In response to questions about this statement from one of my essays:
“I can define myself only by what I think and by what I feel. If I wake up tomorrow, deaf, blind and paralyzed, if I can never talk or paint or write or play music ever again -- all that I can ever BE in that state is what I think and feel internally. Since, in essence, that's all I AM, and since I am not paralyzed and can express my thoughts and feelings, I desire to be loved and accepted for those expressions -- and nothing more.”
This is a thought experiment that I recommend everyone consider. What would you be, who would you be, if you woke up one day completely cut off from the world around you. Granted, you would immediately freak out, but after that? At some point you would have to accept your situation – unless of course you killed yourself which actually, come to think of it, you wouldn’t be equipped to do. So, OK, you either accept what is or you go insane. But let’s assume you come to grips with your status.
Who are you then? No more job, no consideration of the opposite sex, no TV, no golf, no motorcycle, nothing to occupy your time except yourself. I suppose you would still have your taste buds but let’s rule out focusing on food, assume the people feeding you are bad cooks. Who are you?
The root of this question is buried in a memory of a movie that I saw on TV when I was about 6 years old – maybe it was the Twilight Zone. Anyway. there was this man -- a father and husband – who somehow became completely paralyzed. My recollections are fuzzy because I was so upset that I didn’t stay to watch the whole thing but the essence was that he was somehow aware of everything happening but no one knew he knew.
I maintain that if you can fully remove the external world from how you define yourself, you will discover who you really are. And for all of us then, who we really are boils down to our thoughts and our feelings (by which I mean, our internal emotions). What you think and feel, therefore, are all that you are. Everything else is window dressing.
Sure, maybe what you do and how you behave in the outside world is productive, important, necessary, and/or fun, but it isn’t you. Maybe your talents and skills have enabled you to do amazing things, but they are not you. Maybe you have money and that has opened doors for you or allowed you to do many things, but your money isn’t you. Maybe you have defined yourself by how much you work, how “together” you are, or even by how kind or helpful you may be to others, but the “doing” you do is not “being”, so you are not this person. Maybe you are good-looking and rely on that to ease you through life, but if you can’t see yourself, or even know if people are looking at you, how long will your vanity last? How much of the real you is defined by your looks? Maybe you are funny and witty and the life of the party, is that who you think you are?
So, who are you? Would you be anybody if you were in this conscious, vegetative state? To be somebody in the real world requires that you be somebody inside – and that somebody inside can only be defined as what you Think and Feel.
Do you think? Do you ever explore ideas beyond what is convenient or beyond whatever will get you through a given social situation? Do you consider things? Life, justice, the universe, why love is not everlasting? If you remove yourself from the real world and are sitting deaf, blind, mute, paralyzed – what would you think of the way the world is? Would this be the first time you took the time to reflect on it? Consider all the things you do daily, without thinking about them, and without conscious thought at all. All these things you do, you take for granted. Yes, you take for granted the fact that you can see and talk and walk, but what about all the other things -- like your car, all the food you eat, the clothes you buy, the TV you watch, the house you live in, the energy and resources you consume? All these things, if you think about them at all, you think that you earned them or deserve them. But do you? Would you feel the same way about all these things if you could not take advantage of them at all? What would you think if all you could DO was think?
How about all the feelings and emotions you try to cope with, or avoid, every day? How much of what you feel, or allow yourself to feel, is simply in response to what is done to you? What emotions do you have that are not simply selfish reactions to what you perceive as offenses to you? How much empathy do you let yourself feel in a single day? I ask because I think that if you were unable to receive any external input – after your own bout with self-pity – all that you would feel as an emotion would be empathy for the plight of the rest of humanity. But I am getting ahead of myself ---we are asking, “what do you think about and feel about -- now?”
This is a serious question and requires some deep reflection. If you discover that you don’t think about much at all, and if you are devoid of feelings beyond your own self interest, I would say that you are not much of a person and, if you had any inkling to think, I believe you would agree. So start becoming more than just another cog in the wheel. Stop living your life for the purpose of dying comfortably. Live to love. Live to experience bliss. Live to think. Live to feel. Live to make something of your inner self.
On that note, here’s another thought experiment:
Does everyone born on this planet have a right to an equal share of its resources or not. If not, why not?
The above question is not to be confused with this one: Does everyone born on this planet have an equal right to a share of it’s resources”
If you answer “yes” to the first question, consider how much of what you now have and take for granted, is more than your fair share. If you answered “no”, then reflect on the reasons you give. All your reasons will be justifications to allow you to have more than an equal share. You will be attempting to legitimize your opulence. You will, in effect, be saying, “I deserve more than you because I am somehow better than you”. Fine. Now, consider if would maintain that viewpoint while in the aforementioned conscious, vegetative state. Would you? Could you? And if you couldn’t, and if what you think in that state is the real you, why are you going against your true nature now, by justifying a living standard that robs the rest of the world?
Thank you. Class dismissed.