An interesting point I find floating around in Eckhart Tolle and others’ writing has to do with the notion of striving. We seem to live in a world that places great value on striving and struggle. For example, if you ask two people what their plan is for the day and one answers, “Well, I might go the beach and read a book. Maybe watch some old horror movies. But first I’m going to take a nap.” and the other says, “Well, I woke up early for my jog – I’m in marathon training – and then I studied for my pre-law class. Now I’m running off to work and later tonight I’m going to stop off at the orphanage and nourish the orphans back to life,” we are programmed to believe that the second person is a better, more valuable person. Because they are “doing something with their lives.”

This attitude is built into our modern culture, particularly – and I hate statements like this but it’s clearly true – American culture. We are a nation of strivers or at least a nation that reveres strivers. We value struggle. We worship people who tackle adversity. George Washington. Lincoln. The greatest generation fighting the Nazis. Martin Luthor King. Rosa Parks. (This attitude probably goes back to the Puritans and their life-is-only-to-be-endured ethos.)

This seems so built into our DNA that it’s hard to imagine people who aren’t addicted to struggle the way we are. But I’m reminded of my visit to Morocco several years ago. Like a lot of Mediterranean cultures, people there seem comfortable chilling out in the afternoons. Grabbing coffee, chatting with friends, taking what the Spanish would call a siesta. I remember walking into a restaurant one burning hot afternoon and having to wake the waiter up to order a much needed Coke. (Man, that Coke was awesome too – I can still taste it.) Here was a guy who was comfortable not striving.*

* A caveat here: Morocco is a Muslim nation and struggle does seems to be a big part of the Muslim ethos so I’m probably oversimplifying things, but in the public sphere of Moroccan life I did not see the kind of struggle and striving you see in America and similar nations.

The first world’s comeback to this would be “But that’s why Morocco hasn’t accomplished anything whereas the first world, particularly America, has been to the moon, teased apart the mysteries of science, given the world movies, Computers, music etc.” And, yeah, that’s all true. But I’m not sure that really matters in the long run. And I think we may have driven ourselves crazy in the process.

My main point here isn’t that struggling is bad, but that struggling simply to struggle, struggling because struggle is revered and honored, is bad, or at least takes a toll on the individual. And I can’t help but suspect that if everyone stopped struggling and chilled out then we wouldn’t have a lot of the problems everyone seem to be struggling with.

I’m continuing my reading of Eckhart Tolle’s “A New Earth.” One of Tolle’s contentions is that the ego (that ethereal ball of self-interested consciousness living within us) is very invested in “forms.” Forms could be objects the ego uses to define itself, like “Look at my fine collection of Peruvian Death Masks.” Or the forms could be non-material thoughts or stories the ego uses to define itself, like, “Let me now bore you with my exhaustive knowledge of 13th century castle building techniques.” The point being that our egos are dependent on these forms to build them/us up.

The problem being that all these forms eventually decay. Your “stuff” will eventually break down. Your knowledge and ideas will certainly die when you die if not before (e.g. when you get Alzheimer’s/demetia etc.) So to be dependent on this stuff for happiness is a recipe for disappointment. This is all pretty standard Buddhist type philosophy, though Tolle has a nice little anecdote. He describes how he and a friend discovered a burnt out husk of a house in a nature reserve…

As we approached the property, long overgrown with trees and all kinds of magnificent plants, there was a sign by the side of the trail put there by the park authorities. It read: DANGER. ALL STRUCTURES ARE UNSTABLE. I said to my friend, “That’s a profound sutra [sacred scripture.]” And we stood there in awe. Once you realize and accept that all structures (forms) are unstable, even the seemingly solid material ones, peace arises within you.”

If that’s Tolle’s reaction to an old house, he’d probably get a real kick out of this headline from today. Cosmos may be ‘inherently unstable’

Scientists say they may be able to determine the eventual fate of the cosmos as they probe the properties of the Higgs boson.

A concept known as vacuum instability could result, billions of years from now, in a new universe opening up in the present one and replacing it.
…
“What happens is you get just a quantum fluctuation that makes a tiny bubble of the vacuum the Universe really wants to be in. And because it’s a lower-energy state, this bubble will then expand, basically at the speed of light, and sweep everything before it,” the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory theoretician told BBC News.

But don’t fret.

It was not something we need worry about, he said. The Sun and the Earth will be long gone by this time.

Just knowing a quantum bubble is gong to eradicate the universe as we know it makes me feel peaceful already.

Recently I had a rather unpleasant interaction with a woman who was one of these new-agey, hippy types. You know, one of these people who feels that they have a deep understanding of the universe and thus are superior to you.

Now, currently I’m reading what my be considered a new agey book: “A New Earth” by Eckhart Tolle. Tolle, while not associated with any particular religion or belief system, is one of these guys who argues that humans can achieve a sort of inner peace. I’ve heard about him in the past and a lot of what he says seems to jibe with my theories on neuroscience and psychology so I thought I’d give him a shot. Today I come across a section about how material possessions help construct our egos. He notes…

… [R]enouncing all possessions has been an ancient spiritual practice in both East and West. Renunciation of possessions, however, will not automatically free you of the ego. It will attempt to ensure its survival by finding something else to identify with, for example, a mental image of yourself as someone who has transcended all interest in material possessions and is therefore superior, is more spiritual than others. There are people who have renounced all possessions but have a bigger ego than some millionaires.

I read that and it immediately brought to mind [annoying woman who shall remain nameless.] I had the sense that for all her purported spirituality, she was very much in the thrall of her own ego. She would do something nice for someone (whether they needed it or not) and you could practically see her patting herself on the back. (“Aren’t I a good person, so much better than these scum around me.”)

Frankly, this is what bugs me about a lot of do-gooder types, be they altruistic liberals or conservative Christians. There’s this unavoidable sense that they feel their self sacrifice makes them feel superior to all around them (in which case it’s not much of a sacrifice, is it?)

Tolle continues.

Anticonsumerism or antiprivate ownership would be another thought form, another mental position, that can replace identification with possessions. Through it you could make yourself right and others wrong. …making yourself right and others wrong is one of the principal egoic mind patterns, one of the main forms of unconsciousness.”

That’s the rub right there. A lot of people purport to have beliefs that serve the interests of everyone else, but it seems these beliefs really serve the owner’s ego.

I, on the other hand, do not need to endlessly tout my own good acts to create a sense of being superior to those around me. I know I’m superior to everyone for a variety of reasons I can get to later. Thus I am truly enlightened.

I think I’ve mentioned in the past my interest in pursuing a state that I call “flow.” (I’m also interested in pursuing Flo, the Progressive Insurance girl, through as many states as necessary.) To my thinking, in this flow state you’re operating almost unconsciously. You’re doing things, performing actions etc. but you’re doing it without thinking about it; there is no mental effort. You’re not running down a mental to-do list in your head; in fact, your mind may be 1,000,000 miles away.

This kind of state is, of course, more and more difficult in the modern age with its litany of beeping, screeching distractions. But I think that with practice, one can achieve a certain flow.

As I think I’ve also mentioned, we need look no further than the ninja to understand flow. When the ninja is about to do what he does best — kill people — he doesn’t think, “oh boy, so now I’m gonna kill someone. I guess I’ll use my ninja sword… well, wait, maybe some ninja throwing stars… no, that’s not right… maybe some nunchucks? Oh, I don’t know!” No, he simply calmly and methodically kills someone, without really thinking about it. Some guy walks up to him and says, “say, Mr. Ninja, would you mind signing this…” and whammo! That guy’s head is cleanly sliced off his shoulders.

It sounds like a very peaceful way of existing.