an essay to myself
this is a copy and paste of a blog post i published on medium awhile back. also publishing it here because i trust bear blog will last longer than medium, but who knows really. perhaps both of these websites will get shut down and all of this insignificant writing will get lost forever. maybe ill have some physical backups as well. this is the original link and directly after is the copy and paste of the text. - https://medium.com/@LucidSif/an-essay-to-myself-af26cbbb84a1
About 60 million people have died every year for the last 10 years worldwide. Such large numbers are hard to comprehend. That’s an average of over 160,000 people a day. That number is still hard to comprehend. It’s estimated that about 30 people have died by the time you have read this assuming you have an average reading speed.
And still, even numbers we can understand aren’t personal enough. If death strikes someone you know, especially someone you’re close to, it feels like it affects us directly because you perceive that person to be a part of you in some way. My neighbor or my mom or my child — you know them all in relation to you. What feels worse? A bus full of strangers dying or your child dying? Suddenly a quantity of 1 is more impactful than a quantity of a million. I’ve had the gift of having a younger brother whom felt more like a son die a few years ago. That caused enough turmoil that I developed a psychiatric illness (no worries, i have cured myself of this over the last year). And you know what’s even more close than the closest person to “me”? “Me” or in your case, “you”.
Death isn’t bad, but its the fear of death that saps your life. I have also had the gift of nearly dying more times than I kept count. In fact, just a few months ago, while working out at the gym, I finished a set and absent mindedly left a 45 pound barbell in an unstable place and went to tie my shoe laces. It dropped several feet onto the back of my head. The back of the skull, unlike the front, is quite fragile. At first my parents, wife, and unborn son came to my mind. What will they do without me? But then I realized they will be fine. I didn’t even feel fear or panic as I went to the ER. In an alternate timeline, I would have died from brain hemoragging, been in a coma or ended up paralyzed. That outcome would have been OK to me too (not because I want to die, I now enjoy life more than I ever had). In a billion other parallel universes/timelines, I have never come this far and I couldn’t have even thought to start writing about any of this.
“Write like you’re a goddamn death row inmate and the governor is out of the country and there’s no chance for a pardon. Write like you’re clinging to the edge of a cliff, white knuckles, on your last breath, and you’ve got just one last thing to say, like you’re a bird flying over us and you can see everything, and please, for God’s sake, tell us something that will save us from ourselves. Take a deep breath and tell us your deepest, darkest secret, so we can wipe our brow and know that we’re not alone. Write like you have a message from the king. Or don’t. Who knows, maybe you’re one of the lucky ones who doesn’t have to.
- Alan Wilson Watts
What a wonderful yet terrifying perspective which to write from.
The reason I was absent minded in the gym was because I was thinking. I was thinking about how to stop a bad habit of mine, if I’ll up my deadlift, and when I’ll finish this sprint’s JIRA ticket. To think, my last moments in life could have been spent thinking about these trivial things. And yet, I am sure, many people have died with just such banalities before their knew it was their time. Natural disasters, aerial bombings, work accidents, car accidents, drive by shooting, robbery gone wrong, plane crash, falling in your bathtub, wild animal attack, fire, unforeseen drug reaction, stroke, pregnancy complication, and other freak accidents. The chances of most of these vary by circumstances of course and are usually small, but there are millions of way to die and the number grows as complexity grows. When you play multiple “lotteries” everyday and every moment every day of your life, you are bound to “win” one eventually, no matter how careful you are.
And what is as worse or perhaps even worse than dying with banalities in mind? Dying while wanting to live. Slowly dying due to starvation or disease like billions of people have and already do. Never fulfilling your life dreams or goals. Not even being able to save your family or yourself. Imagine suffering to the extreme and then dying anyways. It has been and is reality for many. A non-profit on WhatsApp keeps sending me videos of families with a child suffering from disease and poverty and they can’t afford the medical bills. I never asked or wanted this “content”, but I will look at these videos and keep them as long as they come. While we do not share the same physical body, I am that mother and father who couldn’t save their child. I am that child who died before even getting a chance to live. How can I not even look at myself at that stage?
Death is at least an escape. There’s a lot of buildup, but it has an end. How about the life of physically or mentally disabled humans? Having no legs. Having no arms. Being a quadriplegic. Being so disfigured people don’t want to look at you. Blind. Deaf. Unable to speak. Unable to socialize. Being mentally handicapped. Making less than able bodied or at worst, not being able to make a living for yourself at all. Having difficulty taking care of yourself or living day to day or at worst, not being able to function without a caretaker. 16% of the world population or about 1.3 billion disabled people in the world. Many will never experience a fraction of the things abled bodies take for granted. Are they doomed to a life of suffering?
What about for those of us who are fortunate to be physically and mentally able and able to live in more prosperous societies and times? Perhaps a modern nation with education, infrastructure, science, medicine, technology, and a good economy (compared to non-developed nations) will save us from suffering. Don’t get me wrong, electricity, fridges, computers, vaccines, motor vehicles, software, search engines, medicine, anesthetics, capitalism, democracy, surgery, and so on have saved many lives and improved quality of life incredibly — I would likely not even be here otherwise nor would I have had the comforts, productivity, rights, or conveniences of life I had or have now. I am grateful for these, but none of these were a permanent solution or panacea to psychological suffering. Taking USA, the nation with the highest GDP in the world, do not have near the same level, number problems, or quality of life as a third world country like Bangladesh and yet nearly 60 million Americans have mental health problems (I was one of them). I was never in dire physical or financial duress in my life and, yet I’ve shed so many tears from years as a child to even as a 30 year old man. Its been so bad I didn’t want to live several times. How could it be? I’m not special here either. In 2021, nearly 50,000 people killed themselves and there have been 1,700,000 suicide attempts in the USA alone.
The current solution to mental health illnesses are psychiatrists, pharmacology, and therapy. The medications worked, but required regular maintenance. The side effects were a such detriment to the quality of my life that it motivated me to quit them. Other medications had addiction potential. I self medicated anyways until problems got so out of hand that I needed to quit those too. I’ve seen friends who suffered from addiction or turned into emotional zombies from the drugs their doctors gave them. Millions of people are addicted to prescription drugs, about a billion people use nicotine regularly, 2.3 billion drink alcohol, and millions are addicted to other drugs worldwide. People say that addiction is a problem, but it is only a symptom of the underlying problem. When life is filled with such suffering and chance of death, it is no wonder people want to feel good. Therapy and counseling wasn’t compatible with me. I’ve had a professor in university who had therapy multiple times a week for the last decade. Over 40 million people in the USA alone receive counseling for mental health. Pharmacology and therapy is a valid treatment. They help, sure, but it is not a cure. If you were tasked to fix a bug in code and your best solution was applying a patch that needed to be implemented everyday or even multiple times a day, your solution would not be accepted by your team or even yourself.
There is also the world of self help and self improvement. Meditating, journaling, cold showers, exercise, waking up at 5AM, positive psychology, learning how to better oneself, feel better, be productive, and succeed. It’s very promising and often made me feel better. But, it required discipline. I would have a daily to-do list. When I did everything as best as I could, I felt good. If I felt I didn’t meditate correctly or didn’t feel present, or didn’t write something satisfactory, I felt like something was missing or I failed in some way. When I missed multiple things or missed a day, I would felt bad. I would feel guilt or regret or shame for not performing to expectations or not being disciplined enough. And this is why, although I did self help for years, I was still the same person having the same experience. I improved and became a better version of my “self”, but my experience of life did not change. I still suffered.
If the help of medical professionals, health professionals, and the world of self help couldn’t help me, maybe I just suck at life, right? Maybe this is alluding that this world is not for those who aren’t in the top percentile, even if you are in a country in the top percentile of the world. Let’s even presume that that I and all these other people who suffer are just not cut out for this world.
What if you did all the “right” things? Made a lot of money, are wicked smart, creative, can attract choice mates, and are high status. Most of these don’t apply to me, but I listen to and have read about people who succeed in these dimensions like tech entrepreneurs Naval Ravikant who was a co-founder of AngelList and investor in companies like Uber, Twitter, Postmates, and many more. Naval reported that after achieving financial independence, his experience of life went back to how it was before his success, just with the added comforts and egoic boosts. What.
And there is a thing called “gold medal syndrome” — athletes, business people, and entertainers who achieved every single dream and goal they ever had for life. And many of them end up depressed or unfulfilled anyways. Michael Phelps, known for being one of the world’s greatest swimmers, fell into such despair he contemplated suicide after winning 2 silver medals and 4 gold medals. Britney Spears, the pop icon of America, had a public meltdown and suffered mental health problems. How can the world’s elites and celebrities suffer like the rest of us? Let’s take even someone like Elon Musk who weathered the storms in his life, but even he was never immune to the ups and downs. Elon reported extreme levels of stress and extreme behaviors during his businesses that most of us would not only refuse, but would not be able to handle with our current perspectives and attitudes.
Anxiety and stress while working towards success and depression and nihilism after achieving it? If success does not guarantee fulfillment nor protect from suffering, what’s even the point and why all this chase towards? You can say it’s all worth it if has a positive impact on people or humanity or is an outlet for creativity. Van Gogh is considered to be one of the greatest painters, but he died a poor, miserable, unknown artist. Would you still say it is worth it if pour your life into something, but you would get absolutely no rewards, compensation, or even recognition of it for your whole life until after your death? And you will die not even knowing if it can or will impact people at all. Would you take that deal if it would be for the good of humanity?
People say friends and family is the key to happiness. Will the man in Gaza who lost his wife and children in a bombing ever feel happiness again? Or a veteran who has come back home with PTSD even 10 years after the war? Or a wife whose husband commits infidelity 10 years into a marriage? Will a child be happy if he his neglected or abused? About 700,000 couples in the USA alone had a divorce. About 50% of all couples in the USA attended couples therapy and 10% regularly do. I don’t know what the number of couples who do not divorce or go to therapy is, but it is likely not a small number. More than 600,000 children in the USA alone were abused in 2021. Data suggests that 10,000,000 people in the usa are affected by domestic violence in 2023. About as many as 5 million elders are abused in the USA every year. I have experienced and seen abuse in my own family and in other families. Family does not guarantee or imply happiness.
So the root of all evil and suffering is immoral or bad people, right? The pedophiles, rapists, murderers, serial killers, terrorists, gangsters, robbers, drug dealers, corrupt politicians. Evil, right? No. I once met a man in a psych ward who was an ex-gangster. He has shot people, beat up people, and stabbed a man in the eye in prison. There are undoubtedly more crimes and sins he has committed than this. He was well read in various religions and philosophy and he had a wisdom that I could recognize. I would listen to him over other religious people in my life because he was true to himself. If I had his parents, lived in his home, had the same influences as he did, grew up how he grew up, and at the time that he did, I would not merely be like him. I would be him. In fact, I am him.
I never was the author or programmer of myself. I no more had a choice in writing this very sentence than a tornado had a choice in going through a town. To take credit for any “good” I ever did would be untruth and to take blame for any “bad” I did would be untruth. Free will is an illusion, there is either freedom or will, but not both simultaneously. Genetic, environmental, social, cultural, biological conditioning is real. Whether the universe is deterministic or random makes no difference — there is no free will. There are many unconscious processes. Even modern science has recognized that free will is an illusion (feel free to google this — there are experiments you can run to prove this to yourself). The total prison population is about 10 million in the world and there are certainly many more who would be imprisoned. The current system is to take broken people and put them with more broken people and make their “pay” for their crimes. Surely, they will become better citizens when they come out. 44% of criminals are repeat offenders within a year in the USA? If there are criminals who do not reform, they should be kept from the civilian population just as a wild bear is kept from a civilian population. There is no need to inflict suffering on a wild bear. Reform it, isolate it, or even kill it — doesn’t matter unless of course we are OK with perpetuating the chain of suffering. Suffering begets suffering. Even the Bible says “an eye for an eye and the whole world goes blind”.
Lets go further. Maybe we can eliminate suffering with intelligence and knowledge? Philosophy is the precursor to mathematics and sciences. Logic, Metaphysics, ontogy, and epistemology are some of the most powerful tools we have to understand ourselves and the world and somehow it failed in transforming us. Some of the most profound philosophers in history like Nietzche, Wittgenstein, and Kierkegaard experienced mental health problems like anxiety, depression, and even had mental breakdowns.
OK, what about intelligence and knowledge in the context of something more tangible and applied. Walter Pitts, the cognitive psychologist who is known for his contributions to AI struggled with mental health and took his own life. Percy Williams Bridgman won a Nobel Prize in physics and yet, he had depression and eventually took his own life. These people including the philsophers mentioned above are undoubtedly, smarter than me by several magnitudes — genius by definition of their contributions. And genius did not save them from suffering to the point of taking their own lives.
Religion was the closest thing we had to address the human condition of suffering for milleniums and the direction/intention was actually right though the method is flawed. The idea is rather than looking at the world for happiness and fulfillment, we should strive for it on a spiritual plane. The problem is that religion and God is used as a tool to attain happiness/fulfillment from either the world or to get some reward in the future - both of which are made to be external or in the future. Or there is fear from losing something or being sent somewhere we don’t want to go. The desire of a reward and the fear of losing is a breeding ground for suffering because neither is guaranteed and as we discovered earlier, getting what you want from the world doesn’t garauntee fulfillment.
I grew up in a religious family. Faith in a higher power can and does help people deal with the brutality of life. And religions are based on the same essence of truth. Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hindusim, Buddhism, etc all have traces of Truth in them. Where people argue over the details, I see the same fundamental source that is present in them all. The problem is that those truths are adulterated with lots of dogma, rituals, and beliefs. If you do not have the ability to discern truth, you will treat a diamond like the other 99 pieces of coal. Or worse, you will leave the diamonds to hoard the coal because you don’t know any better. Praying, going to church, reading the Quran, etc can certainly help alleviate suffering in the short term and make you feel you are doing something good. It requires maintenance much like prescriptions and therapy. If you think and act as dictated, you will feel good and accepted by your community. Otherwise, you will feel guilt or shame. If you see members of other religious groups as “other”, there is another breeding ground for conflict which leads to suffering. Religions typically also requires faith or beliefs. This will not work for rationalists or skeptics like atheists and secular people.
Spirituality is closer to the heart of religion. It tends to be more universal so it is open to various religions or secular people so it isn’t an “us vs them” issue and the goal of worshipping or pleasing God is replaced with attaining enlightenment or finding truth or feeling love/bliss or being in union with the divine. We are getting closer to the real stuff, but there are still beliefs, rituals, and spiritual mumbo jumbo that is propagated by people who don’t really know what they are talking about. Today’s spirituality is a neo religion. Spirituality is harmless, but it isn’t necessarily effective which can lead to people who have spent years or even decades seeking without ever finding what they seek. Just like religion, spirituality is fine if you want to feel good and join a community of people where you feel like you are making progress towards something greater. If you are happy and content with what it gives you, that is fine. For those who want to be free of suffering or know what’s really real or true, neo spirituality is not it.
Physically abled, mentally abled, poor, middle class, rich, intelligent, hard working, successful, athletic, creative, average, genius, moral, family, senior. Developed country, third world country, infrastructure, medicine, science, technology. Knowledgeable, religious, spiritual, secular. None of these guarantee happiness, fulfillment, freedom, or elimination of suffering. Suffering is the great equalizer of mankind. I have critisized everything that humanity has built and valued since the dawn of civilization. I have criticized almost every desirable state or destination that humans seek. I have critisized things people have devoted their whole lives and livelihood to. I have even slain the sacred cows. Certainly, you must ascertain that I will propose an alternative solution or system that is superior to all of these. I do.
Jesus of Christ, Buddha of Buddhism, Adi Shankachrya of Advaita Vedanta/Hinduism, Rumi of Sufism/Islam — they all realized it.
It’s not limited to people associated with religions either. Albert Einstein very likely tasted its water, if not swam in it. He described himself as an agnostic that did not belong to any religion, but he was actually more religious/spiritual than most people practicing religion and spirituality. His philosophical perspectives resonates with Schofenhaur, Kant, and Spinoza’s teachings which have compatibilities with the realizations of the aforementioned legends of humanity that inspired billions to follow in their footsteps.
“The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion. It should transcend a personal God and avoid dogmas and theology. Covering both the natural and the spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all things, natural and spiritual, as a meaningful unity.“
- Albert Einstein
There are CEOs, engineers, and atheists as well as even completely ordinary people who found it. Over a thousand people in the world from the walks of various religions, nationalities, ages, intelligence levels, education levels, economic, and social status have found it and they have been studied (there are more than these). What the Saints, sages, and mystics realized is accessible for the ordinary man or woman and even the non-religious/secular of any background. It is an universal, permanent solution to suffering. Nothing in the world can buy it and yet it costs nothing. It is not available tomorrow, it can theoretically be realized today. It is not on the other side of the world, you do not have to move an inch.
Halfway through writing this essay, I found the book written by a social scientist who studied the people who found it over the course of the last 15 years — Finders by Jeffrey Martin. In scientific terms, the term that is used to describe the transformational change of consciousness these people had is PNSE (persistent non-symbolic experience). It is also as enlightenment, non-dual realization, God realization, Truth realization, nirvana, moksha, consciousness realization, etc. Truth, God, Consciousness, Existence, Being, Brahman, Atman, Annata, Allah, Tao are all different words pointing to the same thing. As Shakespeare said, a rose by any other name is still a rose.
Science is starting to catch up on what the wise humans have known for thousands of years. Physicists like Nima Arkani-Hamed have determined that space-time is not fundamental. 3 quantum physicists have won a Nobel prize in 2022 for concluding that the universe is not both local and real. Donald Hoffman, a cognitive psychologist have determined that living organisms have a 0 probability of discovering the truth and that evolution selects for survival not truth seeking using simulations using mathematics and game theory. Bernard Kastrup is a known public philosopher and computer engineer who rejects materialism in favor of Analytic Idealism (i don’t what the analytic part of it actually means, but it is not materialism/physicalism and that much I agree with). A unifying pattern is emerging between domains that have been in conflict and competition with one another throughout history.
Religion, spirituality, philosophy, science…i thought you said these are not the solution and yet you speak of them.
Yep, still true. What religion, spirituality, philosophy, and science have in common is that they all operate on the assumption that there is truth and there is an objective reality. They are incredibly useful for advancing human civilization, but these systems are not truth nor can they capture truth. These are finite structures and systems built and used by finite minds trying to capture the infinite on which they are based on. A second order reality based on a first order trying to capture the first order. There are no words, thoughts, perceptions, or concepts that can contain Truth. Taoism says the Tao that can be talked about is not the true Tao. Words are nothing but a pointer — a finger pointing at the moon. You must look at the moon, not the finger.
I’ve been thinking — if I were to die tonight, what would I want to do? The answer I got was to write one last thing. Not merely about today’s jira ticket, this quarter’s goal, for the team I’m working for, a new JS library, all the users of my company’s product, my entire career, the tech industry, my entire life, my family, my future unborn child, my descendants, my entire country, or even the entirety of the human species. No, something including and beyond humans and all animals — whether they are of Land, sky, or water. Something that includes and is even beyond all life forms including plants, microorganisms, fungi, and viruses. I want to write about that which will outlast all life on earth. Including and beyond even the earth which is expected to last 250 million years. Including and beyond the lifetime of sun which is expected to last a few billion years. It matters not even if humans become a type III civilization on the kardashev scale and can control the entire milkway Galaxy. I want to write about that which is beyond even the local group (the theoretical limit humans can ever reach) and including and beyond even the life of the universe — somewhere between 22 billion years and 100 trillion years. it is said that the universe will end in either heat death, big rip, or big crunch. The death of the universe is the death of space and time itself. I want to write about that which includes and is beyond even space and time. That where space and time, the universe, galaxies, planets, earth, humans, ants, plants, bacteria, viruses, atoms, and quarks exist within. Waking, dreaming, and deep sleep exist within it. That which is immanent — all pervading, yet transcedant — beyond the material. That which is existence itself and the source of everything we know and can conceive of. That is consciousness. I am consciousness. You are consciousness. An ant is consciousness. A piece of metal is consciousness. Consciousness is all. All is consciousness.
“What you seek is seeking you.” ― Rumi