiating between my life, and dealing with /
managing the circumstances of my life as symbols, allows me to
differentiate between my life itself, and my faux life of substituting
symbols for my life (dealing with the circumstances). Substituting
symbols for my life in lieu of living my life itself, kills off
my access
to living
authentically,
leaving me living only by symbolic representation ie as the result of
symbolic substitution. "I've amassed a lot (the symbol) so they'll
think I'm whole and complete (the substitution)" etc, is the epitomy of
living our lives
inauthentically.
