Moving to Cuba to Get Closer to My Ego

I recently watched the movie Arrival and was surprised with my experience of it. It's a movie I wouldn't recommend for those wanting to escape into a story. It challenged my thinking in ways that were very perplexing, frustrating and exciting. Won't say more about that. No spoilers.

I will address one scene, though, that got me to thinking about thinking. In the film, Louise, the Amy Adams linguist character, tells her colleague, played by Jeremy Renner, that immersion in a new language, rewires your brain, i.e. re-patterns how one thinks within their experiences.

So I looked it up on the internet and sure enough, there's a lot of research that has been done on that subject with similar results. It immediately got me fantasizing about moving to Cuba and immersing myself in Spanish for a few months. Seriously, I'm thinking about it. But even more so, it got me thinking about the language that I have grown up within, English, and how it has affected how I process experiences and information.

It's been happening all along, but I first noticed that I was noticing it in a song that has been a staple within the ministries I have served and attended. Some of you know I was ordained a minister by the Unity School of Christianity over thirty years ago and you may have your own experience with Unity churches as well. At the end of the services, the congregation gathers in a circle and sings "The Peace Song".

The song has evolved (PC) through the years. "Our Father" has become "Creator". "With every step I take ..." became "every breath I take" and other changes too. But in singing the song a few weeks ago, a very glaring observation occurred. Near the end the lyrics are "... let this be my solemn (or joyous) vow. To take each moment and live each moment in peace eternally. ..."

Suddenly I realized that the words "each moment" would not do. It needed to be "this moment". Because to futurize the word "moment", i.e. sing of each progressing one, was to say nothing with any meaning at all. The moment is Now and never beyond it. "Each moment", is a plan, not an entry point. It's the ultimate cop-out to push anything into the future. Once projected there, it's safe to say I don't have to deal with it Now. I can postpone it to the fantasy of the next moment instead, which never ends ... until ... Now.

It got me thinking further about our language of futurizing. It's the language of our ego actually, the loudest, most compelling voice in the world, the noise of our collective repetitive minds driving us with what to do.

And what do we hear? "You should ...", "find this ...", "what will happen if ...", "how can I change this ...?", "what's missing?", what do I want/need?", etc. What these messages have in common is a reliance upon and impetus toward "what's next?" and "what will or won't I do about it?"

It's the noise of the world that compulsively drive us to keep pace without taking the moment to seriously question whether any of it means anything more than a drum beat to continue marching to.

Oh, but Dale. What would happen to the world if we didn't keep trying to solve the world's problems? How about no problems? How about a shift in global perception that changes how we function from seemingly isolated doers forming billions of problematic gaps within our doings, into collective realizers who together accept the prosperity of harmony within and all around us? But then that would take away, "the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat". That's a pretty powerful teat the world, its leaders and most of its citizens are sucking on. But it's like a wise soul once said, "Sometimes a majority simply means all the fools are on the same side."

Relax. I'm not writing this as a plan. It wouldn't work as a plan. More like a wakeup call that can emerge through inevitable collapse. And we are most certainly headed for psychic collapse. I'm certain of that. Because insanity can be very exciting, but it's still batshit crazy, even and especially when it's the norm. And the cost just keeps increasing. Sanity might look at first boring or impossible, but really, it's just an excuse to hide our fear of having no control over it. However, it's all that's left when insanity becomes too much and gives out. And I have to say, I am a realist. I don't think we have a ghost of a chance of maintaining the illusion. It's wearing us down into freedom. We're running out of time and space to distract ourselves from the pain of living so decidedly meager, while simultaneously pockets of secular realization are emerging.

That's all for now. In one of my next blogs I hope to address in detail, a powerful tool. How to facilitate sane, loving and conscious dialogue with one's ego that can release us from the insane drama of fighting, shaming and attempting to overcome and change our egoic thinking, while accepting how to love and appreciate the ego's precious role in helping us to survive in the insane world that we have imprisoned it within. I am just Now looking at this anew, within the insights of addressing sane and insane use of language--not the content, but the intention with how it is expressed. Because it is projection, not content which corrupts pure, loving intention.

It's all about love and the most unloved is that noisemaker in our minds that we hardly pay attention to, less actually hear. We formed the ego eons ago, as a thought entity to insure that our intention to protect ourselves was consistently enforced. And it is faithful. We need to love and respect what it has done for us. And so free it from the fears of the future that we have bound it to, so it can speak to us anew of the great love (us) that it has found so worthy of working endlessly to save.