Bleeding Edge

Sometimes life seems like being in battle and you feel like you are engulfed in a war.

And sometimes we win our battles, and sometimes we don’t.

Yet, when we fight against the world to hold-on to our principles, to maintain our faith, to keep our families together, to fulfill our mission, to excel at our work, to seek the path to our Vision, and to do the more mundane yet absolutely necessary things, like cook & eat healthily, clean your home & buy groceries, pay bills and provide services to others, volunteer and do charitable work, and to keep our inner engines running smoothly while all the world militates against our Peace of Mind…

That is why it often seems that the war in the midst of our life is simply an unending fight against entropy, against chaos, and especially against the constant forces of decay, degradation and debauchery.

And this holds true, especially if one is an old Soul…

These lives that we clumsily built out of the proverbial straw and mud like little birds making a nest, is the symbolism of trying to start, keep or run a home, a family and a business — because they all need a steady hand at the wheel, a constant maintenance schedule to keep the home fires burning, and a steely determination that we are doing the right thing for ourselves, for our families, and for our community.

And this in and of itself is another giant battle against division, hate, destruction and entropy, all in and of itself.

Of course those who have a modicum of Abrahamic faith in their upbringing — might recall that G_d was the one who commanded Noah to take dominion over the Earth as He commanded Adam in a similar fashion. Taking dominion means imposing order on the chaos, putting things into their proper place, and acting in sequence of events and that is why the first acts of the Creation were acts of imposing order in the soup of the dense matter/antimatter & dark matter ball of frosty materials he had as the starter package of Universe creation…

Light was created first, and then it was separated from darkness. Sky, Earth, and Water were then separated from each other.

Home, Family and Business building, is all about building Order out of Chaos, and yet it is primarily about the process of Creation. Turning wild grass into gardens, turning hillsides into terraces, turning trees into houses. It’s common to think of nature as being full of life, and it is, but it’s also full of a chaotic, lush and unproductive life, all fit together because nature abhors a vacuum.

So, it’s the job of the human, to learn, understand & comprehend the ways of Nature, and ultimately to rule that land, in order to impose order out of chaos, and thus set boundaries so that life can flourish in a good way and in a balanced equilibrium within a healthy Ecosystem of a healthy planet, and a healthy Universe.

That is the most important article of faith in the Bible, in the Paulian, in the Messianic Torah, as well as in the Rabbinical explanation of our resourceful Creation and maintenance of Creation during this short History of the journey of our ancestors and our fellow Humans on this Earth…

AND PERHAPS IN THIS NEW YEAR THIS CAN SERVE AS OUR NEW VISION & CREED. LET’S KEEP IT TOGETHER…

And maybe that can also serve as a symbolism for our complex and warring modern lives today.

In the ancient times, and in the original Bible, the word “symbolon” from which we get today’s “symbol” referred to a practice by which an agreement was written on a piece of pottery, that was then broken. This was done, so that each party had a piece of the “symbol” and the pieces could be rejoined to show that the agreement existed. “Symbols” bring together people, things & circumstances in order to show an agreement, a commitment, and a relationship.

Today, we use digital images, old fashion ikons and even our own videos and selfies, as symbols, because these ikons help us to link us to our history, our reality, and our God. We don’t venerate painted wood any more than a soldier saluting his flag is paying respect to a piece of colored cloth. An ikon may be imbued by God with His Grace and be or do something miraculous, such as help cure illness, give blessings, and emanate myrrh and perfume — but it’s never the wood itself that does it.

This is only the shibboleth. The unmistakable symbol of greatness of belief, faith and human spirit reaching up to the divine for a measure of Grace…

The opposing word of “symbolon” is “diavolos”.

This means to separate things. And it is the Ancient Greek / Aramaic word “diavolos” where we get the word “devil” from. It also pretty much defines the devil’s Modus operandi, because the Devil separates us from God, from each other, and from the natural order of things.

According to Genesis, our progenitors Adam & Eve, where evicted from the Garden of Eden and forced to live on cursed earth, starving for essentials, and suffering through the inclement weather, sickness, disease and time’s ravages of old age — all while they strove in the bondage of sin, pain & death.

And thus it passed that the whole of mankind slowly disintegrated from one couple living in harmony with each other, nature, and God; to billions of people who not only ignore each other, but choose to fight on the streets, and occasionally throw fission bombs against those “others” who are perceived as enemies…

So now, I have to ask you this:

Where do you think, it was that we missed the boat on transcending our very own Nature?

Regardless…

Maybe modern Psychology and Evolutionary Biology can give us a hint here:

We all know Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.

Or do we?

What only few people know is that Maslow revised his pyramid of needs — when nearing the end of his life, he added one additional layer on top of the Maslow Pyramid. 

Maslow’s Hierarchy (or Pyramid) stems from 1943 and is one of the most well known models of people’s psychological needs. Its logic is simple and attractive: from bottom to top you have physiological, safety, belonging, esteem and self-actualization needs. The core idea is that you first need to satisfy the lower levels before you can move up. In short: you first need food, before you can worry about your hair. 

The pinnacle of the pyramid as most people know it is “self-actualization.” It is the place where we strive to achieve our full potential, use our creativity and capacities, to truly become the best version of ourselves. 

Nice as this may sound, it is a pretty egocentric end goal. It suggests that the highest one can achieve is discovering and exploiting one’s own capabilities. But what about concern for others and for the rest of the world?

That’s exactly what Maslow started to realize at the end of his life in the late 1960s. While he never spelled out very convincingly how exactly to resolve his dissatisfaction, it is clear that he saw “self-transcendence” as the solution.

While self-transcendence may sound too mystical or supernatural to some, it is a very relevant and timely concept. What it means is a sense of being part of something greater than just yourself, of looking beyond your boundaries to the world as a whole, and of connecting to others because you care about them. 

In today’s world, we definitely need more self-transcendence.

We need big picture thinking, empathy, and global solutions that cross organizational and national boundaries.

We need new people acting away from the norms of their own Creed, Faith, Politics, and Race, towards a New Human Path towards an animated Human Being, Self fulfilled and willing to transcend their very own Self, their own Time and even their Place of Origin, and forget all of that — in order to lead us like a New Moses to the Promised Land of our Dreams, our Destiny, and our Desire to Love & to Be Loved.

So with this New Year — let’s have one and only one, resolute wish.

And that is to Transcend.

Yours,

Dr Churchill

PS:

To transcend means to go beyond and enlarge the filed of your vision and not just the depth of field…

Understood?

#self-transcend
#growth
#humanity