Since we have come to the place, it does not appear to be foreign to our subject to lay before the reader an account of the manners of Gaul and Germany , and wherein these nations differ from each other. In Gaul there are factions not only in all the states, and in all the cantons and their divisions, but almost in each family, and of these factions those are the leaders who are considered according to their judgment to possess the greatest influence, upon whose will and determination the management of all affairs and measures depends. And that seems to have been instituted in ancient times with this view, that no one of the common people should be in want of support against one more powerful; for, none [of those leaders] suffers his party to be oppressed and defrauded, and if he do otherwise, he has no influence among his party. This same policy exists throughout the whole of Gaul; for all the states are divided into two factions.
Throughout Gaul there are two classes of men of some dignity and importance ….One of the two classes is that of the Druids, the other that of the Knights. The Druids are concerned with the worship of the gods, look after public and private sacrifice, and expound religious matters. A large number of young men flock to them for training and hold them in high honor. For they have the right to decide nearly all public and private disputes and they also pass judgment and decide rewards and penalties in criminal and murder cases and in disputes concerning legacies and boundaries. When a private person or a tribe disobeys their ruling they ban them from attending at sacrifices. This is their harshest penalty. Men placed under this ban are treated as impious wretches; all avoid them, fleeing their company and conversation, lest their contact bring misfortune upon them; they are denied legal rights and can hold no official dignity….It is thought that this system of training was invented in Britain and taken over from there to Gaul, and at present time diligent students of the matter mostly travel there to study it.
Julius Ceasar, Gallic Wars, 11 and 13. circa 55 b.c.e.
Iggy screamed. Images flooded his mind. A severed stone head. A wooden figure rough carved and ancient. A spinning woman in gold on a placid lake, her eyes fierce and predatory, a mighty headdress of pearl and lacquer reflecting the light of the sun. A great silver bundle of endlessly flowing pleasure and pain seething throughout the empty spaces between all that there is.
Every nerve ending in his body fired in sympathy. Medusa herself could not have frozen him more effectively.
Iggy twisted, unable to move. He saw himself bound, hands behind his back, only, he was not a he. She. She felt herself bound, unable to move, a cruel fist wound in her hair, bending her head back. The knife cutting her jugular. She died.
Iggy twisted, unable to move. The hag smiled.
“You’ll do.” She said.
Out of the corner of my eye I see my children in rapture
For those interested in a more academic treatment of this subject, a number of books are quite useful.
There are two I would recommend as coming to the subject from a more scientific point of view.
The first is Sex, Ecology, Spirituality by Ken Wilber. One of Wilber’s main interests is in mapping what he calls the “neo-perennial philosophy”, an integration of some of the views of mysticism typified by Aldous Huxley‘s The Perennial Philosophy with an account of cosmic evolution akin to that of the Indian mystic Sri Aurobindo. He rejects most of the tenets of Perennialism and the associated anti-evolutionary view of history as a regression from past ages or yugas.[19] Instead, he embraces a more traditionally Western notion of the great chain of being. As in the work of Jean Gebser, this great chain (or “nest”) is ever-present while relatively unfolding throughout this material manifestation, although to Wilber “… the ‘Great Nest’ is actually just a vast morphogenetic field of potentials …” In agreement with Mahayana Buddhism, and Advaita Vedanta, he believes that reality is ultimately a nondual union of emptiness and form, with form being innately subject to development over time.
The second is The Matter with Things: Our brains, Our delusions, and the Unmaking of the world by Iain McGilchrist.
Dr Iain McGilchrist is a psychiatrist, neuroscience researcher, philosopher and literary scholar. He is a Quondam Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, an Associate Fellow of Green Templeton College, Oxford, a Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and former Consultant Psychiatrist and Clinical Director at the Bethlem Royal & Maudsley Hospital, London.
He has been a Research Fellow in neuroimaging at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore and a Fellow of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Stellenbosch. He has published original articles and research papers in a wide range of publications on topics in literature, philosophy, medicine and psychiatry.
He is the author of a number of books, but is best-known for The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World (Yale 2009)
Both of these gentleman are rigorous and erudite. Highly recommended.
Everyone has some sort of stress reaction. Some people get tired and shut down, go take a nap. Some people feel the need to beat the shit out of a body bag at the gym, or push themselves with weights and strength positions. Some people drink and or do drugs. Some people eat. Some people have sex. Some people argue.
Everyone has some method they have developed to cope with a stress reaction. Methods vary according to the strength of the reaction, whatever your personal resilience factor is, and the nature of the stress. Other variables, too, of course.
A great deal of stress can be avoided simply by the recognition of two factors. The first, naturally enough, are whatever variables in the situation that are out of your control, directly or indirectly. Even things you think are in your control, there are more than likely aspects that are not.
Do not stress over what cannot be changed. Unless it is fear. Fear that cannot be changed will eventually give rise to revolt, no matter what the context, not just the overall societal picture. The way you go about thinking, is paramount. Many people are unaware of how their cognitive stack operates.
The second has to do with expectations and attachment.
It is very difficult to live life without expectation. We are wired for it. We are generally gratified when expectations are met. It is fine to have them.
In the right proportion and in the right context. This seems obvious, but many of us fail to see the obvious, myself most of all perhaps. The eyes slide right over obvious; it is most often viewed as beneath us. Until you miss it.
Stress reactions. When I was young, I got into a lot of fights at school, during my elementary and middle school years. The fights ended by high school, the benefits of being transferred to a private school, at least, seemingly.
After I got into my fight, I would have my stress reaction, not before or during. I got nauseous, shaky, sweaty, and often emptied the contents of my stomach. It took me a long time to calm down. I eventually learned to channel that reaction.
I can feel it coming. I no longer shake, sweat, or vomit. Stopped that before I got into the Army. I did use to take drugs. Quite a bit in my youth. Stimulants and psychedelics. I dislike alcohol and opioids – anything that makes me intellectually bogged down. Cannabis does not. It does for some.
I have my methods. They have changed over time and according to my level of self improvement. Meditation is good. I am peripatetic by nature, my dog appreciates this. I am learning to play the guitar. I find that very therapeutic. I suck of course, but everyone does when they start something.
And then there is philosophy. What a balm for the troubled soul.
“Doctors keep their scalpels and other instruments handy for emergencies. Keep your philosophy ready too.” Marcus Aurelius
Why? “For as time passes we forget and end up doing the opposite.” Epictetus. Heraclitus would say, well, yes, naturally. But I digress.
Knowing yourself is key. I know how I react to stress. Adrenaline and energy. I learned this because as a kid I had three choices, depending on who or what was doling out the hitting.
Run. Always the best option. Not always possible.
Fight. For when the best option fails.
Take it. This happened more often than I would have liked.
Ignoring it is even better although I put this under the take it category.
I am hard to anger and easy to appease. I have trained myself to be this way. I rarely stay angry more than a day. Or a night’s sleep. But after anger fades away, there are still lessons to learn. I try to make sure and let anger fade before I make any decision of consequence. I have yet to think of a time when I made a significant decision in anger that turned out to be the best decision, or the best way to go about a decision already made.
I am an old hippie. Nevermind I was born in 1966 and am too young to be an original hippie. Nevertheless, an old hippie is what I am.
Peace, love, understanding. They had it right. They got much wrong. I take the good and leave the bad. As much as I am able.
Since we live in an age where privacy is no longer valued and actively commodified, I have decided to no longer tack against the wind and instead let the mainsail billow, so to speak.
I’ve long known that a life of service is the most gratifying life one can lead. There are of course, many ways to do this. It is one of the reasons I joined the military. There is a reason why the questions, “Were you ever in the service?” or, “Where did you serve?” are used. But make no mistake, this is not the pinnacle of service. Not even close.
We put far too much emphasis on military service and not enough to civil service. Because we love the gun. That’s one reason. Very few volunteer for an all volunteer military, that is a reason as well. Another is that there are very fine qualities that the military emphasises and actively trains for. Excellence. Loyalty. Duty. Leadership. Situational awareness. The ability to discern what is called for in the moment and take the initiative in order to achieve mission success.
Even if that means falling on a hand grenade so as to save your squad.
That is what the job requires. It is what a nation requires. It is what a culture requires. Sometimes it is what love requires.
That doesn’t make it laudable. Often, the only difference between courage and stupidity is the result.
Thus enters the fool. The fool is full of potential. Is nothing but. And every wind is favorable when you don’t know where you are going. It is impossible to foil the plan that hasn’t been made.
Or is out of your hands.
For those of you who have been following along, our Hero was fated for an appointment with a nurse practitioner and their prescription pad.
It was a very pleasant appointment. I charmed the receptionist. My wife is part owner of a medical clinic. I know where the power lies. The lines of communication. The politics.
We had a substantive chat, the nurse practitioner and I. I explained my history, much as I did to you. I elucidated certain external and internal pressures, nothing that billions aren’t going through, to a greater or lesser degree.
I gave my subjective viewpoint. And I allowed that it quite possibly is one that need be questioned. I question it daily. I gave my philosophical viewpoints, including my preference for Jungian psychology as a hermeneutic where applicable. I have many hermeneutic stances.
She was intrigued. Said my case was atypical. Most people with mania (she had already jumped to that conclusion, despite my explanation) experience either depression or irritability/anger issues. I do not suffer from depression, never have. I do have anger issues. But no one would ever, and has ever, suspected this. Because I know the danger of anger. Rage. Oh. I get angry.
She still reached for her prescription pad. Lamotrigine, the 62nd most prescribed drug in America, used to treat bipolar and epileptic disorders. I was amused to learn it was first marketed in Ireland. I have a lot of Irish in me.
I am taking it. I admit, it is helping me sleep. I can feel it during the day, in an odd way. I will continue to take it.
Let’s get back to the anger. I know that when I get angry, I should pay attention. This is some sort of little monster in my basement, trying to tell me something. Something important. I listen to my little monsters.
Because monsters get bad press. The worst. Monsters, contrary to popular knowledge, are your friend. True, they do want to eat you. They do seek your destruction. For your own good.
Inner monsters only destroy you, only cause self destruction when you do not see what transmutes self destruction into self sacrifice. The only difference between self destruction and self sacrifice.
Love. Without it you get the former with it the latter. Now, one can take this too far. Especially if one has a twisted sense of love. That is why it is best to also dedicate yourself to both the true and the good.
How does all this relate to my visit with the aforementioned nurse practitioner?
Just before they reached for their prescription pad I told them this, “I am here as the consequence of an ultimatum.” This is true. I was prepared for this ultimatum and had already consigned myself to agreeing to it, if it in fact came to pass.
It did.
They said they were very sorry. And still reached for the prescription pad.
So why am I angry? By my own admission, I executed an action I thoughtfully planned out, mused over all the possibilities, mitigated variables as much as I was able, and resigned myself to accept the consequences of my action, no matter the result, seen or unforseen. Because this is what adults capable of critical analysis and moral judgment do.
I even posted a Mea Culpa, which was applicable in more ways than one. I am not angry about my action nor about the valid and much needed apology for it. I learned much from this.
No. I am angry for this reason:
I was bullied. Bullied by a power I can not fight. Forced into an action not entirely of my choosing. Ultimatums work. Robert Downey Jr famously said this.
He is right. They do work.
They also breed resentment. I hate a bully. I have been one in the past. An intellectual bully. Imagine my shame. I have gotten past this. The only crime is pride. If one is to learn, if one is to change, if one is to really achieve redemption, than one has to put aside their pride.
On matters that one ought to put aside their pride on. There is no shame in being proud of things that are worthy of pride. Being a good father. Keeping your word. Discharging your duty. Treating women with respect and honor and nobility.
My wife issued me an ultimatum. You see someone and get on medication or this marriage is over. Not only that, she referred me to the nurse practitioner in question. Got right in. That was the ultimatum. I agreed.
Swearing yourself to the service of the true, the good, and the beautiful. That is what I have done. I will not break this vow. This does not mean that I give up my autonomy. I refuse to do that.
So. My dear. If you read this, and there is no good reason you will, although others may no doubt inform you, I want you to know this:
I understand. I do. You are the victim of the hermeneutic that is central to your life. This is the way you see things. I respect your right to have your own experiences and come to your own conclusions.
But you bullied me. And you used your power as a physician and the status as my wife to do so. Tsk. Tsk. I will not forget this.
I may forgive you. May. I am still thinking on it. This is my right, to have my own experiences and come to my own conclusions. I will continue to take this medication. I will not come to any conclusions just yet.
From the journal of Mathilda “Mad dog Mattie” Shelley.
I was a girl.
At an age well before any awareness of the passions and dreams of a woman, and yet I would dream of a man. A particular man. He was mine. He was not paternal, nor a brother, nor a friend, but I loved him. I did not understand love. I did not seek it. But it was strong. It distracted me when I was awake, and the discomfort it gave me sometimes caused me to wish it away. It has never left me.
He had a pale face framed by thick dark hair. His voice rumbled like water, and echoed in my mind long after he spoke. In his presence I felt the warmth of his love.
Only once have I seen hands as strong as his.
Although I try not to, I know I still seek him.
When we first meet we will hardly touch. That will be later, very much later.
We have plenty of time and will wait for the moment.
I will hold your hand, put my head on your shoulder, and feel the warmth of your presence.
That is all I crave. For now.
To me you are a man in a movie or a photograph. I visit you often and you speak to me of yourself. You explain yourself to me – the way a close friend does when you are giving an honest description of yourself. My fascination with you, in that movie, has not left me.
I remember well my feelings, as a girl, when I knew I would meet you. I knew that I would blush, betray my dreams, and the monsters in my basement.
The banshee. The wail that has never left me. Somehow I know you are there, as well.
I had a clear view of you. I tried not to stare. I was dazzled by you. You are beautiful.
But I cannot remember you.
I can only remember the movie.
When will I see you again?
In the mirror?
On the web?
Behind the wheel of a car?
In a hotel room?
I will be dressed in clothes that betray me.
As they always do.
20 Years Earlier.
She opened the door and saw the SUV drive away.
Then she cried at her feet. Shirley looked down and saw the most beautiful thing in her entire life.
She forgot about the SUV. The child wailed. Shirley was amazed at how much sound came out of something so small.
She leaned down and picked up the car carrier. She fell instantly and completely in love.
“Shhhhh. Shhhh. Honey. It’s ok. It’s alright. You’re going to be fine Mathilda.” She was very surprised to hear herself say that name.
With thanks to the exquisite Maria Popova, expert generalist extraordinaire.
Whether love lasts but one brief span of time or for eternity, it is the only creative, inspiring, elevating basis for a new race, a new world.
In our present pygmy state, love is indeed a stranger to most people. Misunderstood and shunned, it rarely takes root; or if it does, it soon withers and dies. Its delicate fibre cannot endure the stress and strain of the daily grind. Its soul is too complex to adjust itself to the slimy woof of our social fabric. It weeps and moans and suffers with those who have need of it, yet lack the capacity to rise to love’s summit.
Some day, some day, men and women will rise, they will reach the mountain peak, they will meet big and strong and free, ready to receive, to partake, and to bask in the golden rays of love. What fancy, what imagination, what poetic genius can foresee even approximately the potentialities of such a force in the life of men and women. If the world is ever to give birth to true companionship and oneness, not marriage, but love will be the parent.
―Emma Goldman
Anarchism and Other Essays
(1910)
I cannot find any patience for those people who believe that you start writing when you sit down at your desk and pick up your pen and finish writing when you put down your pen again; a writer is always writing, seeing everything through a thin mist of words, fitting swift little descriptions to everything he sees, always noticing.
―Shirley Jackson
If in the beginning was the word, than that which creates is by definition a writer.
And she loves dirty limericks and whoopee cushions.
“What reveals itself to me ceases to be mysterious, for me alone: if I unveil it to anyone else, he hears mere words which betray the living sense: Profanation, but never revelation.” ~ Outer Temple of Karnak, Luxor
The quote from the Outer Temple of Karnak in Luxor, Egypt is a profound statement about the nature of knowledge and wisdom. It suggests that the deepest truths cannot be conveyed through words alone. They must be experienced firsthand.
The quote begins by stating that “what reveals itself to me ceases to be mysterious, for me alone.” This suggests that knowledge and wisdom are not something that can be acquired externally. They must come from within. When we have a personal experience of something, it becomes real to us. It is no longer a mystery.
The quote then goes on to say that “if I unveil it to anyone else, he hears mere words which betray the living sense: profanation, but never revelation.” This suggests that words are inadequate to convey the deepest truths. When we try to explain our experiences to others, they can only hear our words. They cannot experience what we experienced. This is why the quote says that it is “profane” to try to reveal the deepest truths to others. It is not true revelation.
True revelation is a personal experience. It is something that we must have for ourselves. We cannot have it vicariously through the experiences of others.
Here are some examples of the truth of the quote:
• We can read about the experience of love, but we cannot truly understand it until we have experienced it for ourselves.
• We can read about the experience of grief, but we cannot truly understand it until we have experienced it for ourselves.
• We can read about the experience of spiritual awakening, but we cannot truly understand it until we have experienced it for ourselves.
The quote from the Outer Temple of Karnak is a reminder that the deepest truths are not found in books or in the words of others. They are found within ourselves. We must have our own experiences in order to truly understand the deepest truths.
The quote also reminds us to be humble about our knowledge and wisdom. We should not try to force others to see the world as we see it. We should respect their right to have their own experiences and to come to their own conclusions.
One takes beauty where one finds it, friends where one makes them, curiousness in the ordinary, the unexpected in the everyday, hope in the commons, and meaning with each other; one leaves memories where one makes them, hope in the ordinary, friends with the curious, meaning in beauty and love in each other.
To the turning of the season. The sun begins its arc. We all breathe for another day. To your good health.
Make your own meaning. Do not let anyone do it for you. Be kind to yourself and you will find it easier to be kind to others.
