I’d like to begin with a caution. Language is a tricky business. Endeavoring to express the full richness of experience by means of a tiny cluster of sounds and shapes was always a foredoomed venture. And yet we moderns, so addled by our engineered lives and, frankly, so disingenuous in our communication, tend to exchange the map for the territory without thinking twice.
Dear one Jordan: It is time-pausing when something, someone, lands directly into a space that has been waiting for words to cluster within me....... so that I could respond to not one, but several close friends, who have, just in the last few weeks, told me they wanted to find out more about "spirituality." I haven't known where to begin... given all the influences we are all part of during these times. Your words are both onramps and destinations....for both uninitiated and initiates, new hands and old hands, ones that upvote the wholeness of life...and+or.... the nothingness, the being .... and+or .... the doing, the stillness .... and+or .... the movement. Deep smile. (─‿─)*ﾟ ゜ﾟ*☆
What I see being expressed here, Jordan, is an erotic spirituality, a spirituality expressing eros (the desire for ever greater wholeness) which is the flip side of thanatonic spirituality (thanatos - the silent death urge, completion, desire for nothingness, peace, letting go of needing to be anything, including anything more whole). The two are inseparable and joined at the hip, never not co-present. In bringing this to you attention I pick up on the precautionary principle in the first paragraph - there is more to behold in spirituality than I believe this piece latches onto.
There is a desire for death, for self-annihilation, for no-Self, inherent in spirituality, from which paradoxically arises a 'return' to wholeness and a freedom to desire greater wholeness. This isn't the only 'way' or sequence, but just a way of expressing what I feel these notes implicitly externalize. To seek not wholeness but rather to allow disintegration is a purification in the right context and paradoxical 'return' to wholeness; But it does not start with a desire, a seeking, of greater wholeness. It is interesting, as an aside, how so many evolutionary niches are fulfilled in this indirect way (called exaptation in the literature). This is another 'way' and 'why' of spirituality. If one "just sits" - in the aesthetic of Zen meditation - with a deep skepticism of any intent at all - including the intent to 'just sit', and of course the intent for wholeness - with a kind of desire for nothingness, a deep contemplation of felt nothingness (to 'be nobody,' including a more whole 'you'), it is no less spirituality. Spirituality can be thought of as a reformation of man from contemplating the ineffable images of God, and if God in one image is all that is (wholeness), God is also no particular thing (nothing) - there is always a dual image. To rest assured that spirituality is solely about ever greater wholeness is to subtly run from death, from unbecoming. And this will come back around if that is one's chosen way.
The point here is not to swing to the opposite, thanatonic spirituality, but to hold the paradox. Not polarity 'management' but inhabiting the true contradictions directly and letting them transform one's perception. When one sits in (the anti-image of) nothingness, one will paradoxically feel 'reformed' in the sense of a return to an original wholeness, a peace that passeth understanding, and a freedom to desire without contraction. It is a renewal, a deepening sense of aliveness, that emerges just as well. Of course you can approach from the other end as you are saying, from desiring desire, from the impulse to seek greater wholeness, and in doing so find oneself in a state of non-seeking (not 'not seeking,' but more like desiring without attachment and therefore desiring without friction i.e., desiring completely or, desiring in a way that is already complete - here we find the truth in the paradoxical relationship of thanatos and eros).
I think it is good to concede the influence of Forrest's metaphysics. While an incredible contribution, it is exactly in matters of spirit (and relationship) that I think the metaphysics can get us trapped in definitions that lead to local optima and cut off the search for deeper meaning. The metaphysics is largely written in systemic-functionalist language. It defines spirituality in terms of its function and in terms of its relationship to other functions within a broader system of art and philosophy (and in doing so, implies that there is a wholeness greater than the wholeness of spirit, which contradicts itself and your piece here). Spirituality must serve some function within the IM intellectual regime. But if we respect the history of spirituality, we see spirituality to be something of an anti-function. It is precisely in defining the function of spirit (in the case of this deepcode entry, as orienting to greater wholeness, becoming) that its opposite will emerge and antagonize. Case in point: my commenting on what this written piece is not accounting for.
Enjoyed the perspective, thanks. The word "sacred" comes to mind as some of the stuff beyond the quantifiable. Life is sacred, the whole and the parts. The beauty and the struggle of it all
Thanks for this. It’s much appreciated and well worth reading as always. Here are a few thoughts.
The fact that you sense a necessity to lay down a disclaimer prior to writing about spirituality seems to point to a gaping hole in the consciousness that we are living with today.
The words are not the Dao. So what is? More refined smaller and more granular data points?...still not the eternal Dao. No matter how fine the data you still don’t approach the space in between the data points. Everything lives in that vast space which feels like spirit to me.
So if the map is not the territory do you abandon the map? That doesn’t seem right. So can the map become alive and lead you to the territory? Perhaps the map can be a kind of back door in to the territory.
What if the aversion to spirituality and to the idea of spirit as real not just metaphorically, but really real is a characteristic of our time that is due to our current consciousness being so tied to physical reality and more and more of it being poured into digital reality as opposed to the consciousness of our ancestors (us in earlier times?) being more rooted in the spiritual world. Perhaps the ancient gods of our ancestors are more real than we tend to imagine them to be.
Maybe the data points (words) that are the map and not the Dao can point to the reality that runs through the map and holds the map up. For example take the prologue of the gospel of St. John.
In the Beginning was the Word
And the Word was with God
And the Word was (a) God
Is the Word the same as the words that are not the Dao? It seems more like the Word is the territory that the words point to.
How do the words that are the map relate to the Word that is the territory?
Maybe we need to find the path that leads from the map to the territory, from the words to the Word, from the Dao that can be spoken to the eternal Dao.
Very well-put and a much needed refresher. Thanks Jordan.
Spirituality, as with grief, often feels to me like “coming back home.” Life is long and there are plenty of opportunities to wander out of wholeness, but to embody the “spirit” in spirituality is to come back to that wholeness. Time and time again.
Having discovered your writing and videos a couple years ago, I can say with confidence that this is the effect that you’ve had on me; as has the Tao Te Ching, Bhagavad Gita, and the Bible.
The road from the hangover to wholeness is stepped in spirituality. It’s waiting for you, time and time again, whenever you’re ready for it!
Thank Universe! Finally a second beautiful mind steps up to risk constructive thought, as opposed to opening with the crisis of humanity, blight on the environment, catastrophes of COVID & vaccines...someone also simply concerned with concentric thinking around a better life. Thank you, thank you and thank you once more.
I read the first paragraph and wonder what the director expresses directing (theatre) actors based on an interpretation of someone else's writing (script).
Dear one Jordan: It is time-pausing when something, someone, lands directly into a space that has been waiting for words to cluster within me....... so that I could respond to not one, but several close friends, who have, just in the last few weeks, told me they wanted to find out more about "spirituality." I haven't known where to begin... given all the influences we are all part of during these times. Your words are both onramps and destinations....for both uninitiated and initiates, new hands and old hands, ones that upvote the wholeness of life...and+or.... the nothingness, the being .... and+or .... the doing, the stillness .... and+or .... the movement. Deep smile. (─‿─)*ﾟ ゜ﾟ*☆
What I see being expressed here, Jordan, is an erotic spirituality, a spirituality expressing eros (the desire for ever greater wholeness) which is the flip side of thanatonic spirituality (thanatos - the silent death urge, completion, desire for nothingness, peace, letting go of needing to be anything, including anything more whole). The two are inseparable and joined at the hip, never not co-present. In bringing this to you attention I pick up on the precautionary principle in the first paragraph - there is more to behold in spirituality than I believe this piece latches onto.
There is a desire for death, for self-annihilation, for no-Self, inherent in spirituality, from which paradoxically arises a 'return' to wholeness and a freedom to desire greater wholeness. This isn't the only 'way' or sequence, but just a way of expressing what I feel these notes implicitly externalize. To seek not wholeness but rather to allow disintegration is a purification in the right context and paradoxical 'return' to wholeness; But it does not start with a desire, a seeking, of greater wholeness. It is interesting, as an aside, how so many evolutionary niches are fulfilled in this indirect way (called exaptation in the literature). This is another 'way' and 'why' of spirituality. If one "just sits" - in the aesthetic of Zen meditation - with a deep skepticism of any intent at all - including the intent to 'just sit', and of course the intent for wholeness - with a kind of desire for nothingness, a deep contemplation of felt nothingness (to 'be nobody,' including a more whole 'you'), it is no less spirituality. Spirituality can be thought of as a reformation of man from contemplating the ineffable images of God, and if God in one image is all that is (wholeness), God is also no particular thing (nothing) - there is always a dual image. To rest assured that spirituality is solely about ever greater wholeness is to subtly run from death, from unbecoming. And this will come back around if that is one's chosen way.
The point here is not to swing to the opposite, thanatonic spirituality, but to hold the paradox. Not polarity 'management' but inhabiting the true contradictions directly and letting them transform one's perception. When one sits in (the anti-image of) nothingness, one will paradoxically feel 'reformed' in the sense of a return to an original wholeness, a peace that passeth understanding, and a freedom to desire without contraction. It is a renewal, a deepening sense of aliveness, that emerges just as well. Of course you can approach from the other end as you are saying, from desiring desire, from the impulse to seek greater wholeness, and in doing so find oneself in a state of non-seeking (not 'not seeking,' but more like desiring without attachment and therefore desiring without friction i.e., desiring completely or, desiring in a way that is already complete - here we find the truth in the paradoxical relationship of thanatos and eros).
I think it is good to concede the influence of Forrest's metaphysics. While an incredible contribution, it is exactly in matters of spirit (and relationship) that I think the metaphysics can get us trapped in definitions that lead to local optima and cut off the search for deeper meaning. The metaphysics is largely written in systemic-functionalist language. It defines spirituality in terms of its function and in terms of its relationship to other functions within a broader system of art and philosophy (and in doing so, implies that there is a wholeness greater than the wholeness of spirit, which contradicts itself and your piece here). Spirituality must serve some function within the IM intellectual regime. But if we respect the history of spirituality, we see spirituality to be something of an anti-function. It is precisely in defining the function of spirit (in the case of this deepcode entry, as orienting to greater wholeness, becoming) that its opposite will emerge and antagonize. Case in point: my commenting on what this written piece is not accounting for.
Enjoyed the perspective, thanks. The word "sacred" comes to mind as some of the stuff beyond the quantifiable. Life is sacred, the whole and the parts. The beauty and the struggle of it all
Hi Jordan,
Thanks for this. It’s much appreciated and well worth reading as always. Here are a few thoughts.
The fact that you sense a necessity to lay down a disclaimer prior to writing about spirituality seems to point to a gaping hole in the consciousness that we are living with today.
The words are not the Dao. So what is? More refined smaller and more granular data points?...still not the eternal Dao. No matter how fine the data you still don’t approach the space in between the data points. Everything lives in that vast space which feels like spirit to me.
So if the map is not the territory do you abandon the map? That doesn’t seem right. So can the map become alive and lead you to the territory? Perhaps the map can be a kind of back door in to the territory.
What if the aversion to spirituality and to the idea of spirit as real not just metaphorically, but really real is a characteristic of our time that is due to our current consciousness being so tied to physical reality and more and more of it being poured into digital reality as opposed to the consciousness of our ancestors (us in earlier times?) being more rooted in the spiritual world. Perhaps the ancient gods of our ancestors are more real than we tend to imagine them to be.
Maybe the data points (words) that are the map and not the Dao can point to the reality that runs through the map and holds the map up. For example take the prologue of the gospel of St. John.
In the Beginning was the Word
And the Word was with God
And the Word was (a) God
Is the Word the same as the words that are not the Dao? It seems more like the Word is the territory that the words point to.
How do the words that are the map relate to the Word that is the territory?
Maybe we need to find the path that leads from the map to the territory, from the words to the Word, from the Dao that can be spoken to the eternal Dao.
Is this the essence of deep code?
Thanks again for publishing this.
Very well-put and a much needed refresher. Thanks Jordan.
Spirituality, as with grief, often feels to me like “coming back home.” Life is long and there are plenty of opportunities to wander out of wholeness, but to embody the “spirit” in spirituality is to come back to that wholeness. Time and time again.
Having discovered your writing and videos a couple years ago, I can say with confidence that this is the effect that you’ve had on me; as has the Tao Te Ching, Bhagavad Gita, and the Bible.
The road from the hangover to wholeness is stepped in spirituality. It’s waiting for you, time and time again, whenever you’re ready for it!
As always, well said, empathic, analytical, and integrative.
Reminds one of Steve Hayes’1984 contextual perspective: https://contextualscience.org/files/Hayes%201984.pdf
Thanks Jordan. A thought-provoking post.
Thank Universe! Finally a second beautiful mind steps up to risk constructive thought, as opposed to opening with the crisis of humanity, blight on the environment, catastrophes of COVID & vaccines...someone also simply concerned with concentric thinking around a better life. Thank you, thank you and thank you once more.
I read the first paragraph and wonder what the director expresses directing (theatre) actors based on an interpretation of someone else's writing (script).