Conversations For Transformation: Essays Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

Conversations For Transformation

Essays By Laurence Platt

Inspired By The Ideas Of Werner Erhard

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The Piercing Essay

Cowboy Cottage, East Napa, California, USA

June 30, 2024


"The ball game might seem to be over at [this] point because you now would know the truth - what is, is  and what is not - is not. You could just sit there and dig the experience of it and let it be the way it is and it is perfect. The problem is you've only handled the truth - you still have the lie to handle."
... 
"When I don't know who I am, I serve you. When I know who I am, I am you."
... Hanuman speaking with Rama in the Sanskrit epic Ramayana
This essay, The Piercing Essay, is the companion piece to Three Stairs At A Time.

It is also the twenty fifth in the open second group of Experiences Of A Friend (click here for the complete first group of thirty five Experiences Of A Friend):
  1. Friend, Partner, And Ally
  2. Go To The Beach
  3. Proof Of Life
  4. Going Out Like A Supernova
  5. Relationships: They Start, They End
  6. Evidence Of Source
  7. On Knowing When To Be Ordinary
  8. Letting Be
  9. Transforming The Untransformable
  10. There's Always The Next Piece
  11. Plastic Chandelier II
  12. Yes You Really Are That Big
  13. A Way With Words
  14. The Quietest Mind
  15. Approaching Integrity
  16. Dancing With Life II
  17. Staying In Integrity
  18. Ordinary People Star, Extraordinary People Recreate Themselves
  19. Committed Existence
  20. When You're Being Like Werner, You're Not Being Like Werner
  21. "There's Life Happening Where You Are"
  22. At The Level Of Self-Expression
  23. Intergalactic Dude
  24. Wonderful With People
  25. The Piercing Essay
in that order.

I am indebted to Josh Cohen and to Ryan Lilly and to Bruce Miller and to Anita Lynn Erhard who contributed material for this conversation.


Foreword:

I've written The Piercing Essay like a painting collage (creative interpretation) rather than like a photograph (factual account). It comprises

 1)  vignettes which really happened in the past,
2)  one or two possibilities for the present / future, and
3)  a dream sequence.


As the germ of its idea called me louder and louder to write it down, I assigned to the in-progress  origins of this essay the working title The Piercing Essay. "Piercing" in the working title, wasn't alluding to the essay (or me, for that matter) piercing anything. It alluded to me being pierced  (by communication, in case you'd been wondering). But it wasn't very long before I heard "No, that is  its title.". And so its working title of The Piercing Essay became permanent.

Photograph courtesy Ryan Lilly Franklin House, San Francisco, California, USA June 1973 Click to expand
Werner
To get what the "piercing" in this essay refers to (and why it's The Piercing  Essay's subject in the first place), let's go to Hanuman's "When I don't know who I am, I serve you; when I know who I am, I am you", and let's pose this question: "When I know who I am, and you speak, from whence  does your communication originate?". When I know who I am, you're no longer over there. So when you speak, your communication originates from me  ie from who I am. And when I don't know who I am and you speak, it's your communication which originates from who I am, piercing  through not knowing who I am, teasing out who I am.

There's no chit-chattery  with you. Never. Not ever. No banter. There's no cheap talk. Every opportunity to speak with you is an opportunity for intelligence, erudition, and education. I get that when I listen you ... or, restated as a corollary of this, The Piercing Essay, I get it from who I am when I listen you. The value of that is vast. But it's not even that which is its true worth. Its true worth is where you're speaking from, is piercing the veil of who I'm not, leaving me with just who I am - unerringly, inexorably (and scrupulously and ruthlessly too).

Some people have taken on and attempted mastering being in intelligent conversations. Yes, and other people have taken on and attempted mastering conversations piercing the veil of who we're not, leaving us with just who we are. But aside from you, there's no one I've ever met or gotten to know anyplace on Earth who's as acknowledged as being a master of both.

So far we don't have a name for this ability, for this transformative power. I've looked around / all over and I can't find one. Maybe it doesn't exist yet in the world of phenomenology. Maybe it only exists (for now, at least) in the world of direct experience. Its true worth (it should be stated again for emphasis) is that your speaking, piercing through the veil of who we aren't, teases out who we really are. I don't need to ask the way it works. That would be a "How?" question, one which I've long since eschewed. Yet remarkably when I'm around you it's your piercing speaking through which I've come to know who I am.

Now Hanuman suggests this happens (ie is made possible) by being you. That's fine, but I don't want serving you to be mutually exclusive from being you. It's not an either / or. For me, they don't occur as separate. For me, they always show up together. They may not for others, and if they don't, that's not a bad way for them to be. Speaking for myself (and only for myself), it was through serving you that I began to get an inkling as to who you really are. And it was in being around who you really are that I got to realize I am you. And the two never occurred for me as mutually exclusive. The one begat the other.

"I'm Werner Erhard!":

When I Know Who I Am, I Am You



It's a quiet afternoon in the Franklin House. I'm watering indoor plants and ferns with a watering can. Jim Adams, logistics master / house electrician (at least, that's a hat  he's wearing for now - it's one of the many hats he wears around here) is halfway up a ladder changing light bulbs. Kenneth Yamamoto, Werner's aide, pores through paperwork in the office just off the hallway by the kitchen. The front doorbell rings. I put down my watering can, walk over to the door, and open it. It's the delivery guy from Federal Express (yes, Federal Express:  they hadn't taken the moniker FedEx  yet - that would come later).

"Special delivery for Werner Erhard" he says, holding out a package. "Thank You" I say, taking it from him. The Federal Express guy then proffers the usual proof of delivery receipt to be signed, and a pen. I hesitate. Werner's working upstairs. Should I take the package and the proof of delivery receipt up to him to sign and interrupt him? If not, who's the appropriate person to accept the package and sign the proof of delivery receipt? The Federal Express guy looks on patiently, then puzzled, watching me. I stand there, pen poised, not signing. Jim Adams, halfway up the ladder, tool festooned electrician's belt around his waist, new lightbulb in hand, is taking in the entire scene, assessing what's happening. Suddenly he calls out "I'm Werner Erhard!", then he climbs down the ladder, smiles at the Federal Express guy, walks over to me, and takes the package, the proof of delivery receipt, and the pen from me.

At that moment, Kenneth Yamamoto appears in the hallway. Kenneth is always 100% fully alert  (it's his job to always be 100% fully alert). He's overheard everything going on. Looking at the Federal Express guy, not missing a beat, Kenneth smiles and says "I'm Werner Erhard!". Suddenly I get it (I don't stay stupid long). "I'm Werner Erhard!" I say, smiling with Jim and Kenneth. I really  get it. The Federal Express guy, in the middle of smiling at Jim, suddenly stops smiling, his face going blank, his jaw dropping slightly as Kenneth and I say "I'm Werner Erhard!", "I'm Werner Erhard!". By then, other staff and assistants walking through the hallway are picking up on what's happening. One by one they chime in "I'm Werner Erhard!", "I'M WERNER ERHARD!", "I'm Werner Erhard!", "I'm Werner Erhard!", "I'm Werner Erhard!"  over and over and over and over again and again and again. Hanuman would've been proud.

Everyone in the Franklin House, everyone in Werner's monastery within a monastery  on this unusually quiet afternoon it seems is being Werner Erhard.

Jim Adams signs the proof of delivery receipt for the Federal Express guy - that is, Jim Adams while being Werner Erhard  signs the proof of delivery receipt for the Federal Express guy, then he gives it and the pen back to him while "I'm Werner Erhard!", "I'M WERNER ERHARD!" ... is ongoing in the background.

Now the Federal Express guy is smiling brightly also. He gets it (he too doesn't stay stupid long). He realizes he's just gotten Werner Erhard's autograph.

When I Don't Know Who I Am, I Serve You



When I don't know who I am, it's in being of service to you that I open myself up to / make myself available to your piercing communication. And yet, isn't it that you're being of service as well? (to be specific, to the world?). Isn't it in being of service to you that I open myself up to / make myself available to the possibility of being of service to the world also? That's what happens when I'm around you: I discover who I am in being of service to you / the world. And look: there's no discovering who I am separate from discovering being of service to the world. Hanuman knew it. You're the one piercing through to it.


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