The Purveyors of Sensation

The CARNIVAL! The festival of the flesh, what's not to like?

We are led and driven in life by sensation. The existential needs of the animal express themselves in sensation: hunger, thirst, varieties of comfort, the list goes on and on. Sensation is external to Pristine Awareness and yet elemental to the survival of its corporeal expression. It could be posited that all animal behavior is a response to sensation, and the statement "I want this, I need this" is a tacit admission that this wanting is external (though perhaps essential) to this "I".

Of necessity sensation is baked into our repertoire of behavioral norms, and this makes us vulnerable to manipulation by psychological parasites. The transparent cynicism of carny front-men comes to mind, and the "sensational" appeal of extravaganza, religious and secular. In his autobiography the American artist Thomas Hart Benton casually remarks that "The wealthy are dependent upon artists for the paraphernalia of their pretensions." Which is to say that a certain category of art produces a certain complex of psychological sensations. From the subtle to the gross we find everywhere the imprimatur of sensation.

Meditation is the cultivation of the silent Self which is the true litmus of the bitter and the sweet.