"The beauty of the truth is that it need not be proclaimed or believed; it skips from soul to soul, changing form each time it touches, but it is what it is..."
One of my all time favourite quotes from an exceptional novel The Winters Tale by Mark Helprin.
Perhaps 16 years in Buddhist Thailand have changed me, but I no longer see Truth as absolute, or worth fighting for or dying for. I see it more as a Rubik's Cube: you see the white side and I see the red, while others see many other combinations and patterns, and these manifestations change each time one tiny external thing shifts.
The truth we think we hold about how easy it would be to die quietly alone is changed instantly by one tiny shift in the ether: being told you are actually going to die soon. The truth we think we hold about natural medicine can be changed instantly by one tiny thing coming into our orbit: pain.
A very wise friend once said to me quietly, "There is no need to create duality."
And so faced with the so-called informationwars, I see that they are all about one truth being suppressed and manipulated to enable another more politically or financially expedient truth to become dominant. The masses accept this and are too tired or numb to fight. The so-called radicals? They feel incredibly vindicated and powerful if they finally kick the system to replace one truth for the other that they know has been suppressed, distorted and manipulated. Actually, they're not wrong. Just not seeing the 4 other colours and shades of truth at play.
The deepest concern I have about the so-called informationwars is that they feed and encourage proselytizing. Selling the new truth with all one's night, because one KNOWS it is right. Would lose a friendship, fight or die for it. Best observed amongst religious zealots, american politicians and some vegans. As soon as you start hammering people with your version of truth, resistance is created and polarization begins. We are pushed apart when we make others wrong. There is no place forward from there except into conflict.
When you relax into knowing that your truth is not permanent, you stop needing to defend it. Or ram it down someone else's throat. It simply is like this, for now, in your experience.
So I would love to see the whole idea of informationwars disappear. To stop censorship altogether. To educate ourselves continually and bring back excellent public discourse. To explore the 17 versions of something on the table and perhaps come up with a creative hybrid 18th model, rather than exhausting one's energy promoting or defending "the truth".
I still personally lapse into judgement, strongly held opinion and discounting of another's truth cos mine is the only thing that is correct. Obviously, because I (the great eternal and never-wrong ego) hold it. Haha.... And then I (usually) catch myself, laugh and remember Rubik. What a genius to give us such a toy! Such a powerful learning device and such a profound philosophical teacher.
It is a daily, personal choice to hold space for many versions of truth and not to collapse into conflict or intense debates of one reality versus another. In that place there is not only freedom, but creativity, growth, transformation, community and connection.
BlissednBlessed.
One Love
It’s interesting how there is a completely different paradigm of epistemology in Asia, isn’t it?
I love the Rubiks Cube metaphor, I think it describes things nicely. I used a similar metaphor to my students when I lectured in Chinese Medicine. Things always look different from different perspectives, but we’re all looking at the same thing.
I think Gregory Bateson describes it the best — he called it “news of difference”. Human neurology has evolved to handle multiple descriptions of the world.
😊🙏🏽☯️
I really like that - "news of difference" And yes, Asia definitely has a very different paradigm. Given that we are all one, part of the same whole, the absurdity of declaring one part or idea as "wrong" or "bad" bewilders... Coming back to that appreciation of oneness is a beginning towards a new world.
Truly beautiful and profound! The words you wrote spoke to me, the metaphors were very repeatable, keep up the good work!
I'm so galad that it spoke to you - thank you for stopping by to say that. :) Probably every one of us should own a Rubik's Cube as a perpetual reminder.
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Much appreciation @gregorypatrick. :) Nice to contribute something to the larger discussion and have it deemed worthy of curation.