Weltanschaung

The Philosopher’s Stone

zenothestoic@protonmail.ch

Tag: Purpose

  • Purpose in a Meaningless Universe

    Purpose in a Meaningless Universe

    You are unlikely to find it, unless you provide it yourself.

    In the endless years I have wandered the world’s sacred places, god has always kept himself well hidden.

    It is true that I have spoken to the dead on several occasions. That I have heard voices and music in an ancient and remote former public house in Devon. And that my lifelong habit of sitting quietly in contemplation has often provided a sense of the numinous, a quiet joy.

    I have several times asked entry of the gatekeeper to a hidden kingdom. Sought to cross the boundary between the worldly and the transcendent.

    Once I saw a knight in black armour, standing proud somewhere above exquisite Gothic tracery, white stone framing the deep hues of ancient stained glass. I asked to be let in, I assumed he guarded a sacred portal, entrance to the eternal. Did he answer me? Did he use words or was I just left with a silent impression that the door would not be opened to me. Or perhaps, on the other side, there was not that which I had long sought.

    I remember speaking to some wise men once, in a waking dream, who seemed to have answers. Were they gods, I asked. It appeared not, and I stumbled on.

    The mind is a curious instrument when used properly, capable of conjuring wonders a plenty. Do such visions have their own reality, do such conversations take place anywhere other than in what we call the imagination.

    How can I tell?

    William Blake walked the streets of London talking to angels. Countless mystics, East and West, have met their numen, their desired end point. And found unshakeable certainty.

    But in our post Gallilean era, we demand such standards of proof, we labour under such a heavy evidential burden.

    If I feel anything out there, it is because I want to. I can not say with any certainty that these visions and conversations have any reality, except within the narrow confines of my own mind. Much as I would like to believe they do.

    Meaning is not given to us. We can not open our windows on a fine sunny morning in spring and expect to greet a wizard, a mage with a tall pointed hat and a long staff. Who will make it alright. Who will give us purpose where there is none.

    Gandalf would do me just fine. He is more than halfway there, with his magic, his wisdom. His triumph over the black curse of Saruman and his evil master.

    Even a real elf would be welcome. Or a hobbit come to that. And Reepicheep of course – what would I not give for a conversation with that mighty mouse.

    These days we have serious grey men in white coats who tell us they have seen black holes at the centre of the universe. In the old days we had men in long black clerical garb warning us of Satan and his henchman Beelzebub. But these fictions are mere weaklings when put side by side with monsters light years across, gobbling up all and sundry and never letting it out again. Once upon a time Cerberus guarded the gates of Hades, letting no one out, but these days hell is guarded by an Event Horizon. Just as fierce and, we are told, horribly effective. Quite a lot better than a dog with several heads.

    Today’s guardians of rectitude tell us tales of black energy and dark matter. Which apparently are to be found everywhere but can’t be seen.

    A bit like god then.

    And today’s high priests tell us we do not exist at all. That we are figments of our own non existent imagination with no free will, unable to do or feel anything other than that for which we were programmed at the very dawn of time. No power of governance over our own desires or actions , no thoughts we can call our own.

    Modern man has replaced Satan and his fiery domain by something just as vile.

    At least the old priests had a carrot as well as a stick. If we behaved ourselves we would find our reward in a vividly coloured candy world called the after life. God may make life hell on earth (for reasons only apparent to those deeply familiar with His ways) but if we tell him he’s the tops and ignore all the competition, we will get loads of virgins and lots else later on.

    Today’s Priests of Scientism can only come up with a stick. No carrots at all, let alone heavenly virgins. That’s not a great deal of fun – put up with ethnic cleansers, earthquakes, and Donald Trump and then you die.

    Is it any surprise then that those of a more discerning nature refuse to bow down to any priest, whatever the colour of his robes or the object of his devotion. Neither priest, old or new, seem to have much on offer in the here and now. And as to later, well, a bird in hand as they say is better than one in the bush. And a lot more nourishing.

    So close your ears and your eyes. Shut out the priests, along with social media and the newspaper.

    But what of Gaza, I hear you say. Or the Ukraine. How can we allow such slaughter, how can we ignore it. Well yes, quite. The old school gods delighted in bloodshed and it was all for our own good. The gods of science say none of it means anything anyway and evolution has made all of us savages to ensure our survival.

    Who and what are you to believe. All of it, none of it. Who cares. Had I Gandalf’s magic staff I would wave it and peace and plenty and prosperity would be for ever and ever.

    Sadly, I seem to have misplaced it.

    And so, in a meaningless universe, where must I seek meaning. Where am I most likely to find purpose, peace and content.

    In my own thoughts and my own actions. Within.

    If there is no absolute right and wrong, no good, no bad, then I will make my own.

    A lifetime of wandering thought has taught me that if I want to find peace, I must live peace within and without. Do unto others. I’m really trying these days, although I think I’m very probably the only beneficiary of my efforts. Since I don’t go out much.

    On the rare occasions that I venture out of my front door, I am making a big effort and that certainly makes me feel a whole lot better inside.

    I can not tell you what the universe is made of. Or when or by whom or what.

    I can not tell you whether Yahweh or Vishnu, Mara or Satan are out there somewhere. Or Odin, Zeus or the Jainist Jinas.

    But I can tell you that quiet contemplation makes me realise I do not need to know. That I do not really care that much. That all I need to do to obtain peace is to let go.

    To abandon pretense and vanity, to be decent to others if I can. To remain good tempered, good natured if I can mange it. To cause no harm and to bring joy and comfort where I am able.

    No wonder Buddhism has always attracted me.

  • Words from a Garden

    Words from a Garden

    Why is there something rather than nothing, he mused. Does life have any purpose.

    Are we merely a jumbled collection of quarks and leptons or part of some grand design, something much bigger altogether.

    He wondered, as he sat in his Edenic and walled garden, why he so badly needed to know. Why, since early childhood the concept of “no thing” had so disturbed him. If not this universe then what. How was “no thing” possible.

    What were the answers and where were they to be found. Did he but know it he had spent his life seeking. In all the wrong places.

    Had he advice to give, anything to help his younger self stumbling along the path. Or any other soul seeking to make sense of the maelstrom of life on earth.

    There is no sense to be found, cried the materialists. All is physics they said and life a random element of evolution. Consciousness they claimed is an illusion, we have no self merely a string of memories we use to guide us in making predictions. Driven be a sightless urge evolved to spread our virus, our very lives no more than a carrier and we no better than a disease.

    Surely, he reasoned, we might be said to be greater than the sum of our parts. Or was the ability to witness our universe and to sense our very existence yet another mirage dreamt up by a mindless algorithm.

    I refute it thus, he thought and buried himself deeper in the mystery. Appealing not to the stone of Bishop Berkeley, but to the witness of his own changing thought patterns. To his ripening ability to enter a different reality even if only within the confines of his own mind.

    He leant back in his chair and closed his eyes. A mist descended and that world so often called reality receded to be replaced by something other. Something altogether more benign. Which then was more “real”, internal or external.

    Gradients of bliss were what he sought and in that alternate reality he often seemed to find them. He asked to be “where no storms come…out of the swing of the sea”. In such moods he found himself ” in fields where flies no sharp and sided hail and a few lilies blow”.

    In such a world all became clear. Brutality and hunger did not exist, ambition and the quest for ever more made no sense. Creed and foolish dogma held no sway there and man did not kill man in pursuit of some fabricated ideal.

    Was it an escape from harsh mundanity, from the often cruel and pointless. Was it a valid quest, this journey into a different reality which seemed at such times so close. He thought he saw transcendence, witnessed it, entered into a realm where all was well.

    At these moments, the world made sense, if world it was he witnessed. Who was there, did anyone come to meet him. A creator perhaps or at least an omnipotence. He thought not, at least not persons or entities that he would normally recognize on a more terrestrial plane.

    Something was there though. An indefinable sense of being. And well being at that. Creature of his own mind some would say and yet if so, what a creation, what a different way to exist. What a state to enjoy.

    Drifting deep in meditation he sometimes found himself in a situation he recognized from waking “reality” and sometimes not. He is aware that he is aware. He is aware that he perceives, that he has or is consciousness. But what he is or quite where he is often eludes him altogether at such moments.

    Sometimes he believes he may be a note of music as he seems to hear the deep and dark melody of a glorious cello. His being is intertwined with that music, that note. He is it, it is him. Who is playing or where the playing is performed does not matter and time itself seems to have no purchase. He is. No more seems necessary, no explanation required.

    At other moments or places in this sea of infinity he is colour and pattern. He is in and integrally part of some great and beautiful scene, abstract at times and then something more recognizable. A field of flowers perhaps, gently waving in the breeze. A barque upon a sea whose white and wind filled sails lead on to some fabled land beyond a wall of blue water, where snow glistens upon distant mountains and the sun shines on gentle uplands. A blue sky with a light wind and the cry of wheeling gulls. The tang of a salt breeze.

    Where are you he said, show yourself if you are to be found. But the answers were not so much ill defined as unexpected and arcane. It is not that simple they seemed to say. We are and we are not. Things work differently here. We are you and you us. Or neither, perhaps even existence itself is illusory.

    While some may find alarm in such apparent chaos, he found great joy and calm. He did not expect to find sense in any conventional terms.

    And yet sense he did find in an altogether more satisfactory manner. Common sense ceased to matter. Material existence was nowhere to be found, just a profound peace in an infinity without beginning or end.

    The numinous some would say, the divine. Back in the world of men and letters such states had been described as best they might for thousands of years and across all races and creeds.

    The Cloud of Unknowing wrote one such contemplative some 700 years ago. A liberation wrote another, sitting under a tree. A state of perfect peace and nothingness at the very fount of all that is or ever was or will be.

    When he woke to find physical presence once again it was with a slowness and a realization that life was to be lived for the sort of dreams and ecstasy he had found within. If indeed there was any such difference between within and without. Increasingly he came to understand that there need not be.

    Quietness and slowness and silence were the way to lead life, he knew. And simplicity within and without. To see and hear beauty at every twist and turn in a world which, while apparently physical, was in most senses as immaterial as anything encountered in the midst of meditation.

    Matter they said had no solidity. All was energy arranged in such a way as to produce the appearance of stability. How wonderful then was this world and how closely did it reflect the visions he had seen from within.

    And so he would listen to birdsong along the shoreline and he would play music and sing in quiet and ancient places. He would live among flowers and trees and he would write and he would read.

    Why is there something rather than nothing, he mused. Does life have any purpose. I am, he said. Let that be enough.

  • The Destructive Power of Cynicism

    The Destructive Power of Cynicism

    Reading of the demise of renowned fund manager Neil Woodford, I was reminded of my deep capacity for destructive cynicism.

    The fellow had had a good run for many years but like all gurus, investment or otherwise, he eventually proved to have feet of clay like the rest of us.

    But cynicism and its close relative schadenfreude are undoubtedly not the correct way to “greet” the news.

    Cynicism seems to be one of my default settings and it is not a healthy one. It strikes most vehemently after a bad night’s sleep when I am feeling (just for a change) irritable and grumpy.

    It is my view that active fund managers succeed more by luck than skill (however intelligent they may be, or otherwise). They also prosper by good marketing. Fund managers are by definition “Andy Average” and the stars, over the long term, revert to the mean.

    While that may be true, the correct response to such a decline such as that suffered by this long successful manager should be quiet understanding of the laws of the market which humble us all eventually.

    My natural temptation on bad hair days is to crow. To say “I told you so”. But this is not helpful. He, along with all the other fallen stars, have presumably done a good and honest job as stewards of our pensions and savings over many years.

    It is entirely our own fault, not his, if we believed the hype which inevitably follows such people on their rise towards what (inevitably) turns out to be their zenith. If we were so convinced that such stars are eventually pulled by gravity to their nadir then so be it, we were right all along. But so what?

    If we believe in fairy tales we will eventually be disappointed, but we have to believe in something or we will not get through the day, let alone life.

    Cynicism is such an easy and yet self destructive trap to fall into.

    Instead of commenting on such things (or even noticing their occurrence) we should be quietly promoting views which we consider to be more appropriate.

    To concentrate on the positive and to ignore the negative.

    This post is not intended to be about my investment views. But I should concentrate on the positive; I should tell people about what I consider the “correct” and more durable approach to investing.

    Negativity serves no purpose whatsoever.