Crasses et Voluptés

On some deep level almost everyone feels insecure, afraid, separate, isolated, and unsure of his or her own authenticity and value. We rarely openly confess and share these feelings with each other without attributing it to some specific cause or incident. Sometimes our anguish shows up in works of art or drama, or when it has built up to a point of crisis that can no longer be kept hidden. But about this personal suffering as a constant background condition, we generally keep our mouths shut and our gaze elsewhere.

To cover up this raw state, we obtain knowledge and adopt beliefs. From these, we fabricate a particular sense of self from which we deal with life. We might feel more “valuable” in the eyes of our community, but this does nothing to change our base condition. The only difference is that we’ve added yet another layer to our sense of “self.” It’s here that we step into an unending struggle with life. We suffer a nagging sense of fragmentation and dissatisfaction, and we lose our sense of real being—the source of our genuineness and innocence. Seeking relief, and unaware of any alternatives, we obtain new goals and possessions or adopt new character traits to bolster our self-identity. With each new attribute or acquisition, we further lose touch with the source of our own power, creativity, and inner peace—the very qualities we desire most, and also the only means to repair our situation.

 By design, the modern human mind craves knowledge, especially in places where we can find none. When faced with an absence of information, we’ll make something up—we will believe and assume. This tendency appears to be universal—in every culture, some form of beliefs arises to fill in for the lack of absolute “knowledge.” Every subculture with a set of beliefs clamors to have the last word on the subject, claiming themselves guardians of the Truth. Many of the different factions are willing to war over their inventions, but no one is willing to confess that they simply don’t know what the truth is.

The Book of Not Knowing
Peter Ralston