Holy Fool?

Myth-Perceptions: Confessions of a Holy Fool

“When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything else in the Universe.” ~John Muir

*****

Apparently, Muir’s observation includes us, and even our blind spots.

I've spent much of my life trying to understand how we human beings see—or don't see—reality. Hence Seeing True™. I've studied psychology, spirituality, recovery, leadership, systems, consciousness, and goodness knows what else. Not just applied to myself, but most dangerously, to others.

All of which might lead one to believe that by now I see things pretty clearly.

Oh my! There is some deep mischief in that. (Or maybe, myth-chief since it involves our personal myths?)

Over the years, people have bestowed some wonderfully flattering nicknames upon me: RonnieMas, the RonnieLama, even Ronald the Wise.

I confess to liking these. They certainly make me feel important, which happens to be a lifelong strategy I’ve had to repeatedly excavate from my shadow-self. And they fit rather nicely with my longstanding personal mythology of teacher, guide, strategist, and increasingly, wise elder. Both can be true.

Then there is the nickname I gave myself: Ron Quixote.

That one may be turning out to be considerably more accurate.

My old teacher and friend Sam once offered me some particularly useful counsel:

“Ron, you need to periodically stop your rocket propulsion and look over your shoulder to clean up the possible carnage.”

Bang! Smash! Clang! Boom! (It turns out I can be a human demolition derby too!)

Apparently, wisdom and foolishness are not opposites. Perhaps they're dance partners. The human dance that is each of us.

I've recently gotten another glimpse of something I've known in various forms for years: we don't merely misperceive reality. We myth-perceive it.

We construct stories about ourselves—I am generous. I am wise. I am the victim. I am responsible. I am right. I am good. Then, quite unconsciously, we become remarkably ingenious at protecting those stories from inconvenient evidence.

Even our virtues can get recruited.

I’ve recently seen that generosity can carry self-importance. Wisdom can carry certainty. Service can make us feel consequential. Our sincere desire to make a contribution can become intertwined with our desire to be someone who makes a contribution.

So there is this truth-telling: Perhaps the spiritual journey isn't toward becoming Ronald the Wise. Perhaps it is toward becoming Ronald the Whole.

Seeing True in Action™

That requires a different kind of practice, a guide I’ve constructed for myself that may be useful to others. (Damn! There goes that self-importancing again!)

·      Come as you really are—or as best you are able.

·      See as clearly as you can—or can't. Most of reality is obscured from us. Surely that deserves some humility.

·      Tell the truth of what you discover. Any honest version will do. Telling the truth about ourselves to ourselves can be remarkably powerful.

·      Remain curious about what you cannot yet see. Every windmill might also be a mirror.

·      Allow others the same dignity. Oh my. There's that second greatest commandment again.

·      Consent to Reality—or your best understanding of Reality. More will be revealed. Rest assured.

And finally:

Trust Grace with what follows.

Actually, perhaps that's still not quite it.

Trust that what follows is Grace.

Maybe Sacred Ground isn't something we finally reach once we've become sufficiently conscious, sufficiently healed, sufficiently wise, or sufficiently good.

Maybe this—the seeing and not seeing, wisdom and foolishness, nobility and ego, revelation and collision—is Sacred Ground already.

Our assignment may simply be to become increasingly willing to inhabit it.

Not perfectly. Honestly.

Bang! Smash! Clang! Boom!

~ Ron Quixote, V7.0.0
Suspiciously Human, More Will Be Revealed