don’t shoot

To quote Will Farrell, this might get a little weird. Be advised.

This has been my preface.

From childhood, we are told that we are not the center of the universe. This is a convenient way of understanding that our selfish (read: self satisfying pleasure with complete disregard for anyone or anything else) desires need not always be met, be it immediately or at all. Or maybe a better way to say it is–you can’t always get what you want.

It is also easy to believe that we’re not the center of the universe when we can look around and clearly see other people, whom we must assume have thoughts and autonomous free will of their own, right?

This seems logical.

However, I grow more convinced everyday that, in fact, I am the center of the universe.

(Weird yet?)

And in the event you were wondering, this belief is independent of any Leary-esque experimentations.

I find that it is much easier for me to exercise self-control of said selfish desire when I think the universe is my own unique projection rather than when I think I’m just one of the specks within it. It’s almost like my actions carry more weight in the former scenario. You may think this makes me some kind of Napoleonic narcissist (which is probably the worst kind of narcissist), but in my universe this kind of selfishness leads to spiritual death, depression, and the desire that existence would simply end. Not really a desirable goal.

I am a subscriber to the teaching of Jesus that love wins, that loving others is actually my true desire (even though this is often lost by me) because loving is what brings life and a joyful energized existence that we want eternal. When I practice this loving, I find that I more easily see the logos that John says is Jesus and by proxy God. The Real. It has becomes clear to me, experientially, that this is the way of transcendence.

I find that I love better when I perceive everyone as an aspect of the self. Jesus claims we are One… why wouldn’t I take this plainly at face value?

(Now, I will be the first to admit that I have some pretty substantial mental and emotional issues, so I’ll grant that it’s possible that everything written above is nothing more than being very clearly indicative of these problems. Judging from the way I often act—in a negatively selfish manner—it’s also clear that I do not always unwaveringly believe it’s all about me…maybe not even often, certainly not often enough.)

Obviously, I spend a lot (way too much?) of my mental energies on self reflection…

I could probably wax more fully on the mechanisms of how all of this might be true, but I don’t think it’s all that important right now. However, I will leave you with a final thought—after all; this is supposed to be a blog not a book, right? I’m just enough of a polymath to have a vague understanding of string theory and quantum mechanics, etc. etc.  Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m under the impression that the latest in cutting edge physics suggests that there isn’t a universe at all; rather, we live in the multi-verse…

perception

I am pretty sure that perception creates reality.  I say pretty sure because I cannot, with total honesty, say I have no doubts about my suppositions on this–or anything really.  But I do believe that this is indeed correct.

If I believe, as a result of my perceptions, that Gray’s Anatomy is really about class warfare.  Then it is.  My whole reality will be impacted by this belief.

It doesn’t matter that Shondaland thinks the show is about making money off of some melodramatic doctors.  If my perception is unaware of authorial intent, then authorial intent becomes completely irrelevant to my reality.  Foucault  wrote an essay (or something) called What is an Author? that I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned before.  I think it is an important idea, but I don’t think I really understand the idea fully until now.

He says that the reader of a text is the one who decides what it means, not the author.  I’m pretty sure he is referring to texts where the reader (a pompous French literary critic, as an example) is aware of an author’s stated intent but decides that the author is not actually right, or does not have sole claim on the text.  This is something theorists do.  Every text is about class warfare, or gender relations, or gender identity, etc.  Because these are the stories important to them, they make every story about that as well.  They are creating their reality.

Personally, if I think (or want) a text to be about one thing, and I have a lot reasons as to why I am interpreting it as such and then find out that the author said no it’s not about that it’s about this, this knowledge would way heavily on my understanding of the meaning of the text, because my perception has changed.

I am going to make a brief caveat (because this is going to seem to be in almost direct contradiction of the thoughts I was just having) that I am a big proponent of the multi-entendre.  This is the idea that a text has any number of meanings depending on a lot of factors that all reduce to perception.  I say this to mean that Gray’s Anatomy can be a fine catalyst to discussing class economics.  I just don’t think that one could argue that it is ultimately about that.  The ultimately part is where people get into trouble.

We’ll come back to what things are ultimately about.

Now, why perception matters.  Go read Genesis 2 and 3.

In the beginning of the world there was a tree.  This tree’s fruit contained the knowledge of good and evil.  God did not want us to eat that fruit and said it would result in death.

I get a couple things from this.

1. Evil was already in existence at this time.  I’ve never really thought about what evil is (if someone knows, please tell me).  Now that I think about it, I think evil is the state of not being in right relationship with God.  Sound good?

(That thought about what evil is, might have just ruined this whole thing, but I don’t feel like stopping to consider that, so I’m just going to continue.)

2. The problems resulted from us now knowing about evil, and what makes it different from good.

Our perception of the world shifted, essentially ruining us.

I’m not feeling great and I’m getting sleepy, but I’m pretty sure that perception is pivotal to the nature of reality and our way out of the… mess we are in.