Part 2 - Living an Unreasonable Life

The list of the ways and means through which we behave when threatened, the extremes to which we will go to re-establish our sense of security, goes on indefinitely: letters we are capable of writing, threats we are capable of making, degrees of anger we can express when enraged, acts of manipulation we can engage in when we are determined to get our way. The common factor is that when it comes to battling the forces of chaos that threaten our survival, we will bargain with the powers of destruction and find ways to rationalize our actions, if only in the moment. “I didn’t know the gun was loaded,” said a woman who killed her husband. A young man who shot several students at a high school said in an interview recently, “I really thought the students would just get up again after I shot them, you know, like in the video games I played on my TV set at home.” These are extreme examples, but we can reach the extreme in our lives, each in our own way.

The operative questions appropriate to all of us are these: How much authority do your fears have over you when it comes to the decisions you make? And is it reasonable and appropriate to excuse our behavior by citing our fear? How often have we used fear as our method of explaining destructive behavior, expecting those around us to greet us with an embrace of compassion because we acted out of a fear that “possessed our reason”? The implication of this scenario is that we are not as responsible for destructive actions that spring from our fears, particularly those rooted in childhood, because the fears and our personal history associated with them have made us vulnerable to forces beyond our conscious, rational control. Given that rather dicey form of reasoning, we are then able to rationalize most destructive behaviors in our favor.

And, so, here’s the point: The power to destroy, no matter how subtly that power operates within us—and it very much operates within all of us—is viewed as a rational and reasonable force, because it is activated most often by the fear of survival. And that fear seems to grant us the right to act in ways that push edge of the social, moral, and ethical envelope that many keep sealed when not threatened – for the most part. Now let’s complicate this by adding the mystical perspective, or the unreasonable force.

THE PATH BEST NOT TAKEN – THE UNREASONABLE ONE

Let me say once again that our powers of reason along with well refined five sensory skills are essential to our survival—and survive we must. Make no mistake here, I am not opposed to creating a healthy and comfortable physical life. We are equipped with our five senses and powers of reason precisely to help us maneuver in the physical world. But beyond your five senses and your powers of reason are your mystical senses and your powers of interior perception. Your interior self – your soul – perceives the whole of your life through a lens that seeks the truth and meaning unfolding within every moment. Your soul calls you to transcend the gravitational voice of your fears rather than giving in to the illusions that they create. Your mystical senses seek to illuminate each moment, each mystery of your life, lest you be destroyed or destroy others by the force of panic, fear, and the confinement of your own vulnerability.

Blessings,
Caroline

(Caroline Myss)