Waking Life

"Creation seems to come out of imperfection. It seems to come out of a striving and a frustration, and I think this is where language came from. I mean, it came from our desire to transcend our isolation and have some sort of connection with one another. And it had to be easy when it was just simple survival; like, 'water' or 'sabre-tooth tiger right behind you'-- we came up with a sound for that. But what I think is really interesting is how we use the same symbols to communicate the abstract, intangible things that we're experiencing. Like, what is frustration? Or what is anger, or love? When I say 'love', the sound comes out of my mouth and hits the other person's ear, travels through this byzantine conduit in their brain, through their memories of love--or lack of love--and they register what I am saying and they say yes, they understand. But how do I know they understand? Because words are inert. They're just symbols. They're dead. And so much of our experience is intangible. So much of what we perceive can not be expressed; it's unspeakable. And yet, when we communicate with one another, and we feel that we have connected and we think we're understood, I think we have a feeling of almost spiritual communion. And I think that feeling might be transceived, but I think it's what we live for."

Waking Life

I finally had the opportunity to watch Waking Life (I know, six years too late) and watching this was refreshing. I love knowing that this kind of dialogue and thinking takes place that kind of reinvigorates my hope for mankind and, my take is, almost makes me feel that religion doesn't have a monopoly on the human soul. (They don't say these things, but that's just how I felt.) I think what made it even more remarkable is that the whole message behind the movie resonated with me just that much more since many of the points that were made were points embedded within me prior to watching it, and that being so is in itself a microcosm of the greater point that the movie was trying to make. One of the characters goes on to say that people sometimes have things come to them as if the ideas were transmitted to them by some connection to the network of peoples' minds that have come before or concurrently. Almost everything they touched on in the movie I've either recently spoken with somebody of or have done so in the recent past, as I'm sure many people have. I just e-mailed a friend about lucidity in dreams the other day. I have also spoken with people about the 'Free will' that we are supposedly inherently granted by God, or a god. These thoughts I was having as I watched this movie sort of solidified my stance on things.

A few years back, I spoke with some people (under the influence of cheap alcohol nonetheless) on the topic of this free will notion that seems to be a major selling point of Christianity, and Christ's love for us in that he wanted something other than what he had in heaven; Angels who act as automatons that acquiesce any orders he has given without being given an option to do otherwise. (Side note: If that's the case, I don't understand how Lucifer was ever able to rebel against God...) So here we are on Earth so that (as the story goes) god could have people that are granted with the 'luxury' of choosing whether or not they want to follow him. Then he would have people that follow him because they 'choose to.' However, if I were to tell you, the reader; "Love me or die" -- what kind of backwards idea of love is that? Could he truly then say that everybody that chooses to do his will is doing so out of love or would you say that they do so out of fear? Would it not matter to him? How many people do you think would be Christians were it not for the element of fear of possibly burning in hell for all of eternity? So if god's purpose was to have followers that choose to follow him because they love him and want to do his will and nothing else -- then the threat of burning in hell for all of eternity is a little off the mark and kind of skews the outcome of this elaborate exercise. Would not he have a better gauge of those that chose to follow him because they were pure of heart rather than only following because of the threat of eternal damnation via burning brimstone? I remember as playing the devil's advocate with some friends one night, I said that you can't say (as a character in the movie says) that we are not granted 'free will' because this god already knows what's going to occur. They contend that if your decisions are already known by a god, then really you have no say in what happens and therefore do not realistically have free will. I'd counter that by stating that if all the decisions I have made and will make are known to god, then we could say that him watching my life pan-out is likened to him watching a movie he's seen before. If my life was then a movie to god, and he were to memorize the words and now know which decisions I'm going to make within the movie, does this really mean that I was never once given a decision even though the outcome may now be known from previously watching it? I could, however, just as quickly go on the other side of that and say if god knows which decision I'm going to make before he creates me, why would he create me only to see me die and go to his hell -- only when I think about it that way does the point the movie tries to make come to make sense to me. That's to say if God know's we're all going to sin, we would be proving him a liar if we didn't (nevermind how rediculously impossible it would be to live a pure life devoid of sin; so it's almost required that we not be perfect but yet are then punished for it? If I am wrong for saying what I have, I wish only for whatever it is I'm supposed to know be presented to me To deny my thoughts is to deny the mind of whichever creator has placed within me. To give into a belief without having thought it through is, to me, a greater offense, and god should consequently be offended if he was just chosen as a default belief without the follower having thought it through. "To each his own." Damn, this belongs in a totally different blog in 'diary' mode. I digress though. Big time.

They cover a few other themes in this movie and it's not based soley on religion but the moments when they touched on that are what I found to be the most interesting. My views on religion are somewhat complicated for several reasons of which I will refrain from purging from whatever is left of my tattered soul at this moment. For my friends that are very religious, I hope that I didn't offend you with anything I've thought out loud. I'm not looking to be validated in anything I've mentioned, I'm just sayin'. I'll end this by revisiting Plato's Allegory of the Cave: If you had been chained in a cave throughout your entire lifetime, the only reality you'd know are the shadows on the walls. Plato then says for you to imagine that you eventually come into the sunlight after being freed. Would your newfound world become more real than what you've known all your life or would your newfound reality actually be the illusion and the shadows (what you've been exposed to all of your life) be your actual reality. How difficult would it be t
o convince the others still bound in the cave about this new world you know of. How difficult would it be to wake up to reality and the new three dimension view of the world, and not just the 2-d illusion of reality; the shadows. Would you be able to? Would you even entertain the notion; that is to say; would you even want to shake your own world and turn on its head the only thing that has been real to you-- your reality - for as long as you've known?


-E