Taken back in time
Published: Fri, 04/05/19
On Saturday I went to York to meet up with some people I lived, worked and studied with over thirty five years ago. A couple of the people involved I had caught up with once or twice since but a most of the group I had not seen for three and a half decades. It was good to catch up, find out what people had done in the meantime and talk about the experiences we shared all that time ago. On the way back from York I found myself in a very strange state. There were two BBC TV series made in the past ten years, Life on Mars and Ashes to Ashes. Both were about contemporary police officers who find themselves back in time, Life on Mars was set in 1973 and sequel, Ashes to Ashes, in 1982. Having reunited with people I lived closely with in 1982 I found myself with the weird feeling that I had somehow gone back in time and I wasn’t at all sure that I wanted to come back to the present. It took three or four days this week before I was
sure I had returned to the present. Perhaps I had not realised how much it might affect me to go back to when we were so much younger and all life seemed to be ahead of us.
Okay, it is just a feeling and we all get over feelings eventually. Emotions are what actually drive people and decisions are more likely to be made according to desires and fears than rationally. Even choosing to act rationally is a desire expressed. To act at all we have to either desire pleasure or want to escape pain. We might think that we want to express ourselves rationally but there must be a desire for us to do anything at all. If we have no desire for anything then why even bother to carry on breathing? Yes the body seems have an autonomic system which seem to keep the heart beating almost regardless of our conscious intention. However, have you ever wondered why some people die at fifty and a very few live to be 110? Why some people pull through after life threatening illnesses and serious injuries and others just let go of life? Why some people survive disasters and deprivation and others die in the same
circumstances? You can put it down to luck, genetics or just circumstances but the desire to live plays a pretty massive part too. In the military the term is morale, which means the confidence, enthusiasm and discipline of the fighting unit. When morale is high soldiers will cope with almost anything and keep on fighting. When morale collapses and can’t be recovered the war is as good as lost. To learn more about morale, the story of the Falklands war is worth examining. The occupying Argentinian military had all the advantages over the British forces which were fighting thousands of miles from home. But the islands were still retaken and the contrasting levels of morale were probably the key factor in the British victory.
We humans really are strange creatures when you think about it. We are driven by emotion and without emotion there is really nothing to live for. Yet rage, anger, fear, jealousy, lust and even despair all all powerful emotions too. Responding to such emotions can create massive energy and powerful action but the results will be destructive and cause further pain and conflict. One emotion has brought humanity this far and that is love. Rationality is loving what is best in humanity and seeking to create the best world we can in harmony with other people and all of creation. Truly rational choices are made out of love and rational actions are loving actions. Emotions are essential for life to continue. If life brings no joy then why even bother? But if we are capable of powerful emotion then we are just as capable of hate as of love, of anger as of compassion and of jealousy as of generosity. To be loving we have to know how to
manage all our emotions.
My experience last Saturday reminded me how much we can be affected by powerful feelings. It took me somewhere very strange too, but that is okay, it was my experience and I have managed and learned from it. I am also older now and I have practised several disciplines throughout my life which have helped me learn to manage my emotions. What worries me is that the purpose of social media seems to be to create engagement by manipulating emotions. Addiction, suicide, violence (both real and virtual), self-harm, loneliness, hating ones own body and many other emotional problems are escalating and threatening the well being of our society.
The internet itself is tool of communication. However, like all powerful instruments it needs to be used with care and it is open to exploitation by greedy commercial interests. The generation growing up now is facing temptations and pressures I could never have imagined when I was growing up in the 1970s.
Is there anything we can do about it? I would suggest the following: Be aware of our own emotional processes. Maintain our morale and encourage others to do the same. Set an example of what it means to live a loving life and supporting others to do the same.
regards
Graham
P. S. My small effort is to share some of the practices which have helped me over the years. Martial arts training is a valuable discipline for developing self control and confidence in your own judgment. Getting away on retreat, especially into nature can reset our emotional state in a very beneficial way.
So, tomorrow I am teaching Stav martial arts in Crewkerne http://creth and wkernestav.iceandfire.org.uk/060419.html
On the 18th and 19th of May there will be a similar event in Leaf River, Illinois, USA http://iceandfire.org.uk/usamay2019.html
Then there is the Rune Retreat on the 21st to 23rd of May for which there is one more place left http://rr.stavcamp.org/