Living with the Subtle

Loving Life

My teen and pre-adult years return to me these days … with a half regret … about their previous ambitions. I don't think there was anything particularly wrong with the initiatives we made to stabilize ourselves in our approaches to life. Working in large urban centers like Kuala Lumpur and a short stint in Los Angeles … brought a curious satisfaction to my fancies … but since moving to teach in smaller towns like Kuantan and Malacca … I feel myself more stable in my thoughts.

 

Our constitution in the human condition makes an appeal to both categories of experiences. Some sense of relation to the big and powerful is important … as it relates to the life of the individual. It reflects the gargantuan experience of the universe and world …  cultivates an appreciation for cosmology … and brings that as an over-mind to the individual concerned with daily details of activity. It sets the perception of experience … of the individual … to his environment.

 

I found a huge gap between the two experiences … its virtually two worlds … and if its not going to make too big a thing of it … I'm thinking … its virtually two specie of being. I'm not kidding. Basically … our thoughts in the urban environment … don't anchor themselves … preferring instead to move closer to the quality of dreams in the night. It relies on the identification of qualities in thought … traits … cars … money … posturing and leadership in personal natures.

 

It is entirely self reliant … drawing its notions from itself … and is unable to commit to other perceptions … but makes that flimsy gesture … of doing so. Soon … flimsy … is the very definition of its basis … as it moves to refine it further … in a lifestyle of words and expressions … that reflects the experience … and forms an understanding of itself. There's no doubt that there's value in that … but are we doing it well? Too often it succumbs to an experience of confusion or contortion of issues and falls.

 

I grew up in Malacca … and then moved into Kuala Lumpur … for my studies and career. I recall experiencing a sense of being swept off my feet … into the experience of a bigger and more complex organism of organization … that was constantly at me … to stay on my toes … to be glib … to shorten my expressions … and add a punch to it. It turned me into a prototype of something we might find on the shelf of stores. I was just like anybody else … but my individual nature didn't make that adjustment well.

 

I was less than prepared for the experience. I allowed the urban experience to critique my individual nature. I made it feel embarrassed for the tiny sensitivities it subscribed to … I ignored it … dismissed its calls for attention … and eventually lost contact with it. I returned to the small town … to heal that part of my relation with the subtle … bringing with myself … what I believe is important as urbanization and environmental relation.

 

What I found wrong … in the individual … was in the nature of its dreams and expectations. It relied on archaic perceptions of life … provincial … unexamined sources of faith … naivety … and ultimately unfamiliar with the expanding experience of life in the world. I resolved myself to work it out … and have been doing so for about 10 years or so. Its brought me into contact with some fundamentals truths about life … and to re-discover it in the context of knowledge.

 

In regard to my relation to women … I encountered somethings very informative. The woman helps the man to move better … in a large urban environment … but she's unable to sustain the support for too long … and indicates that same loss of individual nature even faster than the male experience. My wife quit after a while and left for her mother's place in Kuantan. I had tried to make out on my own and that's when I met the demons of my dreams.

 

A well established urban city … with its monuments … sculptures … skyscrapers … fashionable shops …  streets … billboards etc. impacts upon the subtle … and minimizes the relation of the subtle … to the environment. I was starting to feel an alienation from the environment … and a sense of withdrawal from activity. It challenged me on my cause … where that cause implied … life … the fertility of life … and the basis of my peripheral relation to issues.

 

It appeared to me that I had placed too strong a dependency on the wife for the experience of the subtle … that was the basis of the responses of my passions to the city environment. In moving back to Malacca eventually … and taking a job teaching English … I re-examined the nature of the subtle … visited my old haunts … re-established contact with my subtle … and thereafter brought it into relation with my physical natures.

 

There's a part of the subtle … that is an experience of oneness … and it fancies itself in association with its own creation and journey of life around the universal and global experience. I am reasoning with it to say … that it relies on the nature of the physical and social in order to do that. That it didn't do it simply by dreaming. It responds … but stays with its own counsel on issues … that I figure will only be clearer  … in the future.

 

In the meantime … I'm coming into an acquaintance with the several … personas … in my personality as a human and a man. It feels entirely natural to have made the effort to understand myself better … and to make contact with the ethereal … mystic … and female qualities. And I sense in my subtle emotions … the continued presence of the original untrained passions … and also that part that I have trained … in relation to my learning. The original continues in a fashion that's timeless and without space. It hints at the absolute. Its the sleepless dream of the universe. And I draw his attention to my daily life in a small town.