There is a wonderful group of musicians in central New Mexico that perform Kirtan almost weekly. They are not devotees of Hinduism, but are definitely devotees of divinity, and use the beautiful prayers and chanting of Kirtan to create an uplifting spiritual space for all that attend their performances.
I am fortunate to be among those who attend to chant and honor Krishna, Shiva and many other Hindu deities.
The music and chants are transformative and without exception fill my soul with peace and beauty.
Thanks for sharing Martha! I'm curious what their background is and how they got there. As I understand your comment they're singing the names of these deities but it's in service of a more general divine presence?
Yes, your understanding is accurate. Even thinking of a separate divine presence is limiting. "Gods" aren't individuals. Gods represent ideals that we wish to acquire as part of the human psyche. Humans of a particular level of sophistication have a need for a name and a visual to represent these ideals. These are just tools, nothing more.
The more developed the individual, the more that individual seeks additional development. An ideal is just a goal to the highly developed human.
I'm fortunate to have met this group of people who have this philosophy, as well as music, in common.
It’s fascinating how you’ve been drawn to ethos while also immersing yourself deeply in Krishna. To me, they feel like a kind of yin and yang that brings a striking balance to your perspective. You mention that many of your pieces are serious, but I actually find your approach to ideas quite playful, which makes your voice refreshingly distinct. Whatever spirit you are surrendering yourself to, it’s clearly guiding you well.
Omg Yyu’re going to make me cry…I honestly had no idea. I was actually reading Barbara Ehreinreich yesterday (Fear of Falling) and I think I finally found the voice I’d been trying to model mine on. People on the left totally ignore her, the irony given that she founded the DSA and coined the term professional middle class.
Follow the money. Biden's DEI spend was in the $billions. Global corporations are probably spending that much or more (or, used to). Class struggle was rejected by the left-elites/Democrat apparatchiks decades ago (Clinton 1990s) because it did not lead to more power and money for the D-party elites.
It really is just that simple.
Postmodernism (pluralism, relativism) resulted from the failures of the more classically liberal form of Democrat politics. The failures were driven by the fragility to disruption (globalism, neoliberalism) of the old liberal/Democrat system.
Disruption created opportunities for the cultural-left to "infect" the institutions of the establishment with watered down neo-marxism and Critical Theory. The "infection" was possible because of the lack of anti-fragility to disruption of those institutions.
There is a real evolution ratchet involved. Institutions that do not adapt by becoming anti-fragile will be "colonized" by the cultural-left and then descend into spiritual, psychological and organizational dysfunction.
The dysfunction is driven by people with mental dysfunctions, such as sadism, narcissism and sociopathy.
---
PSYCH RESEARCH SHOWS CORRELATION OF LEFTISM TO SADISM
FWIW, I remember vividly when Barbara Ehrenreich was a rock star on the left.
“Nickeled and Dimed” is also good. I remember finding “The Hearts of Men” super intriguing; it would be interesting to revisit that now. Of the ones I read, though, “Fear of Falling” was most impactful.
I read Nickel and Dimed as a youth, and I remember this contributing to my affiliation with the Democrats because I thought they were concerned about the have-nots. I've noticed that no one mentions her in contemporary discourse anymore, becuase her being a woman centering class is inconvenient for the currently feminism first DSA.
He lays out a detailed method of finding meaning and higher psycho-social order and purpose beyond postmodernism and failed systems, similar to Ken Wilber's integral theory, but without Wilber's flaws.
---
The human mind evolved the need to seek meaning and purpose for survival because humans are a socially cooperative, parochially altruistic species. The brain structures (including the amygdala's "bliss" chemicals) and body chemistry that drive spiritual experience and altruism evolved in "primeval" times, as Darwin explained:
---
Peter Richerson, PhD ecology, UC Davis, quotes Darwin (as an example of group selection hypothesis and the neurobiology of sympathy in "primeval times"):
"It must not be forgotten that although a high standard of morality gives but a slight or no advantage to each individual man and his children over other men of the same tribe, yet that an increase in the number of well-endowed men and an advancement in the standard of morality will certainly give an immense advantage to one tribe over another. A tribe including many members who, from possessing in a high degree the spirit of patriotism, fidelity, obedience, courage, and sympathy, were always ready to aid one another, and to sacrifice themselves for the common good, would be victorious over most other tribes, and this would be natural selection (178-179)."
Evolutionary psychologist and cognitive scientist Iain McGilchrist has written several books, most recently two volumes, 1,500 pages, that debunk modern, "scientific" materialism as a bad mental model.
Do you have practical examples of surrendering to a higher power you’d share? It’s easy for me to acknowledge, in a stoic kinda way, that most things are out of my control and I should be humble about my minor contribution to … well, anything at all. But I struggle with the idea that I’m powerless and should surrender to god’s wisdom. It feels both intuitively incorrect and pragmatically counter-productive.
It’s not about surrendering all agency to a higher power, just that you’re giving yourself over to yearning for something non material that you can’t quite reach. The yearning is the point. In the Gita for example Krishna advises that you can’t give up action and you do have agency to exercise in service of the greater good. This can exist along with surrendering to divine love to free oneself of attachment. You have control over yourself, not anyone else, and in theory the divine in some ways affects everyone. But you have to yearn for it.
What if it is actually surrender to a "lower" (embodied) power? Love can be seen as a socially bonding survival condition, possibly derived from the sacrifice of self (altruism) by parents for children. Humans evolved complex social cooperation in ancient times to survive as relatively small "clannish", frequently inbred gene pools.
Another theory is that when humans evolved the capacity for linguistic memory, the idea of future death caused severe psychological trauma. So, the brain evolved the capacity to generate bliss chemicals.
As human populations expanded after the end of the ice ages as food became more plentiful, the problem of Dunbar's number emerged. Larger populations needed more complex hierarchical order (roles/rules), so temple-warrior cultures evolved.
Purity myths emerged (the idea that spiritual impurity, "uncleanliness", sin and evil, "paganism" should be renounced) because it facilitated the process of transcending tribalism to form larger scale, complex societies for protection against attacks.
Religions have two basic narratives: one for the peasant and slave populations, another for literate social elites. Both served the project of maintaining or increasing social order. The peasant population's narrative was about social order. The elite narrative is about managing complexity.
Sociologically, any "civilization" that abandons the renunciation of evil and sin, or the "eastern" (Hindu/Buddhist) equivalent, will descend into disorder. Basic archetypal psychology. See Koestler on "Holons" (Ghost in the Machine).
Transcendence evolved in cultures as a survival mechanism to unify tribes into larger, more ordered social systems that could resist conquest and attacks by "pagan" tribes/marauders, especially after the Bronze Age collapse.
Interesting description of Krishna/Vishnu/Shiva and the various incarnations. I don't know a lot about Hinduism; what little I know comes from discussions with Indian friends and to be honest I find it somewhat baffling. It occurred to me while reading this, though, that a non-Christian might find the concept of the Trinity (three manifestations of a single entity) equally baffling. It also occurred to me that such baffling mysteries are the heart of any religion; these mysteries force you to embrace the unexplainable; to, in essence, abandon the rational with intent, as it were.
I agree that we all have a yearning for beauty, truth, and divinity. Those who reject that yearning seem to me to be the most unhappy people I know, while those who embrace it have a serenity about them that I admire.
Notice, erniet, that you are seeing divine entities as gods that are part of a specific religion.
Religion is for the masses.
However, we can attempt to incorporate into our own psyche the particular ideal that any religious entity represents, no matter the religion.
We likely agree that Jesus represents LOVE. Christianity is (ideally) the religion that teaches love to its believers.
I don't have to be a Christian to want love to be the guiding principal in my psyche. I don't have to go to church, or follow the principals and commandments of Christianity to seek love. I can only be 'ready to love' if my psyche has reached a particular level of sophistication.
Yep. In Ken Wilber's quadrant model of human consciousness, the inner form of awareness is distinct from the outer. Iain McGilchrist's research on, and update of, the left brain vs right brain stuff shows that one brain hemisphere is rational and specific (outer awareness), but lacking in holism, meaning and purpose ("spirit", inner awareness, transcendence).
Beyond the modernism vs postmodernism narrative: meta-rationality
There is a wonderful group of musicians in central New Mexico that perform Kirtan almost weekly. They are not devotees of Hinduism, but are definitely devotees of divinity, and use the beautiful prayers and chanting of Kirtan to create an uplifting spiritual space for all that attend their performances.
I am fortunate to be among those who attend to chant and honor Krishna, Shiva and many other Hindu deities.
The music and chants are transformative and without exception fill my soul with peace and beauty.
Thanks for sharing Martha! I'm curious what their background is and how they got there. As I understand your comment they're singing the names of these deities but it's in service of a more general divine presence?
Yes, your understanding is accurate. Even thinking of a separate divine presence is limiting. "Gods" aren't individuals. Gods represent ideals that we wish to acquire as part of the human psyche. Humans of a particular level of sophistication have a need for a name and a visual to represent these ideals. These are just tools, nothing more.
The more developed the individual, the more that individual seeks additional development. An ideal is just a goal to the highly developed human.
I'm fortunate to have met this group of people who have this philosophy, as well as music, in common.
It’s fascinating how you’ve been drawn to ethos while also immersing yourself deeply in Krishna. To me, they feel like a kind of yin and yang that brings a striking balance to your perspective. You mention that many of your pieces are serious, but I actually find your approach to ideas quite playful, which makes your voice refreshingly distinct. Whatever spirit you are surrendering yourself to, it’s clearly guiding you well.
Omg Yyu’re going to make me cry…I honestly had no idea. I was actually reading Barbara Ehreinreich yesterday (Fear of Falling) and I think I finally found the voice I’d been trying to model mine on. People on the left totally ignore her, the irony given that she founded the DSA and coined the term professional middle class.
Postmodern Social Parasites
Follow the money. Biden's DEI spend was in the $billions. Global corporations are probably spending that much or more (or, used to). Class struggle was rejected by the left-elites/Democrat apparatchiks decades ago (Clinton 1990s) because it did not lead to more power and money for the D-party elites.
It really is just that simple.
Postmodernism (pluralism, relativism) resulted from the failures of the more classically liberal form of Democrat politics. The failures were driven by the fragility to disruption (globalism, neoliberalism) of the old liberal/Democrat system.
Disruption created opportunities for the cultural-left to "infect" the institutions of the establishment with watered down neo-marxism and Critical Theory. The "infection" was possible because of the lack of anti-fragility to disruption of those institutions.
There is a real evolution ratchet involved. Institutions that do not adapt by becoming anti-fragile will be "colonized" by the cultural-left and then descend into spiritual, psychological and organizational dysfunction.
The dysfunction is driven by people with mental dysfunctions, such as sadism, narcissism and sociopathy.
---
PSYCH RESEARCH SHOWS CORRELATION OF LEFTISM TO SADISM
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886924004240
www. sciencedirect. com /science/article/pii/S0191886924004240
excerpt:
Highlights
[] Tested association of virtuous victim signalling with Dark traits
[] Two studies (N = 1500), preregistered hypothesis tests and open data
[] Strong association of virtuous-victim signalling with Dark Triad
[] Virtuous-victim signals strongly predicted by Narcissism & Machiavellianism.
[] Study 3 showed Sadism predicts attacking those accused of victimization.
...
I’ve seen similar conclusions
FWIW, I remember vividly when Barbara Ehrenreich was a rock star on the left.
“Nickeled and Dimed” is also good. I remember finding “The Hearts of Men” super intriguing; it would be interesting to revisit that now. Of the ones I read, though, “Fear of Falling” was most impactful.
I read Nickel and Dimed as a youth, and I remember this contributing to my affiliation with the Democrats because I thought they were concerned about the have-nots. I've noticed that no one mentions her in contemporary discourse anymore, becuase her being a woman centering class is inconvenient for the currently feminism first DSA.
Here is an atheist (Tantric/Raro?) Buddhist (and AI scientist) on the problems of modern rationalism and postmodern relativism.
https://meaningness.com/meaningness-history
He lays out a detailed method of finding meaning and higher psycho-social order and purpose beyond postmodernism and failed systems, similar to Ken Wilber's integral theory, but without Wilber's flaws.
---
The human mind evolved the need to seek meaning and purpose for survival because humans are a socially cooperative, parochially altruistic species. The brain structures (including the amygdala's "bliss" chemicals) and body chemistry that drive spiritual experience and altruism evolved in "primeval" times, as Darwin explained:
---
Peter Richerson, PhD ecology, UC Davis, quotes Darwin (as an example of group selection hypothesis and the neurobiology of sympathy in "primeval times"):
"It must not be forgotten that although a high standard of morality gives but a slight or no advantage to each individual man and his children over other men of the same tribe, yet that an increase in the number of well-endowed men and an advancement in the standard of morality will certainly give an immense advantage to one tribe over another. A tribe including many members who, from possessing in a high degree the spirit of patriotism, fidelity, obedience, courage, and sympathy, were always ready to aid one another, and to sacrifice themselves for the common good, would be victorious over most other tribes, and this would be natural selection (178-179)."
Evolutionary psychologist and cognitive scientist Iain McGilchrist has written several books, most recently two volumes, 1,500 pages, that debunk modern, "scientific" materialism as a bad mental model.
I am unfamiliar but it intuitively makes sense
I don't completely agree with Ken Wilber, but I think this is mostly correct.
https://www.lionsroar.com/liberalism-and-religion-we-should-talk/
Do you have practical examples of surrendering to a higher power you’d share? It’s easy for me to acknowledge, in a stoic kinda way, that most things are out of my control and I should be humble about my minor contribution to … well, anything at all. But I struggle with the idea that I’m powerless and should surrender to god’s wisdom. It feels both intuitively incorrect and pragmatically counter-productive.
It’s not about surrendering all agency to a higher power, just that you’re giving yourself over to yearning for something non material that you can’t quite reach. The yearning is the point. In the Gita for example Krishna advises that you can’t give up action and you do have agency to exercise in service of the greater good. This can exist along with surrendering to divine love to free oneself of attachment. You have control over yourself, not anyone else, and in theory the divine in some ways affects everyone. But you have to yearn for it.
David, the idea of surrendering to a separate entity outside of oneself is a religious concept. Religion is for the masses.
A more refined concept depicts this religious entity as an ideal that one wishes to acquire as part of ones character.
What if it is actually surrender to a "lower" (embodied) power? Love can be seen as a socially bonding survival condition, possibly derived from the sacrifice of self (altruism) by parents for children. Humans evolved complex social cooperation in ancient times to survive as relatively small "clannish", frequently inbred gene pools.
Another theory is that when humans evolved the capacity for linguistic memory, the idea of future death caused severe psychological trauma. So, the brain evolved the capacity to generate bliss chemicals.
As human populations expanded after the end of the ice ages as food became more plentiful, the problem of Dunbar's number emerged. Larger populations needed more complex hierarchical order (roles/rules), so temple-warrior cultures evolved.
Purity myths emerged (the idea that spiritual impurity, "uncleanliness", sin and evil, "paganism" should be renounced) because it facilitated the process of transcending tribalism to form larger scale, complex societies for protection against attacks.
Religions have two basic narratives: one for the peasant and slave populations, another for literate social elites. Both served the project of maintaining or increasing social order. The peasant population's narrative was about social order. The elite narrative is about managing complexity.
Sociologically, any "civilization" that abandons the renunciation of evil and sin, or the "eastern" (Hindu/Buddhist) equivalent, will descend into disorder. Basic archetypal psychology. See Koestler on "Holons" (Ghost in the Machine).
Transcendence evolved in cultures as a survival mechanism to unify tribes into larger, more ordered social systems that could resist conquest and attacks by "pagan" tribes/marauders, especially after the Bronze Age collapse.
Interesting description of Krishna/Vishnu/Shiva and the various incarnations. I don't know a lot about Hinduism; what little I know comes from discussions with Indian friends and to be honest I find it somewhat baffling. It occurred to me while reading this, though, that a non-Christian might find the concept of the Trinity (three manifestations of a single entity) equally baffling. It also occurred to me that such baffling mysteries are the heart of any religion; these mysteries force you to embrace the unexplainable; to, in essence, abandon the rational with intent, as it were.
I agree that we all have a yearning for beauty, truth, and divinity. Those who reject that yearning seem to me to be the most unhappy people I know, while those who embrace it have a serenity about them that I admire.
Notice, erniet, that you are seeing divine entities as gods that are part of a specific religion.
Religion is for the masses.
However, we can attempt to incorporate into our own psyche the particular ideal that any religious entity represents, no matter the religion.
We likely agree that Jesus represents LOVE. Christianity is (ideally) the religion that teaches love to its believers.
I don't have to be a Christian to want love to be the guiding principal in my psyche. I don't have to go to church, or follow the principals and commandments of Christianity to seek love. I can only be 'ready to love' if my psyche has reached a particular level of sophistication.
Religion is for the masses
But I do think this yearning done alone is less meaningful. I’ve never felt so alive as when I’m signing with others.
Logic has built-in limitations that block transcendence.
Yep. In Ken Wilber's quadrant model of human consciousness, the inner form of awareness is distinct from the outer. Iain McGilchrist's research on, and update of, the left brain vs right brain stuff shows that one brain hemisphere is rational and specific (outer awareness), but lacking in holism, meaning and purpose ("spirit", inner awareness, transcendence).
Beyond the modernism vs postmodernism narrative: meta-rationality
https://metarationality.com/stem-fluidity-bridge