Gratitude Mindset 2: Radical Trust

  A second aspect of gratitude that I mentioned yesterday was the idea of radical trust; trust even when there are no more handrails to hold us or sustain us. I feel that this is a vulnerable place, in the sense that it means dying to the ways that a person feels more secure in their identity. However, radical trust seems to be necessary in order for a person to be open to receiving the universe as a gift.

   If a person is always using their hands to grasp onto something that is familiar to them--such as a sense of inner authority, of knowing, or even of being confident--they are not necessarily able to embrace new things. For this reason, it's sometimes necessary to let go of what one thinks they know to be close to what is not known. This is also a test of dying: how far can a person die to the familiar in order to embrace unfamiliarity? This is a test of radical faith. And I believe that life challenges people to slowly become more practiced in an art of letting go, by providing them with moments of uncertainty and doubt to see how they embrace these experiences. 

    What allows radical trust to happen? I think that it's trust that there is some higher cosmos that holds all sentient beings, even in the midst of the direst of situations. It holds sentient beings and guides them in their own particular stations in life. No sentient being is "left behind" as all are on a special journey of learning that is unique to their own struggles and conflicts.  When thought in this way, a person truly needn't attach to a specific identity: they can see themselves as fellow learners on a journey that is definitely going somewhere in a certain direction, even if they don't happen to know where it's going to lead at this point. And what happens when one embraces this idea is that one sees that life is a gift to them. They are receiving life as a gift in this now moment, and there is nothing else that is needed to qualify it as a gift because this moment has been made specifically for our own growth and learning.

Gratitude Mindset 1: The Best of All Possible Worlds?

 I have been exploring gratitude throughout my doctoral thesis, and I am beginning to wonder indeed how this practice can really penetrate into a daily philosophy. Some have talked about "growth" mindset, but what would a "gratitude" mindset look like? One principle I can think of is that, no matter what our situation happens to be, there is always a hidden good side to it, even in the face of confusion or disasters. Some have called this a "silver lining" in the cloud, but I think more can be said of it than simply having a positive attitude.

    Contemporary society, particularly advertising, seems to prime people to think of their lives as an evolution that proceeds from "bad" to "better" and, finally, to "best". Few people are able to, under these circumstances, frame their current situation as the best that it could be. In fact, I think that this attitude of seeing that this is the best of all possible worlds, must have fallen out of fashion since Voltaire satirized it in Candide. But there is merit in seeing that the position one is in now is the best of all possible positions. For one, it eliminates wishful thinking, wherein a person imagines all manner of possibilities yet does not reconcile themselves to the present one. Second, it allows a person to stop and really reflect on what is going well, and what can actually improve in and of itself, given time, without having to make enormous changes to one's lifestyle or situation. Thirdly, it allows for a fully and unequivocal trust that one is exactly where one needs to be in life, to receive life's lessons. This might be the beginning of a gratitude mindset, which I will describe in subsequent entries.

Quest Narrative in Razor's Edge

 Larry Darrell in Maugham's Razor's Edge is an enigmatic figure. Perhaps it is best described as a seeker who has a journey that cannot be foretold. Instead of settling down to a respectable job and marriage, he chooses instead to "loaf" in Paris. And it is here that we have a quest narrative quite different from one in which Fate (or destiny) is clearly set out (as in the two paths, virtue and pleasure, that Heracles needs to choose from). It is none other than the quest for a path itself, which makes this quest somewhat of a meta-narrative on the nature of quests themselves.

   I truly believe that this novel is a post-structural one, whose protagonist is similar to Walker Percy's protagonists-- many of whom are "loafers" in their own right. These stories contain a void or a blank space in their center, and it's for the readers to puzzle on where that blank space points to. I wouldn't exactly say that these characters are "anti-heroes" since calling them as such creates only an antithesis to a worn formula: instead, I would think of them as characters looking for the path to story, yet questioning the very foundation of the path itself. Larry is offset by the sight of dead bodies in the war he survived, but this sight could be something else--the sight of someone succumbing to an illness, for example. The point is that the death he witnesses during the war points to a void that can't be storied. It takes him beyond the point of story--since stories themselves somehow require the consolation (and security) of a path well-trodden and guaranteed to take us somewhere, to not be too abrupt as to end too soon, and to "teach us all a lesson", as it were.

    At that point, it doesn't matter whether Larry finds the path, as his realization truly is that there is no path. But this is not the end of this novel, only its starting point, as characters come to terms with his realization in different ways. And it is certainly a reminder that one person's stark realization impacts the social mannerisms of a well-trodden world.

A View of Medicine and Life

 If I were to organize my book collection and try to read them all in sequence, what sequence would it be? Would it be from easiest to hardest? Fiction first, then non-fiction? The way I think about reading these days is thematically. I often use fiction to find themes that are worthy of exploration or might be of value. One way of doing this is to cross-reference different books with similar themes, similar to a kind of research project?

    I have three books on my shelf that could qualify under a single "theme", namely health and illness. Two are fiction, two non-fiction. The two non-fiction are Michel Foucault's The Birth of the Clinic, and Aledander & Selesnick's The History of Psychiatry. The two fiction books are Thomas Mann's Magic Mountain, and Albert Camus' The Plague. I can think of a lot of themes that can arise from reading these books together. But themes always arise from questions. For instance, what is the relationship between "physical" and "mental" disease? How did the idea of the body as "ill" emerge and evolve into the idea of mind as "ill"? What does the metaphor of illness entail? Can the mind's (and spirit's) illness be reduced to a spatial body, or does it have its own special categories? How can we observe mental illness, and when did it ever become something to be observed? These books also make me think about the birth of the idea of health. They also make me wonder, at what point did the concept of wellness shift from something that is spiritual to something that can be cured using drugs and other chemicals? Perhaps there is no straightforward answers to these questions and they may reflect trends in the way that histories might experience health.

   Thematically arranging books can help ensure focus as well as a more connected reading experience. It avoids the pitfalls of too much idiosyncrasy in reading. I believe that it's a good approach to start the reading adventure.

Life as Cinema

 The players in this cinema do look more real than this bundle of impressions within. They speak, but they speak from a unified place. I can identify their bodies as distinctly real. And when I look in the mirror, I can see that there is this body that can be said to put together all the various impressions. Without that sense of the body, one might not feel so real.

   But when I start to recognize that I am not a single body experience--I am the sum of all these impressions, not just the body--then I stop trying so hard to control what happens to the body, knowing that I am not the body. This is something of a relief! Spending all my time taking care of a body that is bound to suffer the bouts of decay, illness, tiredness, etc. can be a draining experience, and can at times lead to a sense of defeat. So the idea that I am not my body is quite liberating in itself.

    But this would not mean that I neglect the body. Instead, it becomes a tool. I use that tool to be able to get things done and to work, but it's not something I need assign success/failure to. In this sense, I can let go of the egoic attachment to the body.

Breathing Space

 I decided to finish two out of my three lesson plans tonight, before the weekend started. This planning certainly helped me to feel less overwhelmed and more of a sense of release--the sense that I can indeed take a break over the weekend, aside from my regular teaching. I start to reflect: it's only when a person is occupied that they truly appreciate times when they are not occupied. Maintaining that balance between "occupied" and "free" is like the two parts of breath: inhaling and exhaling. These rhythms are homeostatic, and they are somehow mutually indispensable.

    I feel gratitude when I am tired in this way--it's not a tiredness that comes from weariness, but one that comes from being rightly occupied, or occupied in the (hopefully productive) service of others. And although I struggle with always having energy to do so, I remind myself of times when I wasn't so engaged, and it seems that I do prefer this life. Belonging is a human need, and I can only hope that those who suffer loss of employment during the pandemic can feel belonging of some kind, as well as engagement. I do feel that it is a necessity. But, I also remind myself that there is room for much needed rest.

Accessibility To Meditate

 More than anything, what I have been trying to do with my research is to make meditation accessible to teachers, regardless of their situation or what kinds of pressures they go through. I sometimes feel disappointed that I may not make the desired impact in my study--since I don't think I have the power to make teachers love meditation or do it frequently. But, what I want to do is to inspire curiosity and to help teachers become better equipped to use meditation to calm their minds before assessing student writing. This "making accessible" requires making meditation feel enjoyable.

   I personally find myself rushed to take on many things. But it is precisely for this reason that I am able to empathize with those who are squeezed for time. Even tonight, I felt the pressure to try to complete many evaluations and assessments. But I also feel that there needs to be time out-- a space for inner reflection, at the very least--which people tend to take for granted. Centering not only releases stress but it also allows for meaning construction: a chance, that is, to regroup and see what is most significant or meaningful. If one is always in a rush, there is simply no time to feel--not only to feel one's own body but also to feel what is meaningful to that person. What resonates with me? Where do I locate myself in all these changing scenes and events? I believe that it is only in the process of centering that such kind of meaning can surface at all.