Truer words were never spoken
Hello you spicy tuna roll.
As spring turns into summer and my periodic navel gazing moves from the cozy indoors to the great outdoors (ie: from my couch to my little balcony), I have been inspired by the clear blue summery skies to think a bit this week about truth.
I know, I know. I won't be offended if you want to skip to the fun links up in the "Surprise me" (in the upper right hand corner in case you have been missing them) or at the end of this dispatch. But if you are feeling up to it, please do feel free to join me in this little romp through the esoteric.
So first off, when I say "truth", do I mean capital T Truth about life, the universe and everything, or small t truth about the day-to-day ways in which the truth of our "former" lives are being revealed to us in this pandemic? I am not sure (and also I am not sure there is a difference between the two). But I do know that this pandemic has required all of us to grapple with a lot of big questions swirling around us and within us. So exploring truth feels like a resonant activity right now, regardless of what plane of existence that "truth/Truth" resides.
And what do I mean by truth exactly? It is a big question and I am not exactly sure/ it is a work in progress, but I do think I am talking about something bigger than honesty. To me, honesty feels relational, transactional, variable. And it has movement, almost like a currency. Honesty is something that is offered and received, but it is filtered through the layers of our own psychology-- our pains and fears and joys-- and the socio-cultural context in which we live consciously and subconsciously. Therefore by its nature, honesty is subjective. A person can express something as honestly as they possibly can, but that assertion-- offered with a genuine and earnest heart-- may not be the objective truth. We are all broken in our own beautiful ways, and we bring that brokenness into all of our interactions with each other and the world. Honesty often gets caught up in the brokenness in ourselves and of the world at large.
Truth, on the other hand, stands alone-- it does not need people to interact with it in any way-- it simply exists. Like the old saying goes: if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears, does it make a sound? In my opinion, the answer is yes. And the sound that tree makes is the same as truth. We do not bring a truth into being. It exists with or without our interaction.
Since truth does not need us to exist, it can sometimes be elusive to us mere mortals. So I think it behooves all of us to look for truth, and to be open to what we might find. So that when we do happen to be within earshot of that falling tree, we can choose to accept the sound we hear (or not). Sometimes that sound will be a beautiful shusshing of the leaves as they tumble softly to the ground. Sometimes the sound will be an ugly crack as a trunk violently breaks into shards. But all of it is truth, and so worth looking at, if we are able.
I bring all of this up because, in this pandemic-- and with all the listening and quiet it inspires-- I am reminded of (yet another) quote/truth from Daniel Kahneman about human nature, which is that “we can be blind to the obvious, and we are also blind to our blindness.” There is a lot to notice right now, and I am interested in understanding what I am seeing and not seeing-- or put another way, I want to be conscious of what trees are falling within earshot, and I am trying to be open to hear the sound they make.
In seeking truth, we can orient ourselves to the world within us or around us. Looking around us feels easier in a sense right now, since some of the truths seem pretty clear. Many of these collective truths reveal the deeply dysfunctional ways that we have organized ourselves as human beings, entrenching so much racism, sexism, and economic inequality into how we live our lives. But there are many other subtle ones as well. The vastness of human experience-- and its sad, dark underbelly-- is currently on full display, and this is a good thing. As Rebecca Solnit points out, "the intersectional understandings that many of us have been working on have been really useful for recognizing wearing a mask is different if you’re Black and male. Sheltering in place is different if you’re an abused woman. Your kids’ homeschooling has a lot to do with whether you have the digital devices and internet connection that are not universal. And the fact that somebody’s stressed out by too much human contact doesn’t negate the loneliness of somebody who’s not having enough." So many people have been shouting from the rooftops for decades, centuries or longer about how broken things are. And the pandemic has afforded us the opportunity to stop, see and experience these truths of the human experience in a powerful, shared and collective way. If we are open to seeing them, it also gives us a chance to address them directly and collectively as well.
That said, looking outward isn't all bad either. It is also truth that artists are helping us get through COVID, that some people are thriving as we shelter in place, and that there has been a sharp rise in the concept of "mutual aid" and our evolving sense of "we" and communal generosity.
As much as I believe in the "we" and the importance of looking outwards and at the world around us, I also think it is important to connect the truths we find externally to our search for truth internally (and vice versa). Because each one of us is part of the "we", and ultimately the truth of "we" sheds a lot of light on our own internal truths. And these internal truths are what create and transform the world around us. So what can this pandemic moment offer the self-reflecting, truth-seeking person who wants to look inwards for the truths that lie there too?
As we have explored, awakening to inner truths can be difficult and messy. But there is lots to be gained in being open to our own personal truths. To explore them in the quiet spaces that may have opened up in this pandemic, one can experiment with what truly makes us happy to create a happier life, or use Buddhist techniques to try to better see things as they are. And once we see truth, we can experiment with embracing that truth and doing the real thing we know we are being called to do. As a wise jedi once said, "Do. Or do not. There is no try." For when we find our truths, there is an urgent call to do something with what we find, to bring the truth of "I" back to the "we". That is how change happens. "Good things happened because people organized, took initiative and intervened, refused, stood up, or just were generous and engaged. The good things don’t happen of themselves, but there’s evidence that we’re capable of making them happen." And that's the truth.
Ultimately, seeking truth requires us to be willing to abandon what we know-- or thought we knew-- about ourselves and the world around us. But the space that this truth-seeking opens up allows us to create a better future. As Arundhati Roy explains so beautifully in her recent essay, the pandemic "...is a portal, a gateway between one world and the next. We can choose to walk through it, dragging the carcasses of our prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data banks and dead ideas, our dead rivers and smoky skies behind us. Or we can walk through lightly, with little luggage, ready to imagine another world. And ready to fight for it.”
But wait! Perhaps all of this talk of truth is feeling a bit too intense on a sunny Sunday morning? Then speaking of the "we", please feel free to check out this article about Stephen Wolframe who is boldly attempting to crowdsource a unifying theory of everything.
Still too much realness? Then please enjoy these roommates making the most of their dancing and video editing skills during quarantine.
From one truth-seeking person to another, I am glad that we can question what we think we know together. I hope you enjoyed this dispatch, and have a I-hear-a-tree-falling-filled week!
Until next Sunday,
The Earnest Platypus