A Growing Circle

An expanding experience

Indic traditions … if it was brought to the attention … of the Western reader … would cause the eyes to moisten … in a background of crimson. In a phrase … its a picture of the lone man … fighting a mighty storm of creation out in the open … with nothing more than a tattered palm frond in his hands … and a loincloth around his waist. Its pathetic … but they have been doing it … for about 3,500 years … and they haven't quit.

 

It takes place in the subtlest part of the human disposition … founded on the logical nature of things … and its a tiny portion of what we are … beyond detection of our normal senses. Its the story of the sleeping princess in our fairy tales … who couldn't get to sleep … because she lost a needle on the mattress … and hasn't been able to find it. Its the sudden concern of the housewife … out on a night in town as to whether … she switched off the electric iron … before leaving.

 

Our societies have gone on to stress … the practical and we are always telling people … ' its a small thing … don't worry about it.' However … there are those who retain … an appreciation for detail … and will not give up. I had always told my ex-wife … that she was a perfectionist … and she should tone down a little … or risk social isolation. One day … her supervisor at work … screamed … fell onto the ground … and started tearing at her clothes … before the staff came to calm her.

 

I realize that I had been at it throughout our marriage … and no doubt … she found it a sharp critique of her personality. But then I am the the same way. And I think what differentiated her from me … was that I had built a strong social decorum … like a rule … to help me manage. And when I see a situation arising from one mile away … that's going to expose my … ' one needle fastidiousness ' … I create an avoidance … and steer the situation another way. It can be done … and I think a lot of people do that.

 

Our ability to stay in contact with the issues … demands a way of engaging and dealing with such fastidiousness. The alternative is … to succumb to exhaustion … and quite often … care-giver fatigue … and to quit. Thereafter our lives become in the word of the Gita … ' a pathless wind.' No doubt it is a defining human experience … when confronted by … ' simply too much.' ' There's nothing more I could have done.'

 

Certainly not at that particular moment. We can always do more … and that's a fact … but I'm not sure we want to hear that from someone else … not even a husband. And I think its true to say ... that the imperative on that … is to make sure we … the I … creates the initiative to say something like that to itself … and not wait for someone else to do it. DH Lawrence in ‘ The Rainbow ‘ ... referred to it as awareness of the ‘ widening circle.’

 

However … if we are in that way … simply ' too tired ' … we can come to rely on a friend … to help us do that … and stay in the circle of friendship. We do hope our friend … understands our condition for what it is. Its not that we don't care … we are simply too tired … but something extraordinary like that is achieved under two very special conditions … to avoid the rise of the aggrieved sigh of … indebtedness … or dependency.

 

King Agamemnon obviously … was too tired. A culture like Sparta takes its toll … on a man's energies for the cultivation of the perfect life and society. But his friend Achilles … offered the hand of friendship to the King … to make a difference … and maintain Sparta's disposition with regards to the stature of its statehood. Yet that friendship … became fraught with defenses … imbalances of ego … watchfulness … and a quirky alliance. Could that be improved?

 

' Darling … its not what I meant.' That remark could have come from both sleeves of a friendship. It's the ' common child ' of Solomon … in that landmark decision … as to where the truth lies. But if we are unable to apply ourselves to the normal practices we see around us everyday … then we are but relating from the ramparts … preventing anyone or any idea getting in … even if that's something … from outer Mongolia … or ancient Jerusalem.

 

The solution may lie in … in an extraordinary place … and it is the only two conditions that can support … the cultivation of a friendship in which the notions of debt and dependency are completely absent. A man who is obsessed with being male … turns to a new appreciation of women … and in a state of empathy … makes that switch to take on a new gender identity. Its much the same for the woman.

 

In Indic writings … they suggested a mind-based alternative. Its the switch from the personal to the impersonal Brahman … from a life lived in adoration of love and the passions … to one that takes a new devotion to mind and the intellect. Its the transformation of a life with the birth family … to one with the world family. Its a switch from form to non-form … and dealing with the little idiosyncrasies it draws along the way. And so the Indics wrote these huge volumes of treatises about how that might be done.

 

In comparison … Nike … the sneaker company … might have said it better with … ' Just do it ' … and in the subtle resemblance of the feverish mind of the convert … it must appear like … ' even the world says so.' Lawrence … ended his book with the phrase … ' She saw in the rainbow the earth's new architecture.’ I figure she couldn’t have been surprised.