It is Effective.
Utilitarian Motivation
One reason to integrate disciplines is because it typically produces more effective and more comprehensive solutions to our problems.
It is Accurate
Scientific Motivation
Another reason to integrate disciplines is because it actually reflects a more accurate understanding of physical reality- the many parts of our worlds and the disciplines which focus upon them- are typically telling correlated parts of a larger story.
And maybe because….
It is ... Truthful
A Transpersonal Motivation
And yet another reason to integrate might be to uncover a latent unity in what might initially appear to be disconnected.
A desire to integrate might emerge because a unifying impulse could be the very telos of our true nature…
…a desire to expose an underlying often obscured yet never forgotten genuine accordance that lies beneath our chaotic surfaces
…a sense that something bridges our very hearts, that something transcends and includes all of our participations in this dynamic experience of human life.
Sig Kal Shore ;
Essay written in 2003 Sig Kal Shore
March 10, 2003
Journal Entry
It was a rather standard camping/canoe trip. Grade 8. Seven high school friends- ranging from people who I considered on the level of ‘my own spiritual brother’ to ‘the annoying guy that my spiritual brother schlepped on this trip”.
Seven rather normal guys. Rather normal camping. And I still don’t know why these normal conditions produced such a bizarre and such a memorable event that we remember to this very day. But through some absurd twist in the threads of human destiny- the seven of us, in the very first day of the trip found ourselves spontaneously creating an astonishing and previously unheard of human game called - the deceptively undramatic – ‘Now’.
‘Now- That was the name of the game. Not ‘Now We Dance Around the Fire and Make Indian Sounds’ or “Now We See How Badly We Can Burn and Then Eat Hash Browns and See if That Cancer Myth has Any Basis to It” or “Now We See Who Can Canoe the Fastest and Whoever is Last Has to Swim Across the Stagnant Almost Certainly Leech-Infested Murky Swamp/Puddle”.
Of course, we played all those games too, but the one that we would never forget was known as just- “Now.”
The rules were simpler than hide-and-go-seek. It required no complex primal dancing skills, nor an offensively intolerable culinary deficiency (thanks Michel, 11 years later and I still haven’t been able to eat fried potatoes.) None of those. This game needed one thing and one thing only.
Honesty.
Just honesty.
And not just the legal type. Not the obedient child type. Not even the endearing innocent boy scout type. Rather, this game called for a more exposing, more unsettling, more humbling and more terrifying dosage of sheer truthfulness than could be reasonably expected from even the most uncompromising polygraph.
The workings of ‘Now’: At any moment during our canoeing days, our evening meals or our late night tent-under-the-stars teenage musings- anyone of the seven of us could just abruptly turn to any guy that they so chose and… say- “Now.”
And with that command, with all having agreed to participate for the duration of our canoe-carrying-Rambo-style-enduring-wilderness-adventure - the person to whom ‘the Now’ had been addressed, HAD to describe exactly what was on their mind at that very moment. At that very Now.
And with that moral imperative firmly established, the seven of us began our prolonged, painful and astonishing foray into breaking down the seemingly impenetrable nature of individual consciousness.
Of course, at the time, the seven of us would never have understood what that preceding jargon actually meant. We just would have said: for the next four days- we’re all getting a chance to get into each others’ head.
Same thing.
For thousands of years, philosophers have contemplated this very frustrating yet unchangeable actuality of human existence: the impenetrable nature of individual consciousness. This tenet of the human experience basically describes that no matter how much I love you, no matter how much I feel connected to you, how much I care about you- I can’t dip my palm into my head…and hand you one of my thoughts.
I can’t know exactly what it feels like to be another person. I cannot literally access their experience.
Yes, we can do our utmost to describe what we are feeling, or what’s on our mind- but NEVERTHELESS- at best- that description is an attempt to create a similar yet – not identical - mental experience in another’s mind. No amount of empathy will actually have us LITERALLY feeling another person’s feelings. No attempt at coming closer to another will have one literally experiencing the thoughts in another’s mind.
Now, that type of separateness is at least partially a result of biological duality- namely one person’s brain is theirs and mine is mine. Same with our bodies- no matter how close we get. Sex gets us closer to unity but we never get to identity. The fact remains- we have never seen this duality overcome on the physical plane, excluding a few eerie Star Trek episodes.
But we certainly have no need to despair. The biological reality of our occupying separate bodies and brains can’t prevent all attempts at bridging our duality. We have been bestowed with powerful ways to overcome our separateness and in my canoe experience- one stands at the forefront of the bridge-building.
Emotional disclosure. One starts opening up. For some warm and wonderful reason- one person allows another into their head so that they can- to some degree- see the other’s thoughts.
Maybe you’ve had one too many drinks. Maybe you are sleep talking. Or maybe- for some inexplicable reason- you want to feel closer to somebody and- you feel that by removing the barriers of individuality- you might experience such closeness. You feel some longing to share your innermost thoughts.
Or possibly just your stance on the Buccaneers Superbowl chances
Like they’ll repeat. Not.
Seriously- suddenly one’s soul starts tugging and starts whispering and starts saying and starts screaming- I NEED TO SHARE THIS WITH SOMEONE!
And thus, we humans get closer. And closer. And one things lead to another and disclosure leads to intimacy. And more disclosure to greater intimacy.
But back to the canoes.
It went on for days.
“Dan- Now?”
“Just how hungry I am now.”
“Michael- Right Now.”
“Just how I am so lucky that my parents agreed to get me a Sunfire convertible when I get my license…which will be before uhmmm…all of you.”
“John- Now.”
“That this river is one of the most perfect things I’ve ever seen.”
“Kal- Now.”
“Uhmmm…that I’m kind of bored with the point that Michael’s been making for the last 30 minutes.”
“Now- Drew”
“Well, to be honest- that you’ve been pretty annoying through this whole trip and I wish that I had reconsidered going.”
“Now.”
“You know…kind of- well- uhmmm, to be honest- thinking about your girlfriend…”
Got kind of messy sometimes. And we had anticipated this and even decided that revealing certain thoughts would be a little too much disclosure.
We all have moments where we can’t stand the person next to us and at least fantasize about a career as an axe murderer. Everyone has those daydream fantasies, which if made into Hollywood movies would be banned in North America. And to be honest- we wanted to be honest but also not completely rude. Or apparent perverts. Or even ridiculously boring (Dan’s ‘Just that I’m hungry’ came up so often we were wondering if he was a friend or a garburator.)
So we instituted a clause that would limit disclosure but actually assure honesty. An exemption clause. If we were called to ‘Now’ and we felt terribly strongly that we shouldn’t reveal our inner state to six other guys- then we could say ‘Yellow Card’ (don’t ask me about the name. Either too much soccer or a lack of youthful creativity.) And with that said- that was that. You were exempt. Left alone.
That said- You were expected to use an absolute minimum of Yellow Cards on the trip. I lasted the whole 4 days with only one. But overall- we all liked that we had the potential of pulling a Get Out of Jail Free card when things got too mean, too violent or too… well…explicit.
In this way- we felt completely confident that everyone was being completely honest. That no one was holding back what was actually in their head. We had sworn to ‘nothing but the truth so help us God’ so…with the addition of the Yellow Cards, we knew that what the person was thinking… is what the six of us got.
One could smile and glance over our childish game. It sounds so mundane. So simple. So perfectly unimportant.
But to such a comment- I must say that I have heard the voice of Revelation. I have heard the word of God and it was through the blaring speakers of a Sting rock concert. Montreal. Molson Center arena. And I went with my mother – also a major Sting fan.
Well when he sang ‘Desert Rose’ – people cheered. And when he sang ‘Every Breath She Takes’ – we sang along. And ‘Brand New Day’ had us on all on our feet. But my friends- you hadn’t seen anything till he closed with ‘Englishman in New York’.
You know how it goes…‘I’m an alien, I’m a legal alien, I’m an Englishman in New York…” And in that song, there was one line that had me riveted. That had all twenty thousand of us screaming with every last reserve of vocal strength. That had us chanting with such fixation that I wondered if this was a concert or prayer service. If this was a hockey arena or a temple.
‘BE YOURSELF- NO MATTER WHAT THEY SAY. BE YOURSELF NO MATTER..NO MATTER …NO MATTER WHAT THEY SAY.”
Fixated.
BE YOURSELF.
Hooked.
BE YOURSELF.
Consumed.
NO MATTER WHAT THEY SAY.
While we might dismiss it as a simple game- I hear a voice asking- in the name of the prophet Sting and all that is holy- …asking- what – in this whole world- do we possibly want more than- to be completely ourselves… AND still feel the love of another?
What possible gift, what potential emotion or experience is more valuable than for one brief moment – to be completely naked and – in the midst of such overwhelming vulnerability- to be completely accepted- even UNIFIED- with another- who is just as naked, just as vulnerable?
Of course the sexual image comes to mine. But so does every late night talk one has had with their old high school friends. What else could explain the colossal rush of joy as one daringly tells them the secrets that have been withheld all those dreary office-work days, those lonely –count the tiles on your ceiling nights, those empty sterile superficial polite exchanges in the hallways of oblivion some would call- daily life?
What else motivates the required two beer consumption that we ritually practice before putting our arm around that girl we should have asked out ten years ago and who is now- and has been for ten years- ready, willing and hoping to hear something a little more personal than the Buccaneers’ playoff chances.
Like they’ll repeat. Not.
The fact is- one of our most incessant human mantras has been- and as long as the human being feels the awful pangs of existential loneliness as she is forced to exist as separate self in a separate Universe, it will remain our mantra- “With you standing next to me with your eyes wide open, watch me reveal my soul and let me be me…and please… still be there in the morning. And then…would you do the same?”
Or in layman’s terms- we want to show our cards.
We don’t want to walk around with poker faces anymore.
What we crave more than anything in the world- and in one sense- it is behind almost everything we do in this world- is to end this horrible social plague called… duality.
What we want is to actualize the reality that in some mysterious way- we are all beautifully, astoundingly, TRUTHFULLY… completely connected.
Now.