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I have to start this post with a gripe. There are these cliched statements that I fear makes people think a certain way, and makes them unable to see otherwise. Statements such as:
Poor and ignorant. There are many countries where the population, even though they are poor, really strive to get an education.
Divide and conquer. Once there is division, conquering is inevitable? Always? I could tie this in with Hassadim and its constant need for unity, but I'll not.
I think there are instances where dividing is useful. I read a book a while ago called Eating Right for Your Type. It is about the various blood types and what food is better for what type. For example: a type O can handle meat very well, but not bread. A type B can handle dairy products the best. Type A is recommended to be vegetarians, etc.
Plus, learning about the Enneagram can help one point out their various strengths and weaknesses. It can also help pinpoint typical pitfalls in relationship issues and help one to avoid it!
Not to mention my "race" and gender, all these parts and divisions only help me to see the real me better.
So, is it wrong to have these cliched statements floating around? Maybe those are the typical groupings, but I hope folks realize that there are different.
3 comments:
Oftentimes, people use names, and descriptions to label others as less than to justify their treatment of them.
It was not happenstance that Africans and Native Americans were diminished with names such as "savage," "animal," "red skins," or niggers.
By reducing them to less than themselves, treating them differently became that much easier.
Such combinations as "poor and ignorant" served a purpose.
Clichéd statements, ideas, and conclusions cause stagnation of the mind, and spirit.
Clichés say that we already have all the answers, and further inquiry is not necessary.
Clichés are ready-made responses to situations, when a fresh response, a new response is what is needed.
Clichés rob us our most precious gift--our power to create, and create anew, using the gift of choice, and the creative act of choosing.
Clichés stifle our prayers rather than take them into the rarefied realm of inspiration and revelation where God speaks with the authority of new wine for new bottles.
Division has its uses: it's not by accident that we live in the realm of relativity, where one thing is defined by its opposite.
Hot, and cold, up and down, short and tall, male and female, love and fear--polar opposites that allow us to experience that which we are.
We cannot experience hot without first knowing cold. We can't experience love, without first knowing fear.
Yes, division has its place as well as the realm of the absolute, the realm from which we came.
In the absolute, All Things are One Thing. There, only knowing is possible, not experience.
We, gods, desire to experience more than anything.
Knowing who we were was not good enough for us. We wanted to experience who we were--to experience good by knowing the bad; to experience the bad by knowing the good.
That could only occur in the realm of relativity.
We're experience junkies: That's why sports are so popular, movies, plays, musicals, comics, and comedy, drama, and tragedy, gossip columns, the morning newspaper, and twenty-four-seven cable news channels.
Not all experience is derived directly. A vicarious experience is an experience, too.
I like this post!
This touches upon a very deep truth.
The Kabbalah of the Ari (Rabbi Yitzhak Luria, 16th cen.) really brought out this idea in his abundant use of the term partsuf, which means something like "composite integrated entity or reality." Within a partsuf, all the parts are bound up within a greater whole.
Yes, focusing on differences has historically been bound to great cruely. So, some people are understandably reluctant to explore this.
Like the body, unity is enhanced when each component of the whole fulfills its particular function, expresses its unique qualities, within the whole. This is the idea of partsuf.
But, the question is one of focus: you can focus on the differences per se, and lose an awareness of the partsuf, the greater whole. This is why the Kaballah before the Ari is likened to what's called Chaos (Tohu)-- a state of affairs preceding the actual creation of the world as we know it in which a lack of connectivity and unity led to a cosmic collapse. That is, the pre-Ari Kaballah focused on ten sephirot, which indeed are the makeup of any partsuf, instead of the whole!
But, like an orchestra, when each part within the whole fulfills its G-d-given role and mission, the whole can also function as it should. It's not division per-se. but division WITHIN unity.
One last thought. In Kaballistic relatvity, a higher reality or plane can be called "infinte" because it doesn't fit into the "vessels" of the lower reality. But, from its own vantage point, it's a piece of a greater whole itself. And this process continues, up and up and on and on. So, ABSOLUTE unity is something that really pertains to the True Infinte (En Sof in Hebrew). Everything else is really relative infinity, relative unity.
I kinda look at it like this. If you have no country you cannot really be divided per se. I like being a peculiar person, my home is where I sleep. There are always things floating in my head... not really fears just certain paranoias.
Like not getting too comfortable. If you make your defenses to strong for someone to get in, then you can't get out. I try to be fluid, you can't get hit if your always moving. Use the force of your opponent against himself. etc.
So I would look at being divided in a positive light. If your divided, adapt like malignant cancer and spread until you overtake your host.
Just sharing my own insanity
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