Life As Performance Art 99

So then, who are we? What are we? I don't entirely buy into the Buddhist nonsense about the illusion of self. There is something there, definitely there, if not necessarily definite, that identifies me as me, and you as you. I think that boundary is always going to exist between others, among disparate selves. But it isn't all, or always that simple. I think there is a lot of room for paradox here, and most of us do not deal well with paradox. It's too scary for a lot of us, because it deals with complexity, and this makes us have to think, and most of us simply would rather not think too much, but will just settle for the most simple answer on tap, then kick back and suck back another one. I only wish it was so simple. Even if we are individuals, we are not separate, no matter how brainwashed we are by capitalism and individualism. We all connect, and we also all merge together, often in ways that can be downright frightening and catastrophic. For example, when we think of the mob mania of political and religious gatherings. At its very worst, the way Hitler or Castro were able to galvanize the German and Cuban people, respectively, to do their bidding, or the bidding of their morally bankrupt ideologies, through mass rallies where they could pontificate, rant and scream from their podium for hours on end. I am here intentionally conflating extreme left and extreme right as a way of tipping my hat to my old political science prof, who memorably admonished that left wing extremism and right wing extremism are so close as to be virtually inseparable. Scratch a radical, she told us, and underneath you will find a reactionary. Scratch a reactionary, and, behold! a radical. Religious gatherings can be similarly problematic, or a blessing, depending on what's going on. I have been to both varieties. I do recall, in my salad days as a young Jesus Freak, the lovely and ineffable sense of the presence of God bringing us together and out of ourselves, and often for a few minutes there would be an incredible sense that we were all one. But never once did I lose the sense of being a being apart, but in unity with others. If my nose was itching, I would be the one who would sneeze. But we were, and are still, all connected, and we are in a sense, one humanity, though individual selves. Yesterday in the coffee shop, I was eavesdropping (had little choice in the matter, their voices were pretty loud) on two professional gentlemen at the next table. I couldn't get all the details, but one was being or just had been recruited in an executive position by the manager of some corporation and they were discussing various workers and colleagues as though they were livestock whose value was entirely predicated on their professional usefulness. On one hand, I thought they were kind of pathetic, as I am sure they would think so of me, (especially given that, living in social housing, and working as a contracted employee of our public health system, their generous tax dollars from all their hard and thankless labour are helping keep my sorry butt alive) but on the other hand, I felt a certain sympathy, and a connection to them both. I suspect they are both probably really decent and nice people, but had I offered anything at all to their conversation I would have been frozen out like the descent of a sudden ice age. I did sense that they both seemed to have to struggle for their very existence if they wanted to thrive and maintain a certain standard of living in this rampant capitalist economy and I did feel rather sorry for them, not so much because they have to struggle, but because they likely haven't really explored alternatives to living more simply and more sustainably, if also somewhat more poorly. It's that each one of us has a will to survive and to flourish, I think, that marks us as individuals. Also, the fact that no matter how similar, we are all still quite radically different. For this reason, when a loved one dies, they leave behind a void that no one else is going to fill. There will never be another you. But there also must come a point when we have to be willing and ready to rise above the personal and individual and become more connected, more joined to others, because in this our humanity is validated and in this we become truly ourselves. It is like what Jesus said about the grain of wheat, that must fall into the ground and first, die, before it can produce a new stalk, and new grains of wheat. So it is with us.