Lose Yourself

"No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man." That's a quote from late 6th century BCE Greek philosopher Heraclitus, and describes a truth I want to discuss with you today.

We live in a world where everything is separate. Or at least that's how we think about the world and ourselves. However, that's not the truth about the world, the universe or ourselves. Reality is this single, large and unified whole in which we are mere participants. Nothing is separated and everything's connected and in a constant state of flux, never the same as it was a few moments ago. That may sound trivial, but as far as I'm concerned it's something we should have at the foreground of our minds constantly. Why? Well, because it's the truth for one, and because it can alleviate a lot of the negative feelings we have.

We have a natural tendency for making ourselves the center of our universe. In a universe in which we are the center, everything happens to us and we reflect everything back to ourselves. Even though we know that we're this tiny part inside an infinite universe where almost 100% of the events happen without our input, we imagine that we are the masters of our destiny, that we control our life; what else is free choice for? And we also imagine that our consciousness comes from within ourself, from our brain, and that we are separate from the universe and each other. Our entire life, education and culture is based on this false assumption. The separate self constantly compares itself with others and ranks itself in relation to others; am I smarter, faster, better, more beautiful and richer? This cultivates in us a number of mostly negative emotions related to self-consciousness like shame, envy, jealousy and guilt.

Modern society exploits those negative feelings constantly. We're in a constant rat race of self-improvement, reaching for the unattainable, and when we realize we can't get there, we feel guilt, shame, envy and jealousy. And when we do get there we feel bliss for a moment or two, right before society compels us to reach for that next promotion, bigger house, nicer car or whatever next goal keeps the machinery of the capitalist society running. We're in this race from the moment we become self-conscious agents, and it's a race most of us can't win. And it's a race that's based on the lie that we're separate, that we need to become more, better, richer to become happy.

Reality just happens. We use labels, nouns, to things that are in fact processes and ever changing. A tree isn't just a thing, it's a process. Every noun should in fact be a verb. The self is also a process and ever changing, and it changes with the ever changing reality of which it is an intricate part. And we are happy when we realize this. Try to remember when you were intensely happy. I bet that for most of us it were the moments when we completely forgot ourselves. We didn't realize it at the moment, because we forgot ourselves. We were in a state of flow, "in the zone", consumed by some creative task, or making intense love, or finally succeeding at something trivial we've been trying to master for a long time. It's the moments when we find bliss in becoming one with the world, with our surroundings, with the ones close to us.

There's this ancient Chinese painting, it's discussed in the below linked video, in which there's a tiny person, barely visible, standing on a ledge admiring the vast world around them. That tiny person represents the self, lost in a vast universe of nature and beauty. That's the opposite of what modern western society and culture teaches us; in our paintings that person would be on the foreground, just as our egos are on the foreground constantly. There's a wise lesson to be learned from that Chinese painting and eastern philosophy, so I invite you all to listen to this brief TED talk, and maybe take up the invitation to sometimes lose yourself and just be present in the world.

Thanks so much for visiting my blog and reading my posts dear reader, I appreciate that a lot :-) If you like my content, please consider leaving a comment, upvote or resteem. I'll be back here tomorrow and sincerely hope you'll join me. Until then, stay safe, stay healthy!