“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” (Aristotle)
From one day to the next, we are pressed into considering so many diverging and often conflicting thoughts. For most of us, what we have been taught to do is to shut out that which neither reflects what we already know nor builds incrementally on existing knowledge. Both of these, as possibilities, create an easy path or (at least) a reduction of the threat level associated with destabilizing a ’truth’ that has become all too familiar to us. As adults, we invest a great deal of our Life-force in maintaining our commitment to our long-standing, carefully selected and firmly entrenched illusions. We will go to great lengths to avoid or, preferably, completely eliminate the great discomfort that rises up when faced with an invitation to consider that which lives outside the box of our long-practised, collectively enforced ’truth’.
Far from the moment of our current thinking, we struggle with the notion of entertaining a thought that might/that could contaminate the thoughts we have already so carefully cultivated, leaving us without a firm conclusion and direct path to an easily defined and pre-determined outcome. And yet, great freedom lies in the realization that considering something…. daring to explore and wander around in an alternate, likely deemed alien and foreign, ’truth’ or ‘reality’…. need not necessarily mean that we embrace it and make it our own. However, we will never know the fullness of our own capacity to create if we don’t first allow the possibility and invite into our lives, the chaos of mind and body that may well accompany stepping into an idea that does not lend itself to be neatly filed in one of the folders of our current, reliable habits of mind.
As I move through my 66th year, I am more awake and present to my world than I have ever been. As much as I know the power of the WEL-Systems® body of knowledge and what it offers as a way of ‘being’, I am now also coming to know with even greater clarity why it matters; why it can and will become an essential conduit for those who are seeking to live a very different reality.
As I live in the great unknown of choosing to let go of who I have been for the last 30 years of my life, I have become more aware…. more mindful… more awake to…. a much larger context within which all that I have created to date, fits – in deeply meaningful ways – into what I am now discovering.
There are so many threads in this emerging tapestry and my temptation is to attempt to touch on all of them in this one moment. As strong as the pull is for me to do so, I know there is no power in that. I would likely feel better for having done so – like expelling a large gas bubble that hampers digestion and ensures discomfort in its lingering – and I also know: it would not make sense to anyone but me. To avoid the challenges that come with gorging, I am choosing to nibble on these thoughts and allow myself to be led by them… like an easy stroll that follows the pathway through a luscious garden after a spring rain. It will take longer… and the very process, itself, will feed my soul.
There will be many threads…. each, one of the brilliantly woven elements of a tapestry of living that no longer brings Life into our day-to-day existence. Although we tend to see them separately and outside the tapestry – our eyes drawn to the characteristics and dimensions of the thread, itself – in doing so, each enticing and shiny thread offers up a distraction that prevents us from seeing differently; from seeing the interconnectivity, that we might notice the tapestry.
Before even attempting to embrace the possibility of the tapestry, I/we must first embrace the process of the inclusive ‘or’. This is a way of looking at the world (and at ourselves, as an aspect of and expression of and in that world), that allows us to expand the Space of our contemplation to notice what else, rather than collapse that Space to eliminate all the other ‘else’s’ in an attempt to quiet our troubled thoughts.
“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” (F. Scott Fitzgerald)
Most of us have been taught to live in the exclusive ‘or’. It sounds something like this: “I can do this or I can do that…. but I can’t do both.” In that exclusive ‘or’, we might recognize more than one possibility but limit ourselves to the selection of only one, at the cost of exclusion of that other/others. From the enticing box of chocolates, only one will do.
In the world of the inclusive ‘or’ , it sounds something like this: “I can do this or I can do that…. and they are only two of the possibilities that I can entertain.” In that inclusive ‘or’, we recognize that more than one possibility presents and that to embrace one does not eliminate the other(s). We can engage one; change our minds and engage another; or engage aspects of more than one, at a time. We am bound only by our courage, our imagination and our willingness to test our own self-imposed limitations. From this box of chocolates, any and all are fair game!
I choose to live in the inclusive ‘or’. Doing so does not narrow but widens the path, ensuring far more distractions along the way that will, no doubt, become aspects of my own discovery and evolution, as I go. Living in the inclusive ‘or’ can get complicated and messy. It can produce stress that comes from the constant distraction of yet another possibility. And yet, in this great array of possibility comes the recognition of other than that which I already know; if not in the content then at least, in the interconnectivity of their many and diverging arrangements. What I am coming to know from living in the inclusive ‘or’ is that, depending on where I stand, the answer to everything, is yes. All meaning really is context dependent. How do I create meaningful context into which I might manifest my life?
For most of us, our cultural conditioning does not encourage comfort in chaos; does not encourage a sense of safety in the unknown, unanswered explorations – those that seem to be without boundaries or constraints; the ones that break the rules and challenge the status quo. For most of us, comfort demands the need to know; the need to move quickly to closure to ensure minimal disruption to an existing status quo. These have been defined as the hallmarks of a fine mind, a disciplined spirit and a valued – and valuable – contributor to society.
In the exclusive ‘or’ lie the unrelenting hope and noble intentions of quick solutions, presented in a neat and tidy package, with minimal blood on the floor. In the domain of the inclusive ‘or’ live the conflicts and tensions that come from wondering and wandering; from lingering in not knowing and making no effort to bring closure; from daring to see value in the unanswered questions and the willingness to drift around in them. It is in the inclusive ‘or’ that we give ourselves permission to leave the box and discover what we’re made of.
Space. Movement. Flow.
If we want other than … more than!….what we currently have, we must become adept at living in the inclusive ‘or’.
We must discover, within ourselves, our willingness and ability to entertain the outrageous, consider the bizarre and refrain from conclusions…. despite the great pressures that promise approval and reward at the moment of our surrender.
We must relax into listening more than talking. Wondering more than knowing. Asking more than telling. And daring more than cowering in the status quo.
Perhaps our greatest challenge in choosing to live in the inclusive ‘or’ lies in this simple fact: in order to be able to move through the day, we will need to rely on our own internal cues…. our inner guidance system… rather than seeking someone/something outside of us to point the way. We are our own way; and coming to trust that will awaken every fear and dread that has dogged us through this lifetime. The good news? We will, finally, find our way Home.
The world that will belong to our grandchildren must become big enough to make room for their growth and evolution! It must be flexible enough… open and expansive enough… to allow them to discover themselves! That future must offer up not just new ’stuff’ (what we think about) but new and far more inclusive and expansive processes (how we think about what we think about) by which and through which the choices for living are considered, tried, tested and reinvented.
In this world of inclusive ‘or’, there are no absolutes… and perhaps, that is our greatest, collective challenge: to discover more of what lies within, that we might free ourselves from believing that what lies without, must lead… and we must follow. Such unchallenged illusions will take us to our collective demise.
Breathing is good…..
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