The Inevitability of Enlightenment

Recent theories concerning the origins of entropy dissipating micro systems at undersea volcanic vents lends credence to the image of life forms as not rare and random, but inevitable.

To consider the existence of one's consciousness as the result of an unbroken flow of inevitability beginning with the beginning of anything at all, implies that awareness inheres in the field phenomenon, and that those alignments of subatomic events leading to entropy dissipating forms, self replicating and aware, are the natural refinement of what ever the stuff of existence is.

Enlightenment is not a personal event: Enlightenment is the Universe awakening to its Self. The individual is a fresh bud of that vine rooted in the dawn of time, and Enlightenment is its finest flower. The ancient image of the self-consuming snake comes to mind, and it makes one a bit impatient with the ideologues that trade in the various subtleties of death and destruction. What world might ensue in the sway of a culture of Enlightenment?

It is a race against time for this particular experiment in life forms, but the achievement of Enlightenment in it's progeny is the denouement of the stars.

An Exercise in Meditation

It is often said that swimming is the best exercise. Yes, it's good, and to that I would add a personal favorite: playing in big waves. That said I submit as the premier exercise for those reasonably fit: cutting fire wood.

The woods in which I cut are crowded second growth hardwoods about 70 to 80 years old. I have live here for over 45 years and the prettiest forests are the ones I cut in all those years ago. I have always thinned for variety and firmness.....but that's not the point.

When cutting wood on a rocky Ozark hillside one must practice absolute attention. A chain saw is as dangerous as a loaded gun, and boulders and fallen branches are everywhere. In felling one must read the tree and read the woods: where does the tree want to go.....can you nudge it where you want it....will it hang up in in being felled. Trimming the branches and limbs there is spring-back to watch for, and pant-legs and boots to avoid tangleing.  When sectioning into firewood there is a danger of pinching the blade in the cut or clipping a rock. One split second clip of a rock is a half an hour sharpening a blade. You can't drift off for a split second or you will get hurt....perhaps badly. Wood cutting is for me an extreme meditation: no thought, absolute attention, the tree leads the way and one silently follows. Always aware of the blade. Aways aware of ones footing. Always aware of the tree.

Then there is splitting the rounds. A well-placed blow of the splitting maul on a 18 inch oak round will split the log with a sound that is like nothing else. It is a sound that after all these years still gives me an indescribable pleasure. The dull thud of the off center strike also sticks with one. And again it is the thud of the off strike that tells one that one has drifted off, lost ones concentration. Bending....lifting....throwing....bending.....lifting....throwing. Loading and unloading the truck a rhythm emerges that sets its own pace, and the forest floor is an obstacle course of worthy tenor.

Every phase of the process requires absolute attention and each phase makes its separate demands on the various muscle groups. Yes, it is an exercise and a meditation most excellent.

And....
It's getting chilly in here.....time to load the stove.

The Physics of Enlightenment

When life forms are considered as entropy dissipating systems the natural and inevitable denouement of Awareness is Enlightenment.

Fantasy Land

Though usually unnoticed, it goes without saying that all ideas are imaginary: no imagination: no ideas.

All animals are born with a repertoire of instinctual behaviors into a world that under normal conditions changes very very slowly. Ideas are not necessary in a stimulus-response jungle, but advantage is to that creature with the ability of intellectual synthesis. Enter Humanity.

Culture is imagined into being. From flint-and-steel to A bombs, from loin cloths to tuxedos. from rat-on-a-stick to haute cuisine, from water-in-a-bowl to trainloads of insecticide, the world in which we find ourselves is the cumulative realization of fantasy. And all this in a creature whose motivations are still hostage to blind instinct.

In an environment where every aspect of existence is charged with the products of imagination where is one to find a foundation of existential being? In a maze of ideas where is one to find a firm footing from which to take a step in the right direction. It seems obvious that a podium built of further fantasies (regardless of how exquisite) will be a poor jumping off place.

The core of being which in every case labors under its "repertoire of instinctual behaviors" is Transcendental Awareness. Transcendental Awareness is the ultimate truth of the sparrow, and the paramecium, and the beggar in the alley. Transcendental Awareness is anywhere and everywhere the Alpha and the Omega.

The world of illusion of which the ancients spoke is no less than the normal day to day existence of any unenlightened creature. That which we are is not running away from us. The mystery of being is the presence of our existence. If we relax our hold on our fantasies and are motionless at the core of our being we discover Awareness: lucid, un-configured Awareness.

How are we to re-imagine the world when the cumulative fantasies of humanity are leading us to oblivion.


Enlightenment is the only balm that can soothe the sorrows of the world.



Meditate.