an admission

I could flatter my self and say that childhood in no way prefigured the way I have ended up. My child-hood was mostly filled with "what-have-I-done-wrong-now-and-how-can-I stay-out-of-the-way", not to mention genuine misdeeds and misadventures.  At the age of 70 those earliest sensing have not lost their place in the personality made inevitable by those early vagrancies.

That is what the Bird Path is all about.

If the World had not put the question to you, the Universe would not bother speaking to you.

Its OK to be a human being.

Secular Monasticism

In the not so distant past enlightenment was the domain of ascetic religious conservatories.  The age in which we find ourselves is one where the high secrets of traditional monasticism are in paperback books to be bought in dime stores. There is a fabulous array of esoteric technology that is venerable and effective, and precious little practical help with what to make of life if the practice of this magic should have it's way with you.

To awaken to the core of being which is the fire that heats our human appetites and inclinations puts a human creature in an odd position. If this "awakening" were to occur in a monastic environment one would be born into community of those who had made a similar passage by way of a shared tradition and who would welcome the newly born naked-spirit into the community of awakened beings. The austerities peculiar to monastic communities create a haven in which the new born child of the universe can dry it's wings and adjust to the light.  The effectiveness of meditative techniques and the proliferation of these technologies have created a situation where wholly unprepared beings are smacked in the face with enlightenment and have no means of dealing with it.

Let's say you have a job, a family, a functional narrative that suddenly is seen to be significantly other than you supposed it to be. There is no door back to the previous state of naiveté. This point has led to what used to be known as a "nervous breakdown".

The answer is to accept the mantel of creature-hood and to practice a private secular monasticism.

Enlightenment as Loss

Enlightenment tends to be considered in popular thought (in so far as it is thought of at all) as an achievement: as something that adds to our being... as something that somehow make us more of something-or-other. In point of fact it is the exact opposite.

Enlightenment is what's left over when we (for whatever reason) have outgrown our illusions, and native intellegence is left with simple Awareness. It was there all along, but we were distracted.

Our humanity is found to be a costume that can not be abandoned, and so must be reconfigured if it is to fit our new, more slender, form.

This is no small task, but if the spiritual essence of the eternal is to openly exist in everyday life it must be done.

Fact and Narrative

It is almost impossible for any given individual to separate the "narrative" they have embraced from the "fact of existence".

In the first place an individual's "narrative" tends to be invisible to them because they consider themselves to be a repository of truth. In the second place an individual's "narrative" tends to be comfortable like a tailor-made suit. In the third place people generally aren't very bright.

It is not that narrative is an evil that must be at all costs avoided, but rather that narrative is an inevitability that must be recognised and understood. Buddhism is a narrative; Catholicism is a narrative; Communism, Capitalism, Ism-ism. None of these Isms are capable of expressing esoteric fact because they are naturally limited by their attempt to appeal to limited understanding.

The way insanity is recognized is that some mind has succumbed to a distinctly personal narrative. The entire efficacy of propaganda is the human mind's appetite for a self affirming narrative. The efficacy of monastic austerities is the control of narrative. The essence of enlightenment is the abandonment of narrative.

Simply be aware.

And before you know it a narrative will emerge.

Spirit, Soul, Mind, Body

Words matter. The reason words matter is that words are conduits of meaning. Words when properly used have an uncanny ability to describe reality.

At the same time it must be admitted that words are not often used for this purpose.

With this in mind let's look at some over-used words in some limited contexts.

For the purpose of this exercise let us consider "Spirit" as the pure awareness which is the substrate of all life. "Soul" we will declare as the matrix of genetic preprograms that determine the inherent appetites and inclinations which guide and torture the organism in it's passage through existence. "Mind" is the resonant awareness and it's seeming individuality made inevitable by "Spirit" and "Soul" in the physical existence of a "Body".

The seat of "Identity" can reside in any of the above mentioned organs of existence.

Hierachies

In all social systems we find hierarchies. If we took ten perfect strangers and put them in a room for several hours, when we came back we would find a social structure had emerged, and at the core of that structure was a hierarchy. This is not a bad thing. This is the natural emergence of spontaneous recognition of qualities in those around us that have roots in an extremely primitive concern for survival. The world in which we find ourselves has moved so far beyond the survival ethic that we are surrounded by hierarchies which have no basis in the original primitive cooperative realities, and in which ineffectual pedagogues can prosper.

The social structures of the contemporary world are cluttered with hierachic structures in which all that is necessary is conformity and agressive passivity.

Do we suppose this will work out well?

Imagine

Imagine away the universe. The vastness of space, the galaxies, the sun, the moon, the earth, your physical form: imagine them all away. All that is left is your state of being. All that is left is the vibrational character of your spiritual essence blasting out in all dimensions the qualities that are the fabric of your existence, filling a nameless void with the ultimate truth of your being.

Do your like your creation?

Meditate.

Many Mansions

A fellow named Maurice Nicolle (1884-1953) used to go on at some length about the dangers of living in the slums of ones being. He was absolutely right, but his delivery suffered from the antique confusion about Awareness and personality. Many valid and extremely valuable systems are advanced by a modern understanding of the difference between consciousness and Awareness. To suggest to the personality that it should avoid certain unpleasant places in the labyrinth of the mind is not the same thing as pointing out that the personality is as mechanical as a wrist watch, and that Awareness is capable of holding the reins.

It is rather like a missing link in evolution. Systems with extreme sophistication have continued to appeal to the personality rather than making the radical observation that skepticism regarding the personality is an important first step. Awareness must separate, step back, from the personality if the desired metamorphosis is to occur.

The configurations of mind that determine our sense of self and which decide our wellbeing are usually dominated by mechanical forces which are decidedly mechanically-personal. The impersonal Awareness which is the substrate of consciousness is the force of life its self. The practice of meditation makes possible a dramatic shift in perspective: the intellectual map reflects the real landscape. As it is we see attempts to get to a new world using antique maps because they are venerable and because we don't know any better.

The mind is spacious, the personality is limited, Awareness is unfathomable.

When the spacious is infused with the unfathomable the limited rejoices.

Of Two Minds: intuition and memory

The complex world in which we find ourselves will sometimes place us in a situation where we are "of two minds". Chocolate or vanilla, go or stay, buy or sell: ambivalence is not confined to trivial matters, and it is important to understand what's involved in choosing choices.

People's minds are as different as their faces, and as similar. When faced with a difficult decision two things are at work: intuition and memory. Intuition relies on subtle immediate perceptions while memory provides a complex network of preconceptions, experience, and primitive impulse. Intuition and memory always work in conjunction with one having primacy. "Letting one's heart overrule one's head" and "buyers remorse" are examples of the negative sway of the memory side of the equation: consciousness has been seduced by mental artifacts and lost the advise and consent of intuition.

Intuition could be likened to the sense of smell in that is is immediate and non-ideological. Intuition is an awareness not a thought. The utility of thought is unquestionable. But thought is the product of consciousness and consciousness is mechanical. Mechanical things are things of time. Intuition is the product of Awareness, and Awareness is transcendent. Awareness is atemporal.

From that Awareness which is "no mind" emerges the consciousness which is everyday mind. The practice of meditation is the cultivation of intuition, and it is intuition which determines the meanings of memory.






Choosing Choices



Cows choose grass

Dogs choose bones


People make all kinds of choices

Impossible!

The flow of existence is a flux of Inevitability. The fact of the living moment is an unfolding of trajectories (physical and moral inertia) that received all impetus in some mysterious natal urge, and all subsequent occurrence is a nexus of trajectory and resultant Inevitable which in turn has a trajectory. And so the Now ever unfolds as it must. It is by manipulating such trajectories (this and some luck) that we accomplish anything.

There are no degrees of impossible.

Gnomes of the Moor

It has recently come to my attention that people are being damaged, their lives perhaps ruined, by epiphanies occurring at meditation camps. This does not surprise me. There are those teaching meditation for whom enlightenment remains a fairytale. They know and can teach the mechanics of meditation but are ill-equipped to deal with it's fruits. They have a secular understanding of enlightenment and fail to recognize that the sweeping away of one's illusions without preparation must all but inevitably be devastating.

The smashing of illusions can happen in many ways. As a combat veteran it seems to me that what shows up as PTSD is often that one's illusions have been smashed to powder, and no amount therapy could reassemble that powder into a functioning illusion in a million years. All therapeutic attempts at the reconstruction of the former state just lead to further hopelessness and despair because the impossible can not be done: once an illusion has had it's cover blown its over for the little man behind the screen. No amount of encouragement or medication can put things back the way they were, and something radically real must enter into life if life is to ever find meaning again.

Most people leading normal lives are in no danger of enlightenment. They can go to a meditation retreat without fear or hesitation of any kind. They will learn what the teacher has to teach and do as the instructor instructs and they will get something out of it. But there are those (with the right push) who without knowing it are capable of a dramatic transformation. These are human beings in whom, for what ever reason, the necessary elements exist for the dropping of the veil; and once dropped the veil is irretrievably gone. The illusions which sustained them in their day to day lives have been beneficently smashed. What now?

Meditation practices that we have today come to us from ancient religious traditions which had (and have) an intact philosophical matrix. To pluck the practice of cultivation of awareness from it's ancient estuary without drinking the water is like unto courting the curse of the Buddha's ruby. You may get more than you bargained for. Enlightenment is like a loaded gun. It's not for those without some formal knowledge. Truth is not a pathless land, but to be turned out into the land of Truth without guide or map or compass can destroy the personality leaving just a raw nerve.

The Atlantic Ocean blows up mists that ingulf the British moors, and weeks go by where one will see neither sun nor stars. The land is all but featureless and in legends of old we find tales of gnomes offering to guide travelers across the moor, only to leave them to perish in that vast vagueness.

Separating meditation from the dangers of enlightenment can not be done, but the unenlightened will teach meditation.

Unwelcome Guests of the Mind

Our home is a "private residence". It is one place in the world where others may not intrude without express permission. Unwelcome guests can be a problem if we are not firm in our refusal to entertain them. The mind is not different.

Awareness is the ultimate nature of life and Awareness is the stuff of which mind is made. Mind is a construct and is decorated according to our culture, our tastes, and to the latent contents of the unconscious mind. All that considered, one's "mind" is a place where one might expect some degree of autonomy and privacy and (one hopes) some comfort. Unwelcome guests of the mind will make autonomy, privacy, and comfort quite impossible.

As with any unwelcome guest the first thing is: don't entertain them. If you can not "not entertain them" then your mind is not your own. An Awareness in thrall of mind is the world's beach-ball. A mind not lit within by Awareness is like a paper cup to the winds of fate.

If Awareness is not host then one's mind is not one's own, and unwelcome guests can take up residence as they will.

So far as I know, meditation is the only practice by which Awareness awakens as host within the mansion of the mind.

Emptiness and the Inclined Plane of Being: the Zen Doctrine of No Mind

The Zen doctrine of "No Mind" does not imply no awareness. Mind is a configuration of Awareness and when Awareness is un-configured mind does not exist. Awareness un-configured and wholly Aware is the touchstone of being.

It is through meditation that we develop the silence of mind known as "No Mind". This silence is not one of trance but rather one of an Aware stillness in the midst of movement. This is not an end. This is the beginning of life on a different plane of existence. This skill makes possible the understanding of our humanity.

The achievement of "No Mind" is the coming into being of an equilibrium that will sense the sway of creature-hood the same way a ball on an inclined plane will experience the pull of gravity.

In no way does this invalidate the vagaries of creature-hood. But it is the difference between a puppet and a dance master.

Meetings With Remarkable Human Beings

The signature characteristic of remarkable human beings is that they are gifted. No amount of effort or sacrifice will grant to an ordinary human being the august privileges peculiar to the gifted. 

The carrot before the donkey.

The sweetness of the impossible.

Just meditate.

In Search of the Miraculous

Thousands of volumes have gone to press concerning the quest for a penetrating awareness of actuality. To the achievement of this "actuality" has been ascribed miraculous powers of apprehension and the ability to manipulate normal existence.

One of the things that characterizes those who search for the miraculous is blindness. In a universe flooded with light they rage against the dark. In the midst of a seethe of miracles they must have order. Trapped in the confines of their limited consciousness they ask for awareness of the infinite.

One of the difficulties is the inevitability of genius. No one would expect that immersing themselves in abstruse mathematics would make an Albert Einstein of them. No rational being would think that with some guitar lessons they will challenge Andre Segovia's place in the history of classical music. The issue is that there is such a thing as "genius" and that no amount of effort will make of one a genius.

The search for the miraculous is like that of one who went looking for fire with a candle. And there are those spiritual geniuses that, for all their gifts, took some path leading to oblivion.

If one would truly seek the "Miraculous" let them simply meditate.

The obvious will become apparent.




We Who Know Not


we
who no not what we are
and yet in such a rush to be something

as a caterpillar hearing rumors of butterflies
might preen and posture
losing all the joy
of life


come, my friend

let us simply find our selves
surely all else will be added to us

The Illusion of Self Discovery

The ideological self is always vulnerable to a new interpretation of what once was. What once was is the foundation of what is.

The caterpillar does not interpret its self into a butterfly.

By some miracle of internal evolution the caterpillar is digested into the butterfly.




and having been digested is no more.

Intuition and Ideation

It is categorically impossible to over-estimate the difference between intuition and ideation.

Intuition must enter into the mind-field in order to be perceived. Ideation also requires space in the mind-field for it's machinations and as two objects can not occupy the same space, ideation and intuition are in competition for a place within one's limited consciousness. The only way anything is known is intuitively. Secondary knowledge (book learning) is no less than the cultivation of intuition by enriching one's store of fact, and facts are intuitively perceived.

When this simple fact is perceived it becomes obvious: if we are led in life by a head full of ideas our powers of intuition will be correspondingly truncated.

Ideation is a powerful tool, and rightfully idea serves intuition. When idea usurps control of the mind-field there is no room for the exercise of intuition, and we end up with a world such as the one in which we find ourselves.

Meditation is the necessary preparation for a life intuitively lived.

The Problem with Ideologies

A hummingbird might find it's self drawn to a painting of a lovely vase of flowers, and there beat wing 'till exhaustion ends appetite. The painting may be the product of a genius of historical proportions and poetically speak of love....yet the painter's success is the little bird's disaster.

Even the finest ideologies are a desiccated substitute for Enlightenment.

Illusion, Ignorance, and Enlightenment

Looking out at the world-dance of man as we find it, it is staggering how obvious it is that chaos and madness call the tune. It is staggeringly obvious that most people live in a dream that is powered by the dark forces of the collective unconscious, and that world culture is woven of threads of illusion and ignorance the same way silk cloth is woven from the excreted-thread cocoons of silk worms.

The substance of enlightenment is the universe awakening to it's self in the progeny of it's being.

Meditation is the same anywhere in the universe: consciousness must consider awareness. The diligent will one day find the cocoon of creature-hood split open: the darkness which once informed the mind of the animal suddenly flooded with light. And from the womb of animal nature emerges a new kind of creature: awake in the fabric of existence.

Shadow

consciousness is a shadow cast by awareness

in the light of
intelligence

Remembrance of Things Present

I find it exhilarating to remember that nothing has been explained. The scientific community has their best people on it and they are doing a bang-up job. But no-one knows what matter is or why it should exist in the first place. No-one knows the origin of the universe and no-one knows why consciousness should emerge from matter.

We are born into this world and some of us uncover the warp and woof of its fabric, but of the nature of the thread we know nothing except its superficial qualities.

Awareness has risen from ashes and dust, and awareness is what we are. Awareness leaves no ashes and awareness leaves no dust.

But what is awareness?

The Essence of Zen

From the analects we have the tale of a monk who approached the master asking "what is the essence of Zen" the master answered "you ask at a time when I am washing my feet."

Meditation is not an end in its self any more than a cocoon is an end in its self. Meditation trains the consciousness to be silent in order that awareness may find primacy. It does not happen over-night, but eventually awareness becomes the seat of the identity. This is a genuine metamorphosis, and this is the realization of Zen.

I have often used the analogy of "seeing in the infra-red" to describe the difference between Zen mind and ordinary mind. No amount of theorizing or parroting catch phrases will quicken the spiritual vision. Meditation is the door, meditation is the key, meditation is the way: the clarity of being which evolves within one. . . this is Zen.

The Collective Unconscious

Much of what we say "I" to is simply the voice of the "Collective Unconscious". We don't hear much these days about the collective unconscious, but when the observation was first made by theoretical psychiatrists in the early 20th century it was very controversial and quite shocking. The core observation is that the foundation of personhood is a genetically constellated preprogram that determines our responses to the challenges of everyday existence.

The "Ten Bulls" of Buddhist lore is no less than a "pre-science" awareness of this same simple fact.

An element of popular spiritual fandom is that enlightenment happens to people. . . it's not that way at all. . . people happen to enlightenment.

Awareness innocently trapped in the nature of the animal believes it's self to be it affective states.

A Different Kind of Animal

Recent research has found physical changes in the brains of meditators.

Meditation is not merely an enrichment of one's everyday mind: meditation will make one a different kind of animal.

Madness

It seems to me that any objective observer would have to describe the world of humanity as characterized by madness. The kinds of regional and philosophical differences that cost individual human beings their lives, their peace of mind, and any future for their children (desperately important to any given individual) simply reduce to madness.

The machinations of politics in the service of neo-feudalism and a baroque set of ideologies co-opts any rational social discourse. When the ship goes down the last people to get wet will be the ones on the bridge....but they'll go down with the ship just the same. It seems to me that the most important spectrum of humanity to influence is the influential. But like children at the carnival...they've lost track of the certainty of time.

"I can drill all the holes I want in my end of the boat because it's my end of the boat"

This is madness.

Varieties of Certainty

Without some foundation of certainty animal existence would be impossible: the certainty of clover for the rabbit: the certainty of rabbits for the fox: the certainty of people for politicians. These varieties of certainty are fairly simple and straight-forward, but what of the personal categories of certainty. What of those categories of certainty that are personally constellated and have no objective existence except within the confines of individual minds.

Certainty is a dangerous fallacy except in cases such as gravity and similar self-evident objective facts. One thing we can be certain about is that people everywhere are certain about things that no-one really knows. And if we look for black and white answers to colorful questions there is no answer that will satisfy with any certainty.

The colors of being do not require certainty: the colors of being require resilience. Resilience is capable of discerning the shape of things, and resilience is inevitably impeded by any predisposition to certainty.

That resilience which makes possible a crystalline perception of reality is highly improbable outside of the practice of meditation.

Awareness of Mind

There are those who, though schizophrenic, because they are aware of being schizophrenic are able to lead somewhat normal lives. Granted these individuals tend to be quite intelligent, but the point is that awareness is capable of achieving primacy over mind. This is an analogue to the intoxication of animal mind and the capacity of transcendental awareness.

Animal mind is not an enemy any more than a great wave is an enemy. One can be tumbled and drowned, or "catch a wave and you're sit'n on top of the world." The wave is a primordial form and a source of energy.

Though it is inevitable that the awareness which is the essence of all creatures experience the intoxicating sway of creature-hood, it is possible in some cases that awareness awaken to the relation of the wave to the water: of Mind to Awareness. A mind infused with awareness is a very different kind of creature, and the difference is meditation.


Zen

. . .  zen

Take It To the Limit

There is no limit to the possible.

With the possible exception of the inevitable

The Artifacts of Consciousness

We study the lives of lost cultures by examining artifacts. Pot shards, arrowheads, figures modeled on the walls of caves: artifacts tell the story of consciousness meeting the physical and emotional needs of life. The lives of we moderns are no less revealed by the artifacts upon which we depend for sustenance and comfort.

A giant wheat harvesting contraption is an artifact. An atomic bomb is an artifact. Ideas of every stripe are artifacts of consciousness.

That our inner lives are filled with artifacts of consciousness is for the most part completely invisible to us. This observation does not in any way disparage the invented nature of our hopes, beliefs, and skills: but rather should encourage reverence and careful selection of those artifacts of consciousness with which we burden ourselves. Two concepts cannot occupy the same space, and we waste much precious psychic space on conceptual artifacts which have little value other than to provide an example of how desperate humanity is to dodge uncertainty in it's many permutations.

The existence of Emptiness as an artifact of consciousness is one of inestimable value. The contemplation of Emptiness will eventually lead to a spontaneous appreciation of Suchness: and without such an awareness, tyranny of the mind by the artifacts of one's own consciousness is inevitable.

Body Mind Magic

The body is the magic carpet

The mind is the magic lamp

The Trivial

There is trivial art but art is not trivial. One can play at trivial things but play is not trivial. Caring passionately about trivial things trivializes passion.

There is nothing trivial about the trivial.

Self: one hand clapping

When one inhabits that exquisite state of pure undifferentiated awareness found in meditation there is no Self: there is only awareness. Self is a natural and necessary product of the differentiation made inevitable by consciousness. Where there is consciousness there is Self. Because the focus of awareness which is consciousness exists as a center to which "things" are external, the external "not-self" of which one is conscious gives rise to and defines Self. Self is the sound of one hand clapping.

Nothing is external to Awareness. Awareness has no inside and no outside and no Self.

It is difficult to accurately describe these aspects of the real because language tends to be casual in its references. Phrases such as "self aware" serve well enough for street talk, but they are clumsy and misguided for other than colloquial purposes.

Let consciousness relax. Let consciousness dissolve into the awareness which is its substrate: this is meditation. And only by meditation does Self discover its identity and its abode.

Illusion

What would it mean to no longer harbor illusions of any kind? Illusion is that event where things are not seen such as they are. When things are not perceived accurately one's actions will be accordingly askew. The grief made inevitable by labors of illusion is the stuff of which legends are made.

There are all kinds of illusions: illusions peculiar to our biological make-up, political illusions, spiritual illusions, etc. Though illusions are often shared across some broad spectrum of humanity, all illusions are personal and coalesce around some existing predisposition.

Predispositions are formations of consciousness. Awareness has no form.

Only by meditation does one achieve the inner silence which makes inevitable an awareness of the subtle predispositions which are the enablers of illusion.

The Great Teachers

There is a wonderful parable that I first encountered in the Gurdjieff material which goes something like this...

the devil and his side-man are stalking mankind down the road of life...mankind reaches down and rejoices in something found...the side-man ask the devil "what's man found that is the cause of such rejoicing"...the devil says "man's found the truth"...the side-man says "well this is a bad business for us"... the devil says "oh no, we're going to help him arrange it"

The great teachers were pioneers. The great teachers were those precocious individuals who, though born to the earth, awoke as the children of the universe.  They dealt not in ideologies, they expressed the simple truth they found before them. It is not a crime that ten thousand ideologues have filled the space between them and us. It is the inevitable capture of truth by idea.

The soil of being is like that of a desert island: it takes millions of years of death and decay to produce a single flower.

Let us hope that on Earth this time has come.

Now

Charles Darwin was a man of his time: a brilliant inquisitive mind in a world supine to discovery. The voyage of the Beagle (aptly named for a kind of hunting dog) halfway around the world gave him days on end of staring out across the timeless ocean. The vast emptiness and seething sameness of this environment may have set his mind in sync with that timeless ever present Now which is the simple fact of existence. From this vantage point it is not an inconceivable leap of vision to see creatures morphing in-place as awareness refines the utility of consciousness in the Now.

Consciousness is one of the faculties of Awareness. The central illusion common to consciousness is Time. Awareness is ever Now, and Now is ever seething with inevitability. Consciousness is the ability of Awareness to pick up and follow the threads of the inevitable.  The existence of the inevitable and the echo which is its trail within the domain of conscious awareness, give rise to the illusion of Time and all of its subsequent confusions.

This is not to dismiss the obvious utility of the concept of Time, but rather to point out that concepts make a poor roof on a rainy day.

Concepts are an anathema to meditation except as they lead to shelter (which is to say it is a matter of utility). Meditation enables the alchemy which turns leaden concepts into golden realities. Meditation is the difference between Goethe's sorcerer and his apprentice. And Magic is the articulation of Now to influence the Inevitable.





A Thing of Beauty


seven days of snow

un-tread


pristine

before my home



because awareness has no form it can not be resisted

From the Ridiculous to the Sublime

Any objective observer will have to admit that the world is not made a better place by the existence of humanity. We are a high maintenance creature that takes what it wants and doesn't mind leaving a big mess behind. If we are ever to live in symbiosis with our lovely Earth we need big sublime ideas. As it is we find humanity in the sway of a plethora of ridiculously small ideas.

Ideas are projections of imagination and as such are mutable, and all it would take to end the enmity and corruption and needless grief oppressing the peoples of the world is for individual human beings to use their imaginations differently. This is not about to happen because the imagination of humanity is fascinated by ridiculous small ideas. And these ridiculously small ideas revel in ridiculously complex answers to very simple questions: for example...the question of existence.

Sublime ideas are no less the products of imagination than ridiculous ideas. The power of the sublime is it's inclusiveness. What makes a sublime idea truly SUBLIME is it's perfect symmetry with the real, and it's utility. A truly sublime idea is one that like mercury seamlessly absorbing it's separate blobs, effortlessly unites small concepts into one coherent self-evident form.

The ridiculous is not going away any time soon, and those problems large enough to insist upon the sublime may be insurmountable by the time the obvious becomes apparent to the hopelessly occluded.

Fate hinges upon the use of imagination.