Life is all about "getting caught up in it." We lose sight of what brings us to any kind of "essence of self" and find ourselves continually distracted. Usually such distraction is both welcomed and sought by us; at least most of us. Most of us never even notice that we have climbed into the great slowly simmering pot along with just about everyone else. This is for the great majority who must look around themselves at what is going on to see if they are having fun yet.
Others find themselves in this same pot, but, rather than having climbed in willingly, backed in unwillingly. This is often due to the belief that they have to join the club and enter into the cultural norm of "having an income" in a conventional way so that they can support themselves and their families as "responsible citizens." In truth, doing it like this is much easier than going against the flow or the grain of the culture itself. Sometimes my motto is, "Go with the flow ... and roll with the punches." Of course there are different "flows." There is the cultural flow which becomes that of the lowest common denominator. Witness the majority of what appears on TV, for instance. And there is the flow associated with what is happening on a deeper, underlying level of existence or reality. I refer to this as at least the truer reality. And the test is consequently to relate that deeper flow with the living of our lives. Given our current cultural backdrop, the contrast is more and more noticeable. As people become less and less human and less and less sane, it is in fact noticeable to some of us.
Once I firmly believed in such notions as the New Age, and rejected that of the Kali Yuga. Now I see the reality of the latter here and now, and the possibility of the former only after the latter has fully manifested. It appears that much of the false must be lost or destroyed before that which is real or essential can be even noticed, much less appreciated and expressed. As I said, we must ultimately be able to "go with the flow and roll with the punches." This is no silly mantra, but what is necessary. It's akin to "turning the other cheek," a good Christian notion. If we only had more good Christians and fewer good Christian notions.
I have become far more sensitized to the energies around me: the noise, the speed, the anger, the intolerance, the distrust. I don't think it is related to me, for I am probably more pleasant and tolerant than I ever have been. I am more tuned in to how people feel and to what they are probably thinking as well. Perhaps I'm just reading body language better, or body language is more obvious than ever. Perhaps it's because I'm older now. I'll be 64 years old tomorrow. But whatever it is, I find that life -- that being in the world -- is more and more assaultive of me. I feel absolutely accosted by noise, speed, anger, fear, etc. I can barely protect myself anymore and seek to get back home as quickly as possible. And the irony of this is that I genuinely enjoy people and connect with them. I am open to them -- which is probably why I have this problem. And I would rather be open and honest than closed. I would rather be available as a human being to other human beings than not. To close myself up would be to lock myself inside myself and withhold myself from others.
However, to be open invites the possibility of confrontation with those who are invasive and assaultive. This is problematic. And this problem leads to another "discussion" of it at some other time.
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