Thursday 16 February 2012

A Holy Communion

Eucharist-Still-Life-Painting Have you every considered why we experience life so differently?
Some 'thing' exists for us when we draw a line around it in our mind.  By carving out a boundary everything on the inside becomes 'that' and everything on the outside 'not that'.
But these distinctions are not made at random.  There can be no distinction without motive, and there can be no motive unless contents are seen to differ in value.  For example, when we look at something as a problem we draw a distinction around something of a lesser value to us.  Similarly, when we set a goal we cleave a space in mind that we believe has greater value.
Sensation:  You notice a colourful blob.   Perception:  You recognise a car.   Cognition:  It is your car.   Judgement:  It is your car and some bastard is driving away with it.
Our intentions determine our experiences because our intentions determine what distinctions we make.  So... what we think  we see is reality, but what we really  see is what we want to see.  Perception is projection, not fact.
And so, living in these our 'private worlds', communication has come to be a mediation between the different meanings that we've attached to things.  
But there is another way of communicating that I touched on in the last post.  It is possible to speak from an on open, choiceless space, and allow truth to inform our words.  And when we do, the words we speak draw us away from the complex world of perceptions into the realm of Reality itself.
Communication takes place in the world of form -- between physically 'detached entities', differentiated as we first described.  And so, in some way or another, all forms of communication can be sensed and explained on the physical level.  For example, a sound or wireless wave can be detected by a receptor and then decoded into a form that is recognisably. 
But the thing is, without at least some level of communion between those that are communicating, there can be no real communication at all... because what reaches the other end doesn't get understood.  You can see this in a gang of youths -- one syllable can express what it would take a whole book for an outsider to comprehend.  The same in a tight knit workgroup too. 
Communication is secondary to communion.  In fact, there appears to be a fundamental law at work here:  The greater the communion between us, the less the need for physical communication and the more that gets communicated. 

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