He Sold the World

Sunday afternoon, and my Spotify plays this nice cover of David Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World.”

The bit that caught my attention most was:

“Oh no, not me
We never lost control
You’re face to face
With the man who sold the world”

Is it fair to conclude that “the man sold the world” because “he never lost control”? If we go with this assumption, those who never lose control are the ones who sell their world. Or to put it differently, those who are always in control will lose their world.

But what is it about losing control that makes life worthwhile? An example of losing control is falling in love. Hafez has a poem that says:

“Fall in love–for if you don’t, one day the world will cease to be,
While you still haven’t deciphered destiny’s grand design.”

Hafez suggests that surrendering–utterly losing control–is destiny’s grand design. So is it fair to say that those who never lose control are the ones who, according to Bowie, “died alone a long, long time ago”?

I also think Bowie is pointing to being the artists of our own lives, able to express emotion and desire. Those who keep these forces under strict control begin selling their world–bit by bit, brick by brick!

Josh, the explorer

It was a nice, sunny Saturday, and I had just started reading a book titled ‘Less Than Nothing’. I was reading a passage in which the author was discussing how God is less than nothing when I was interrupted by the door bell.

I opened the door while the book was still in my hand. A well-dressed seven- or eight-year-old boy and a middle-aged woman were behind the door. They were Jehovah’s Witnesses. The lady asked me if I had a minute to talk to them. Since it was my first encounter with Jehovah’s Witnesses, my curiosity didn’t let me simply say no. I replied, “If it doesn’t take long.”

The woman asked me if I had read the Bible. I replied that I’m not a believer but I know a tiny bit.

She told the young boy, “Josh, why don’t you share some wisdom from the Bible with this gentleman.” Like an energetic preacher, Josh started to preach while the woman was proudly smiling and nodding her head. But the truth is, Josh didn’t impress me at all. If anything, he unsettled me. For those moments, Josh was transformed into a soulless robot shouting the words of an ideology — too young to be conditioned.

After that, Josh repeated (shouted at me) a verse from the Bible (that I don’t remember) about happiness three times and told me: “Now you know the secret to happiness.” I wish I could tell him that happiness and its secret(s) don’t interest me. There are far more interesting things in life.

The woman told me, “Do you want Josh to come here every weekend and talk to you about the Bible?” I smiled and replied, “I’m sure Josh’s time is spent better if he talks to someone other than me.” I wish I could tell her: “Yes, I like to see him every week–not to listen, but to talk to him. I’d like to talk about Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, NASA’s Voyagers, and evolution; and once he’s older, I like to talk to him about other religions, about Buddha, and perhaps even Nietzsche.”

She gave me a card and, as a last attempt, said, “The Bible has the answers to everything, and we love to share them with you.” I told her, “Thanks. I’ll let you know if I’m interested.”

After saying goodbye, I was thinking about the Bible having the “answers to everything.” I haven’t read it, but I doubt it has any answers on how the Voyagers are exploring the universe..

Succession, a masterclass on Narcissistic Personality Disorder

“I have given you endless approvals and it doesn’t fill you up because you are broken.”

― Succession

Succession, among other things, is a masterpiece about Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD). It’s a story about the children of a selfish and somewhat psychopathic billionaire who desperately seek the approval of their father. Psychotherapists often attribute NPD to emotionally distant or unavailable parents in the early childhood. In childhood, for any reason, the child didn’t receive the attention and approval they needed, and as a result, the foundation of their psyche is severely damaged.

They constantly seek the approval and attention of others (as a replacement for the attention that they didn’t get from their parents) to sustain the facade of their broken self. Solitude is a terrifying hell for them because, in a sense, it is a reminder of the emotional neglect endured during infancy. In adulthood, they adopt narcissistic narratives (e.g. I’m the best; I’m awesome) and often they are willing go into extreme measures to manipulate others in order to secure the ‘attention’ that they didn’t get in childhood.

In this video, Shiv, the daughter of the billionaire, and her husband Tom are ‘clearing the air’. What stood out the most to me was the phrase ‘I have given you endless approvals, and it doesn’t fill you up because you are broken.’ Narcissists demand constant and consistent attention and approvals. Their tragedy is that (without seeking professional help) the endless approvals can’t heal/fill them because, as Tom aptly puts it, they are inherently broken.

Australia Day: The Mark of Cain

“I have always believed that a nation is accountable for its traitors as well as for its heroes. Likewise, civilisations are responsible for their perversions as for their successes.”

– Albert Camus, The Human Crisis

~~

I think the 26th of January is a fitting day for Australia Day. Let me explain. Australia’s history is intertwined with the concept of invasion, whether we accept it or not; it’s ingrained in the very essence of the nation. This day serves as a reminder of the atrocities inflicted upon the Aboriginals.

As Camus is pointing out, Australia/Invasion Day is here to remind us about our responsibility towards aboriginals. It could be seen as a call to keep the dialogue alive and to address ongoing issues related to Indigenous rights. The 26th of January as Australia Day reminds us of the stain of the sins committed against our Aboriginal brothers, similar to the mark on Cain’s forehead.

Hedgehog & Rabbit, a Doomed Love Story

This image appeared on my facebook news feed. Below is an interpretation.

The hedgehog can be seen as someone who doesn’t know how to love. Her spines are going to hurt anyone who attempts to get close to her. The hedgehog’s tragedy is that deep down she craves to love and to be loved; however, due to past experiences such as traumatic childhood, she never learned how to properly love another person. She built these defenses (spines) that will hurt anyone who gets close to her.

I think the love story between the rabbit and the hedgehog, as demonstrated in the comic, is doomed. Because the only way for the rabbit to be with the hedgehog is to say goodbye to the sun and accept a miserable underground dark life. Perhaps the rabbit also believes he doesn’t deserve to be happy. If that’s the case, the hedgehog and rabbit might end up in an everlasting dysfunctional and torturous relationship.

But is there an alternative universe in which the rabbit and the hedgehog will have a loving functional relationship? I think yes. If, in one way or another, the hedgehog understands that she deserves to be loved, if she learns to love herself, and if she comprehends that her defenses are hurting others. It might be the rabbit who helps the hedgehog in her journey or it might be a therapist.

Or perhaps the beauty of the nature can be a remedy to the hedgehog’s wounds. Perhaps the softness of raindrops can soften the spines of the hedgehog:

“And let her rain now if she likes.

Gently or strongly as she likes.

Anyway let her rain…”

― James Joyce, Finnegans Wake

Take Shelter: All Pains are Real

It’s been a long while that I like to write about Jeff Nichols’ Mud, but before that, I feel I must write about another great movie by Nichols, Take Shelter.

“Take Shelter” is a psychological thriller that centers on Curtis, a working-class man, who is haunted by apocalyptic visions. He becomes fixated on constructing a storm shelter due to his fears of these visions being warnings. As his obsession grows, it impacts his relationships and raises uncertainty about the boundary between mental illness and genuine apocalypse. Eventually Curtis acknowledges the visions as manifestations of his illness and leaves the idea of the shelter behind. The movie ends with Curtis and his family on a beach vacation, while the real apocalypse begins. But this time everyone can see apocalypse.

In an interview, Jeff Nichols said that “Take Shelter” is a movie about relationship with a hopeful ending, despite its seemingly tragic and dark conclusion. I think his hint was enough to decipher the movie. Nichols suggests that Curtis’ visions were real, emphasizing that mental issues are as genuine and real as anything else. Nichols narrates a relationship story in which one partner fails to understand and acknowledge the challenges of the other partner. Nichols said the movie has a hopeful ending because, in the end, Curtis’ nightmares are fully realised by his partner.

Serbian psychologist Dr. Aleks Dimitrijevic, in his lectures on trauma, states that the most significant factor in overcoming trauma is to have someone by your side. Someone who actually and imaginatively listens to your story without judgment and helps you navigate through the stormy sea. “Take Shelter” ends on a hopeful note because, at the end, Curtis’ partner actually and imaginatively realises the pain that Curtis is going through. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the family are away from home and the shelter when the apocalypse begins. Nichols implies there is no real hiding from traumas — they need to be faced. The family’s journey ahead is going to be a challenging one, but, at least, they are a team now.

On Worries – 1

Facebook recommended this image to me. It aligns with a few things I’m thinking about at the moment, and I’d like to talk about them.

So here’s my comment:

Sometimes, more often than not, we don’t know the true roots of our worries. The worries reside within us, and they use external objects as excuses for expression. Phobia is a good example. French psychoanalyst Lacan believed phobia is often the expression of another repression or trauma. For instance, someone had a trauma, and for any reason, the neglected issue was buried deep down, and now the person has a phobia of escalators, for example. Escalator phobia is a re-expression of another challenge or problem.

Similarly, if someone spends a lot of time worrying about things that don’t happen, perhaps the external factors were not the real reason behind the worrying. What is shared between all of them is the worry. Perhaps, something deep inside demands attention and uses the external things to be expressed.

The Abandoned Abandons: Up In The Air, a movie review

“Getting lost is our best defence against being lost.”

— Adam Phillips, On Losing and Being Lost Again

The Story:

Up In The Air (2009) is the story of Ryan Bingham (played by George Clooney), a corporate downsizing expert who travels around the country to fire employees on behalf of their companies. He lives his life on the road, flying between cities and collecting frequent flyer miles. Ryan’s company hires a new person to transform their company so they can fire people by using Skype (instead of traveling). In other words, Ryan is on the verge of being fired from his job (which is firing people). Going through this crisis, Ryan falls for a woman (Alex), but it doesn’t end well. The movie ends while Ryan is still traveling to fire people while waiting to be fired himself.

~~

A Review:

At its core, this movie is about abandonment and abandoning. Ryan is a lost soul who, according to Adam Phillips, actively wants to get lost because getting lost is his best defence against being lost. He abandons because he was abandoned. He thinks he doesn’t belong anywhere or to anyone. A Freudian would ask what sort of traumatic experiences Ryan has had in his childhood that make him fundamentally a lost soul?

One could say Ryan has a perfect job that perfectly matches his identity. He goes around firing people because he was fired (abandoned) at some stage of his life. His real refuge is not to have any refuge, to always be up in the air, to be lost, to escape the reality that keeps haunting him if he stays by himself. Ryan being fired from his job can be interpreted as a symbol of being haunted by reality. Facing the reality, Ryan wants to find a shelter, a refuge, a family, an anchorage. He falls for a woman (Alex) and thinks she could be that refuge, but she’s not.

In the end, we are faced with Ryan, who is totally lost. Ryan, who was abandoned and has been abandoning, once more gets abandoned as though being abandoned is his fate. Ryan’s predicament is that he doesn’t realise that by abandoning (and not facing the reality) he’s abandoning himself too. Ryan is the breathing example of this quote by Carl Jung: “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life, and you will call it fate.”

Psychoanalysis, Two Years Later

It has been two years since I began my weekly psychoanalysis sessions, and I thought I would share a few observations and opinions.

A few observations:

– You can speak freely without censorship (almost) and talk about anything that comes to your mind. The analyst does not judge.

– Typically, a good friend knows a secret or three about us. In analysis sessions, you share many of your secrets with the analyst. The analyst becomes the person who knows more about you than anyone else in the world.

– In the first few months, you speak about your traumas, and the analyst listens patiently. Eventually, you become bored talking about your traumas and begin discussing the background. Allow me to elaborate: when we look at the Mona Lisa painting, Mona Lisa is the center of our attention, similar to our known traumas. We believe they define us. We think we have become who we are because of them. However, if you look at the Mona Lisa’s background, you will see a road, a lake, a river, a bridge, and mountains. The background, for sure, has a story! Once we finish discussing the traumas in our lives, the attention shifts toward the background. In other words, things that previously did not receive any attention will come to the surface (and they often has something important to say).

– From month 3 to month 18: Repetitions, repetitions, and more repetitions! During psychoanalysis, I noticed that I repeated the same pattern in various situations. During the sessions, it was fascinating to see how I jumped from one situation to another similar situation. For example, at work, I had an email in my draft folder that I wanted to send to a senior manager for two months. In my relationship with my (ex)girlfriend, I wanted to discuss certain things with her for months but avoided doing so. In my relationship with my family, I wanted to meet them but postponed it for years. Once you become aware of these patterns in your life, you realise that some behaviors overshadow others. For instance, I believed the situation at work was very challenging, but in reality, it wasn’t! Another behavior rooted in my unconscious was projecting itself onto my relationships at work, making it seem challenging. With good communication, I made work feel like heaven and still do.

~~~

A few opinions and recommendations:

– Would I recommend psychoanalysis? Absolutely. However, I believe the analyst’s competence and psychoanalytic school matter. For instance, as someone who previously studied Carl Jung, I don’t like Jungian schools of psychoanalysis. I have my philosophical reasons to reject them.

– Patience matters. Psychoanalysis is a slow process that is not about obtaining quick results. It is a journey of self-discovery. If you want something quick and need to deal with everyday life challenges, you may want to try CBT or a similar treatment.

– Communication matters. Sometimes, you may believe your analyst is a fraud or does not care about you. Other times, you may think you should terminate the sessions because they are pointless. These are known behaviors attributed to different phases of the treatment. Sharing them with the analyst helps him navigate the sessions and the treatment better.

– I started psychoanalysis with close to zero expectations. When the analyst asked me why I wanted to go through analysis for the first time, my response was, ‘I don’t know, mainly because I like the concept!’ I believe low expectations pays off.

– Has psychoanalysis improved my life? I think so.

Our Wait for Godot

When I was teenager, I used to listen to metal music for a few years. That desire eventually faded away. However, recently I’ve found out that metal music and intensive workouts are a great combination. During my intensive gym sessions, I listen to a Spotify playlist titled ‘Workout Metal Beast Mode’! I was listening to the aforementioned playlist when the lyrics of ‘Engine 45’ by ‘Ghost Inside’ caught my attention (yes, even in the *beast* mode, the critic in me is still alive!). Here’s a part of the lyrics:

“All my life I’ve been searching for something,

To break these chains. To break these chains.

But I’ll keep swinging

All my life I’ve been waiting for something,

That never came. It never came.

But I’m still saying

All my life I’ve been searching for something,

To break these chains. To break these chains.

But I’ll keep swinging”

There’s a lot of resemblance between these verses and Samuel Beckett’s ‘Waiting for Godot’. In Waiting for Godot, the protagonists Gogo and Didi symbolise lost souls who are trapped in the meaningless cycles of sterile life. Their entire life is spent on waiting for Godot, something that never came, similar to the lyrics above.

I claim in the 21st century most of us are still waiting for Godot. We are waiting for something that never arrives. It is as though our heart is beating for something; it is desiring something, something that is perhaps located at the end of the infinite scrolls of facebook, instagram, dating apps, twitter, tiktok, etc. We constantly and consistently are searching for something or someone that quenches the thirst of souls. Someone that gets our lacks and something that fills our lacks, or, according to Ghost Inside, something that breaks our chains.

But is there light at the end of the tunnel? Will our desire be satisfied? Renowned French psychoanalyst, Lacan, thinks desire does not exist to be satisfied, but exists only to keep desire going, only for its own sake. In other words, he suggests we will wait and wait, just like Gogo and Didi.

But what about when we think that someone can satisfy us? My favourite psychoanalyst, Adam Phillips, has a very interesting perspective:

“To like someone very much is to be reminded of a frustration that you didn’t know you had; you felt deprived of something, and then it seems to be there. And what is renewed in that experience is an intensity of frustration, and an intensity of satisfaction. It is as if, oddly, you were waiting for someone but you didn’t know who they were until they arrived. Whether or not you were aware that there was something missing in your life, you will be when you meet the person you want.”

One of the things that Phillips says is that through some encounters we realise what we lack; we realise our frustrations. Phillips doesn’t dare to say that there’s light at the end of the tunnel, that Godot one day will arrive. What he says is that sometimes in the journey of life through accidental encounters we might understand ourselves and each other to a greater depth.

But what about the desire that demands light at the end of the tunnel? What should we do about it? Or is there anything that we can do about it? Should we control it? Should we invest in it? That’s a subject for another post/discussion. For now, to sum up, if we see Godot as the light at the end of the tunnel, as something that can satisfy our desires, perhaps this quote from Emerson is somewhat relevant: “Life is a journey, not a destination”. In other words, life is about the journey, not the destination (e.g. Godot). Life is not about the light at end of the tunnel (Lacan already said there’s none: something is always missing); life is about traveling, experiencing, and becoming.

In Defence of Simple Experiences

“One should absorb the colour of life, but one should never remember its details. Details are always vulgar.”

– Oscar Wilde

A few days ago, I was chatting with a friend about a painting. My friend, like me, doesn’t have any art background. When we were discussing the beauty of the painting, he told me – with a tone that implied his inferiority – that his partner (she’s an architect) sees a lot more and absorbs a lot more in a painting. According to my friend, his partner sees symbols, histories, hidden messages, etc in a painting therefore her experience is superior. I told my friend that simplicity is a virtue as well, stating the following two reasons.

The first reason is the same reason that Nietzsche criticized Socrates. Nietzsche sees Socrates as a symbol, as a point in time in which Apollo (God of reason and order) overcame Dionysus (God of passion, celebration and chaos). Nietzsche saw Socrates as a point in time in which reason dominated passion and that is the birth of our tragedy! That’s why Nietzsche invites us to embrace Dionysus, to embrace that part of ourselves that loves to dance to rhythms without thinking, that part of ourselves that absorbs beauty as a whole. 

The second reason: the inexplicable beauty in a piece of art. If we look at the phenomenon of observing a piece of art from a Lacanian perspective, there are at least three types of communications or dialectics at work:

• Communication between the consciousness of the observer and the consciousness of the artist
• Communication between the unconscious of the observer and consciousness of the artist (or vice versa)
• Communication between the unconscious of both parties

I want to claim that it is the communication between the unconscious of the artist and the unconscious of the observer that can bring a sense of awe. I’m talking about that enchanting and magical experience of being fully captivated by a piece of art and not being able to put the experience in any words. It is as if the two souls encounter each other, and due to the alchemy between them, something profound, in the context of meaning, is born.

The Last White Rhino of Laikipia and the Last Lion of Panjshir

In the winter of 2018, just before the spring, in the last days of March, the last northern white rhino, Sudan, passed away and his species went extinct.
I think Sudan, like T.S. Eliot, believed that “April is the cruelest month”. Sudan said his farewell to this cruel world in the winter because he knew that the next spring would be deceptive and hypocritical – just like humans.

How can one welcome the spring when one’s dying in the inside? When one’s heart is being torn apart.. At least there’s a sense of honesty in winter: it portrays death and this is in harmony with the dying heart, or as Wilde put it: “the outward rendered expressive of the inward”.

And now, Ahmad Massoud, the last lion of Panjshir, is fighting the Taliban. And the world is watching the death of the last lion of Panjshir in the same way that they watched the death of the last white rhino of Laikipia, with hypocrisy and indifference.

But I think Massoud is here to remind us that heroes still exist; he’s here to tell us that the value of humans and humanity is more than ‘profit’; he’s here to tell us that the last lion of Panshir will die standing than live kneeling.

In Praise of Love, a brief review

“All that is true is rare and challenging.”

– Alain Badiou

~~~

In Praise of Love, A Book for Everyone (even my for parents who are in their late 60s! )

In this book, Badiou proposes a simple yet profound definition for love. Love: to experience the world from the point of view of two. This definition is more than just being less selfish, it’s about the journey of re-inventing the self and re-discovering the other. Badiou calls this a true revolution.

According to Badiou, love consists of ‘encounter’ and ‘construction’. Encounter is when we meet the other person and construction is when we take risk and accept responsibility. He sees the construction of love as a courageous ongoing adventure of re-inventing love, an adventure that has its own ‘risks’ and ‘responsibilities’ (both risk and responsibility are keywords here).

Badiou thinks we’re dominated by a culture that is afraid of taking risks for love. It is though taking risk for love merely belongs to the realm of fiction, and all great love stories belong to another species in another dimension. He criticises the culture of the dating apps (lacks risk) and one night stands (lacks responsibility).

Moreover, acknowledging our differences and seeing the world from the point of view of the difference necessitates commitment and responsibility. The responsibility of understanding and accepting the other person. That is why Badiou sees love as a courageous ongoing construction. A construction that adds a new dimension to our lives.

France’s greatest living philosopher sees love as a true revolution (both individual and social). A revolution that, perhaps, today, our world needs more than ever. After all, love or as Badiou describes it ‘the greatest experience of existence’ must be the answer to something!

I finish with an excerpt from the book:

“When I lean on the shoulder of the woman I love, and can see, let’s say, the peace of twilight over a mountain landscape, gold-green fields, the shadows of trees, black-nosed sheep motionless behind the hedges and the sun about disappear behind craggy peaks, and know – not from the expression of her face, but from within the world as it is – that the woman I love is seeing the same world, and that this convergence is part of the world and that love constitutes precisely, at that very moment, the paradox of an identical difference, then love exists, and promises to continue to exist. The fact is she and I are now incorporated into this unique Subject, the Subject of love that views the panorama of the world through the prism of our difference, so this represent what fills my own individual gaze. Love is always the possibility of being present at the birth of the world.”

– Alain Badiou, In Praise of Love

The Return of Buddha — Part 1: A Return

Jacob is an interesting friend of mine. I met him back in 2015 through the walk and talk events that he used to organise. The goal was to walk and talk freely in small groups. In every event, he prepared a few absurd questions for the participants.

Last time that I met Jacob (before the pandemic), he asked me another absurd question:

“Which one do you prefer and why?
1- Living for a month in absolute bliss and pure ecstasy and then die
2- Living for several years normally and then die”
And by absolute bliss, he meant something live Nirvana, an ecstatic state of pure transcendence.

I told him I’d go with the 2nd one but before telling my reasons, I like to know how other people responded. He said the majority voted for the second one mainly because of the fear of death. I told him while I, too, am afraid of death, that’s not my reason. I chose the 2nd one because I value a life with all of its ups and downs more than a life of pure ecstasy. Don’t get me wrong; I value all the ecstatic moments that I ever had, but at the same time, I absolutely cherish all the moments that I was so heat-broken that I had to take refuge in the arms of nature; and the moments that I have wept under the moonlight. I’m quite certain that without those moments, something essential would’ve been missed in my life.

A while after my conversation with Jacob, this question started to occupy my mind: “Why did Buddha return?” For he reached Nirvana (a state of pure bliss and without any suffering), yet he returned.

In his return, Buddha embraced the earth with all of its attachments, with all of its sufferings.

[to be continued..]

~~

Painting by Martin Beaupré

Reading Redemption

I simply couldn’t remain silent when I saw Banksy’s new work on the wall of Reading jail. Because it’s about the most favourite work of one of my most favourite writers, De Profundis by Oscar Wilde. A book that Wilde wrote while he was in Reading prison.

De Profundis is the self-reflection of an artist who’s been unjustly exiled from the heights of heaven to the depths of hell. It’s a profound piece about frustration, suffering, sorrow, forgiveness, and re-birth.

Banksy’s work aptly suggests that Wilde set himself free through writing De Profundis. I do agree with Banksy given the fact that De Profundis ends like this:

“[Once I’m free] society, as we have constituted it, will have no place for me, has none to offer; but Nature, whose sweet rains fall on unjust and just alike, will have clefts in the rocks where I may hide, and secret valleys in whose silence I may weep undisturbed.

She will hang the night with stars so that I may walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and send the wind over my footprints so that none may track me to my hurt: she will cleanse me in great waters, and with bitter herbs make me whole.”

You didn’t say it — 2

There’s (at least) one other side to every story. The previous post was about one aspect of ‘I cant say it’. ‘You didnt say it’ is the other side of ‘I can’t say it’. The following chart illustrates this (A and B are persons).

If the previous post was about A, this post is about B. Let’s listen to the song below. The singer (B) expected a significant other (A) to say something, but A didn’t or couldn’t say it.

I think in this song, instead of a heart, there’s a void, a sorrowful emptiness, that is beating. The singer expected (and still is expecting) to hear something. Something that she’s been deprived of. But her expectation was made void.

“I could never forget the way
You told me everything
By saying nothing.”

She says the other said everything by saying nothing. In other words, by saying nothing, the other person told her that she means nothing to them. And this is too hard to bear.

She still expects a conversation:

“Oh, give me the words
That tell me nothing
Oh, give me the words
That tell me everything”

She wants to know why she meant nothing to them. She wants to hear the reason that why she was treated like this. She yearns to know why the other ‘didn’t or couldn’t say it’.

Like the singer, we don’t know why the other ‘didn’t say it’, all we know is that there is (at least) one other side to every story. They couldn’t or didn’t say say it because…

I can’t say it — 1

The other day, I saw this picture in my facebook news feed and in a weird sense it cheered me up.

This cheers me up because it engages my mind in a playful manner! Challenging what can’t be said has been a life-long mission of mine.

‘I cant say it’ says a lot, but not enough. It says there’s something that can’t be described. Perhaps something overwhelming (could be a heavenly or hellish) that can’t be put into words. I see ‘I cant say it’ as an interesting challenge. Sometimes, I think of what can’t be said as the most delightful bird that is trapped in a cage. I’ll do my best to set it free so it can share its beauty with the world.

Some other times, ‘what cant be said’ is a horrifying monster that haunts me. And this makes the challenge even more interesting! Then, like a child who wants to discover his new toy, I sit with the monster, I try to play with it, poke it, tickle it, cry with it, yell at it, and finally converse with it. Many times, it’s not a success, but when it is, you see another beautiful bird is trapped in the heart of once was a horrifying monster.

To me, this is a form of meditation.

~~~

P.S. ‘I cant say it’ can (at least) be interpreted in two ways:
1- I’m not able to say it. Or I can’t describe it. There’s something that is still somewhat unknown to me.
2- I’m not allowed to say it. It could be too vulgar or taboo to talk about it.

This post is about the first interpretation. Hopefully I will write about the second one some time soon, too.

2020, A Most Vulnerable Year

Here, in down under, only a few hours of 2020 is left and while looking at a pleasant sunset, I’m trying to contemplate about 2020. I think it’s fair to say that the word ‘vulnerable’ represents 2020 quite well.

In On Kindness, Adam Phillips (one of my gurus) says: “Everybody is vulnerable; everybody is subject to illness, accident, personal tragedy, political and economic reality.”

In 2020 a lot of us were subject to illnesses (physical and mental) and economic and personal tragedies. In 2020, I witnessed the vulnerability of many of my friends. Conversely, some of my friends saw my vulnerability. I think 2020 taught us that friendships matter, that being there for each other matters. According to Phillips, bearing other people’s vulnerability is crucial to bear one’s own:

“Vulnerability doesn’t mean that people aren’t resourceful. Bearing other people’s vulnerability ―which means sharing in it imaginatively and practically without needing to get rid of it― entails being able to bear one’s own. We depend on each other not just for our survival but for our very being”

I think 2020 showed us how fragile we are. Perhaps, this Sting song was more than ever relevant:

“Tomorrow’s rain will wash the stains away
But something in our minds will always stay
Perhaps this final act was meant
To clinch a lifetime’s argument
That nothing comes from violence and nothing ever could
For all those born beneath an angry star
Lest we forget how fragile we are.”

I hope that 2021 washes the stains of 2020 away. But, at the same time, I hope that we remember our fragility and our vulnerability:

“On and on the rain will fall
Like tears from a star like tears from a star
On and on the rain will say
How fragile we are how fragile we are”

As Phillips explained, being vulnerable and fragile is not a bad thing; it is indeed what we, as humans, are ― despite the fact that our contemporary culture (of Randian toxic rivalry) tries to paint vulnerability as a bad weakness that shouldn’t be discussed.

Finally, I think 2020 (among many other things) taught us that kindness matters.

Happy 2021!

Guilt and Shame

While guilt and shame seem to be very similar and occasionally are used together, there’s an interesting yet significant difference between them. Shame involves ‘other’ whereas guilt doesn’t necessarily involves ‘other’.

In guilt, the accuser, the accused, and the judge can be oneself. And often in order to find some peace, guilt makes one seeks the requisite punishment. I think this song by Black Lab, more than anything, is about guilt: one can deeply feel and breathe the guilt in the lyrics.

I said that an ‘other’ is involved in shame. Shame is similar to being seen naked and there’s no escape. Another person catches us red-handed in a situation, and due to the intensity of embarrassment, we are filled with shame and even might prefer to hide or vanish.

Shame can also appear in interactions with others when our action is perceived way way different from what we expected, to the extent that one might keep repeating: “what the fuck was I thinking?”. I think this song by Jenny Owen nicely describes shame.

If you listen to the both songs again, you may notice that unlike This Night by Black Lab, the presence of an ‘other’ is strongly felt in Owen’s song.

On Idleness – 2

“The [current] morality of work is the morality of slaves, and the modern world has no need of slavery.”

– Bertrand Russell

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In this interesting article, Russell tells us that the belief that work is virtuous belongs to the slave states and is the result of thousands of years of master-slave relationship. He argues that in the modern world, with the help of machines, people don’t need to work as much. For example, if someone can deliver their tasks in 3 hours instead of 8, thanks to machines, then 3 hours is enough.

One of the things that the pandemic and working from home has taught us is that we don’t need to work 8 hours. We can work 4 hours and this can be enough to deliver quality outcomes. Yet, it is a taboo to talk about this in the professional world. Where this taboo is coming from? From a system of morality. The professional world, more or less, still follows the morality of slavery in which the ruling class (kings and clergies) preached: “Satan finds some mischief for idle hands to do”.

Moreover, Russell thinks idleness is necessary for ‘good nature’ and good nature is what the world needs:

“Good nature is, of all moral qualities, the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish forever.”

In short, instead of blindly following the idea that work is virtuous, Russell invites us to think about it, to question it, and to change it. We can have meditations of these sorts only if we are idle!

On Idleness – 1

“I do always look back and think could I have done less?”
– Shooter Williamson

One of the ideas that has been occupying my mind for some time now is the courage for idleness. I like to share a few articles (with summaries) about it. I start with a less serious one.

I liked the phrase “I do always look back and think could I have done less?”. Because on contrary of popular belief, there are many occasions in our lives that doing less could’ve been better.

Example: imagine a super lazy Hitler. He still could be a racist piece of shit, but too lazy to organise anything. The world would’ve a better place.

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Disclaimer: my posts on this subject might be to some extent hypocritical as not everyone has the luxury of pursuing idleness, but I’d claim a lot of my friends, including me, have this privilege.

The Boys, a perfect (anti)superhero TV series

If superheroes were real, I think The Boys would’ve been a very realistic depiction of superheroes in today’s society. The Boys depicts a society in which superheroes care more about money and marketing than kindness.

 

 

In such a society, “success” and “good” are (re)defined based on popularity and the number of followers. The Boys suggests that superheroes are turned into super-villains if wealth is prioritised over kindness.

 

 

In such a society, the truth itself will be under siege, for truth is of no value if it doesn’t add to the wealth. In other words, wealth becomes the arbitrator that decides what the truth is. The truths that doesn’t serve to this purpose, will be ignored and suppressed.

 

 

I think the deepest meaning that The Boys conveys is that kindness is superior to superpowers; that innate kindness should be valued more than wealth.

 

On Isolation – 2

(Before another post on this subject, I must say I’m not advocating isolation in the sense to be anti-social. We need others and others need us (we’re vulnerable; others are vulnerable too). I’m trying to point out a few good things about isolation that are perhaps often overlooked.)

Wilde wrote De Profundis while he was unjustly in prison (3 years of solitary confinement including 2 years of hard labour). It’s so disheartening to witness the torments that his delicate soul went through:

“For us (in prison) there is only one season, the season of sorrow. The very sun and moon seem taken from us. Outside, the day may be blue and gold, but the light that creeps down through the thickly-muffled glass of the small iron-barred window beneath which one sits is grey and niggard.”

The sorrow doesn’t end there. His mother also passed away when he was in jail:

“Three more months go over and my mother dies. No one knew how deeply I loved and honoured her. Her death was terrible to me; but I, once a lord of language, have no words in which to express my anguish.”

Yet, Wilde truly seeks beauty and love, despite of going through the most painful sufferings. And he ultimately embraced his destiny. While in solitary confinement, his words are still truly transforming and beautiful. For instance:

“Love is fed by the imagination, by which we become wiser than we know, better than we feel, nobler than we are: by which we can see life as a whole, by which and by which alone we can understand others in their real and their ideal relation. Only what is fine, and finely conceived can feed love. But anything will feed hate.”

Regardless of the suffering and pain, solitude gave Wilde an opportunity for the deepest meditations:

“I was a man who stood in symbolic relations to the art and culture of my age. I had realised this for myself at the very dawn of my manhood. The gods had given me almost everything[… But] I became the spendthrift of my own genius, and to waste an eternal youth gave me a curious joy… I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has some day to cry aloud on the housetop. I ceased to be lord over myself. I was no longer the captain of my soul, and did not know it.”

And Wilde is grateful for the self-realisations that he’s had in the jail. He writes:

“I want to get to the point when I shall be able to say quite simply, and without affectation that the two great turning-points in my life were when my father sent me to Oxford, and when society sent me to prison.”

Wilde ends De Profundis astonishingly:

“[Once I’m free,] Society, as we have constituted it, will have no place for me, has none to offer; but Nature, whose sweet rains fall on unjust and just alike, will have clefts in the rocks where I may hide, and secret valleys in whose silence I may weep undisturbed. She will hang the night with stars so that I may walk abroad in the darkness without stumbling, and send the wind over my footprints so that none may track me to my hurt: she will cleanse me in great waters, and with bitter herbs make me whole.”

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One can claim that Isolation gave Oscar Wilde a unique opportunity to look within (Carl Jung: “Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes”). One can also claim that he certainly wasn’t happy, but he was more liberated.

On Isolation – 1

“Every man has forgotten who he is”.
– G.K. Chesterton

 

Sartre: “Man is condemned to be free”. One of my most favourite thinkers, Adam Phillips, provides an interesting example about this. Imagine a newly wed wife who gets very anxious when her husband goes to work and she’s alone at home (apparently it’s kind of common). Psychologists would say she’s suffering from separation anxiety. But from Sartre’s point of view, this lady is anxious because she has to deal with her freedom, and this can hurt. She’s left alone to deal with the (seemingly excessive) possibilities of her thoughts and desires. Being alone might also reminds her of what she lacks.

We live in the age of constant distractions: infinite news feed, infinite youtube videos, infinite Netflix options, infinite news coverage, etc. We’ve become actively passive. I go even further and claim the ways that we pursue career success and a healthy life style, in many cases, are distractions too. But distraction from what? From anything that we (knowingly or unknowingly) want to avoid. Solitude gives us a chance to sit with ourselves, with our frustrations and satisfactions, and to understand them better, to understand ourselves better.

Starting a dialogue

 

 

Patriot vs. Bojack Horseman

While both TV shows are about tragic heroes (John and Bojack) who are lost in the absurdity and meaninglessness of life, they take quite different approaches in telling their story. Let me elaborate.

Bojack Horseman reminds me of 2nd-year psychology/philosophy students. Bojack is like that depressed semi-intellectual young friend who all the time nags about the meaninglessness of life. Patriot, on the other hand, like a good story teller, takes us to a journey and let us feel the nihilism of life.

What I want to (somewhat arrogantly) suggest is that Bojack Horseman is a superficial TV show which contains a lot of deep philosophical discussoins while Patriot is a deep TV show which doesn’t have many philosophical discussions.

This reminds me of the original Twin Peaks series and the new one. In the original/old one, David Lynch takes us to a magical to a dream-like world without insisting on complicated concepts. In the new TV show, Lynch restlessly and randomly throws bizarre philosophical concepts at us. In a way, the old one reminds me of Patriot and the new one reminds me of Bojack Horseman.

Oscar Wilde once said: “Beauty, real beauty, ends where an intellectual expression begins”. I guess that’s why I appreciate the original Twin Peaks and Patriot more than the new Twin Peaks and Bojack Horseman*.

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* btw, I don’t hate Bojack Horseman! I really like some of the episodes. But the new Twin Peaks, oh man, I hate it!

Freedom of the Words

[Context: I started to work in a corporation immediately after I finished my PhD — without a break.]

Work, to me, was a burial of the truths inside me. It was an enforced silence. In every long commute (70 minutes) to work, my words, one after another, were dissolving into an abyss. My language was mutating. I began to notice that I couldn’t communicate what meant to be said — what my heart yearned to say. Or perhaps it’s better to say that my mode of communication was changing into something deranged: miscommunication was my new mode of communication. I wasn’t myself.

After I moved to a place close to my workplace and went on a solo trip, the words eventually found their way back to the surface, like the seeds that sprout. I, once again, became myself.

Pride and Leaving

Another weekend and time for having a look at another song.

 

In this song, I particularly like to focus on the following verses:

1- It’s easier to leave than to be left behind

This verse suggests it’s better to leave before being rejected/excluded by others (or a significant other). But I think the writer of this verse has already been rejected because he has enough reasons to believe that he is going to be rejected soon. In other words, he’s been rejected already, but the rejection hasn’t become official yet.

2- Leaving was never my proud

There’s a sense of paradox in this verse. He (the writer) is not proud of leaving, but I claim the very act of ‘leaving’ was a matter of pride. It can be interpreted like this: Leaving was never my proud, but I left because of my pride. In other words, I left before the official rejection.

In short, the protagonist of this story is a heart-broken wandering soul who had to leave because he was too afraid of being left out. His heart is still anchored to a particular person in a particular place at a particular time. The memories of the past are still haunting him. The glass half-full (of the bitter truth) is that he was, at least, able to keep his “pride” — the irony.

 

On the hopelessness of a preacher of “hope”!

Why one should not invest in Canberra or, in other words, why Steven Pinker sucks?

Saw this in a magazine at work. It shows some stats why Canberra is a good place to invest. What it doesn’t show is why Canberra is not a good place to invest. In Soviet Union, government used to publish biannual reports to explain why things were perfect! The reports were factual but, of course, they were one-sided. There were a lot of disappointing facts that they intentionally neglected. Soviet Union’s approach, in a nutshell, summarises Pinker’s philosophy.

Pinker fetishizes about enlightenment and post-enlightenment era by focusing on the good side of things while using “facts”. By suggesting we’re in a good era and keeping things as they are, he preaches conservatism — while we’re facing serious crises: climate change, radical politics, extreme right-wing populism, irrational and semi-extreme left-wing identity politics, disintegration of public morality, fascism on the rise, etc.

Still want to invest in Canberra? It’s ok, but remember Pinker is hopeless! 😉

Heidelberg

Two years ago, I visited this beautiful place. I wrote the following when I was in Heidelberg.

The ecstatic beauty of Heidelberg and the elegance of its castles are ideal for any artist to finish his or her unfinished work, to tell about the concealed symphonies of his or her soul.

Heidelberg immerses you in its beauty. And beauty is a remedy to any wounded soul.

It brings a sense of peace that one needs for delivering perfection.

In Myth of Sisyphus, Albert Camus says: “Myths are made for imagination to breath life into them”.

Likewise, the empty castles of Heidelberg invite you to breath life into them.

This is a place for finishing the unfinished stories,
for breathing beauty into the unknown and the unborn,
for fantasizing.

I know that one day -whenever it may be- I’ll come back here and will stay here for a while.

Because there is an ‘unfinished’ tale that needs to be told. A tale that demands a mystical place like Heidelberg to be born.