Arthur Zajonc, "Holding Life Consciously"

This show from Being, (formerly Speaking of Faith), is such a rich conversation that I listen to it for the "first-time" over and over from a CD I burned. I am fascinated with his description of his first college experience. While mine is not as dramatic, there is a resonance with my experience. While he responded to the wise counsel, I did not understand and act on the wisdom till fairly recently. I was looking back to see if I had already blogged about how I had so many opportunities but never grasped the understanding of the world that now appears so obvious. About a year ago, I commented on the wisdom of Buddhism and reflected on my life's journey towards understanding.

My amazement comes from what seems so obvious now. As I reflect back, I want to give thanks for the contribution that so many have made to my spiritual quest. I hope I can pass it on as my life is enriched by the practices and understandings I have gained. On of my college classes that was a month long exploration including journaling was an opportunity for me to awake. I was reminded as Arthur says of a college proffessor, "we began to talk about the larger issues that were . . . behind the resolution to fail. And as a consequence of that, a whole set of readings, literature, opened up because he had been a longtime meditator himself."

Zajonc was smart or aware enough to use this guidance to begin his college experience anew with a new attitude. As a college professor now, he makes an interesting observation, "I think we often decontextualize the knowledge that we study or teach to our students. And as a consequence, they don't see themselves how to connect it to the rest of their lives." That connection was a long time coming for me.

Science is difficult for so many Christians thinking that our knowledge of the natural world conflicts with the bible. What a fresh perspective Zajonc brings to the conversation, Goethe "consistently rejects the notion that science's task is to get in behind the theater of the senses and to look at the pulleys and counterweights..."

He's not actually advocating a spiritual worldview. What he's arguing for is a worldview which honors the human experience. But what that does is to open the door to all levels of human experiences, the levels of art, the levels of ethical choice, the levels of your very life, which is, of course, lived in this world of experience. It's not lived in a world of particles and waves; it's lived in a world of direct human experience, including even your religious and spiritual experiences.

His continues his conversation with Krista Tippet by explaining Goethe's statement that "Colors are the deeds and sufferings of light."

"So the colors come in to being through the interaction or the conflict or the meeting of light and darkness, these two large polarities that exist within our world within Goethe's imagination. When they come together then there arises color. So when you look at the red of the sunset, you're looking through the kind of darkening agent of the sky, of the atmosphere itself, towards the sun, which is a source of light. And so the light seen through that darkening medium gives us the reds and a complementary account can give you the blues."

I love his conclusion to this portion of the conversation, "Knowledge is not an object that you acquire. It's not a mechanism that somehow you provide to the human mind. It's actually an epiphanal moment. And I think this is true of the arts, poetry, painting, music, and I would say also to spiritual understanding."

I have thought lately about my "epiphanal moment" and looked for an earlier blog entry when I was searching for the link I used above to the blog entry from last January. I didn't find one but sometimes as we become aware of our surroundings, we do not have a precise answer to the question, "What time did you wake up?"

I am a bit jealous of his students as he discusses meditation in an academic setting. I hunger to read more as I love being a life-long learner. So the following is actually quite encouraging no matter what your age.

"Yeah. I mean, there's a real motive. It's not that you're importing spiritual practices willy-nilly into an academic setting. There's a rationale. Of course, students have their own either agnostic, atheistic, or religious beliefs. That's their privilege and responsibility in a certain sense. But the contemplative traditions have been extraordinarily successful it seems to me in cultivating attention, and attention is one of the most precious entities the human mind has to offer the world. If we can attend to something in a sustained way, especially in a learning context, it's much to our advantage. The other, you know, big gain is if there's emotional balance, and this is another set of practices which are common to the various traditions, that one basically creates a healthy mind. So one has both a healthy mind and an attentive mind that one brings to everything that one does is a great benefit."