Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information? T. S. Eliot (1934)
It is ironic that the more serious problems emanate from the more industrially advanced societies. Science and technology have worked wonders in many fields, but the basic human problems remain. There is unprecedented literacy, yet this universal education does not seem to have fostered goodness, but only mental restlessness and discontent instead. There is no doubt about the increase in our material progress and technology, but somehow this is not sufficient, as we have not yet succeeded in bringing about peace and happiness or in overcoming suffering.
His Holiness The Dalai Lama
Men have become the tools of their tools…
… improved means to unimproved ends.
Henry David Thoreau (early 1800s)
Are we happily distracted by information that is grossly sensationalized and designed to appeal to the least conscious part of our selves? This information grabs our attention and keeps it on the surface while deeper realities go unnoticed. Mindlessly buying into this seduction, we collude with the loss of our original knowing and discerning sensibility. Allowing ourselves to be irresistibly drawn into this distraction, our inherent wisdom is easily overridden by the barrage of glitz, half-truth and illusion competing for our attention. Without the determination, or even the willingness to consciously choose what meaningful information we take into our psyches, we are blown about, rudderless, by the winds of meaningless titillation.
There is certainly no shortage of deadening material coming to us through our worship and obsession with technology. Most of what comes, especially through the mainstream media, is what James Joyce would describe as “pornographic” “…that which arouses desire.” The end result of such an encounter is usually discontent with what we have.
When we are able to develop and exercise proper discrimination in deciding what information we take in; deeper meaning and synchronicity substantiates our correct choices. Even if what we glean from the information is dire, we are able to accept the reality of our situation, take responsibility for what is ours and begin to make changes. Intuiting the deeper meaning of things lets us know what is alive and moving in our lives at all levels. The meaning that comes to those with a well developed, instinct becomes a culture's living-breathing mythology. It grounds and empowers a culture in a way that withstands the test of time. Conscious, meaningful creation is efficient and self-sustaining. By its very nature it does not create the blind vulnerability associated with the arbitrary acceptance of meaningless information.
Clearly, we in America are being progressively blind-sided by perfectly predictable disasters, which we have chosen not to see coming. In our frenzied quest for material distraction, we are making bad choices that serve only our immediate desires. Included in these bad choices, is the choice not to acknowledge the looming, disastrous consequences of our actions. The industry of disaster that we are creating through our denial will eventually affect our lives in ways that will be beyond our control.
We are already beginning to experience some of the results of our bad choices personally, economically and ecologically. Twenty-plus years ago, Fr. Thomas Berry warned of looming ecological disaster. He posited that in all of our preoccupation with nuclear disaster, we were not seeing that through our quest for industrial progress we were changing the ecosystems of the earth so radically that, in effect, the bomb had already gone off! We were not listening. Choosing not to hear something does not mean it will not have to later be dealt with as fate.
On an optimistically more twisted note - our salvation may ultimately be realized in the fate of an ecological or economic disaster. I have a personal mantra, “The gods whisper before they scream.” The scream-turn-disaster may be the event that ends our collusive involvement with meaningless distraction. Disaster is a strange god. However it is, at times, the god we get! It is the voice of our wild that refuses to be tamed, denied or ignored. When all else fails to penetrate the complex defenses of our delusion, disaster is the god that comes to humble and awaken us to a more simple and reverent creation.
The party atmosphere created by our collective frenzy of distraction doesn't necessarily create a sense of security and optimism. Many of us are living with the dull feeling that, as a culture, we should be someplace other than where we are! There is a thin line between denial and optimism. The sleepy, guilt-tainted fog that overtakes us when we feel into the issues of our day is the insidious paralysis that denial creates. When we fog-over and seek distraction, it is often a subtle reaction to feelings of powerlessness and hopelessness.True optimism awakens and finds inspiration even in the lowlands. Anyone with any sensitivity, trying to make sense of our times, experiences some degree of this collective fog. It is an overwhelming force that we all must take some responsibility for. This doesn't, however, completely make it our own. The question is; once we become aware of the destructive nature of the fog we have allowed ourselves to be enveloped in, what can we actually do about it?
