Day after Christmas nuthin...
Jesushchrist, X-mas is over. So, the long wait until Spring began today and it doesn't seem as morose as usual. It feels more like any other day.
I was thinking about truth and something about the stories of my life, things I've seen or imagined that have happened, or things I've been told that happened that I've repeated over and over that they have become real events that I now perceive as truth.
And the strange thing is is that the events that I have offered or repeated as happenings have become as real to me as my present reality, and so now, I have to think to myself, did these things really happen to me or have I conjured them into existence by repetition of imagination?
Do you know what I mean? It's a scary possibility really.
Specifically, every so often, I relay a story of my childhood that has been told to me so many times that it has become embedded into my memory as my own memory; but in fact, if I really think about it, I don't have this memory at all, or at least I don't have the faculty to truly experience it in my own memory. I was probably too young. But because it has been repeated to me again and again, I "remember" it. I can actually see myself in my memory there in that place doing the thing I've been told that I've done, and that, my friends, is that. For me, for years it has been real and it really happened, and for years I have repeated the story... but then one day, I think it was about 2 weeks ago, I was telling the story and I realized that I actually had no memory of it at all. It was just something people have told me about my life, and on faith I accepted it as true. But, I really don't know if it is true at all.
I suppose I could go to a relative and ask them, "Is this true?" And they could convince me that, yes, because they were there and saw it, it happened; and yet, their memory of it is still not my own and I have to once again rely on another's perception of my reality as my truth.
If I repeat the story I now feel like a fake and it's hardly relevant so I won't tell it, but it made me realize how it's not just my personal myth, but the myths that people hold so much faith in without question, how these same stories can and probably are the repeated memories of those who were never even there to witness, yet, they become certain truth without any conscious query into the actual reality of them.
I was thinking about truth and something about the stories of my life, things I've seen or imagined that have happened, or things I've been told that happened that I've repeated over and over that they have become real events that I now perceive as truth.
And the strange thing is is that the events that I have offered or repeated as happenings have become as real to me as my present reality, and so now, I have to think to myself, did these things really happen to me or have I conjured them into existence by repetition of imagination?
Do you know what I mean? It's a scary possibility really.
Specifically, every so often, I relay a story of my childhood that has been told to me so many times that it has become embedded into my memory as my own memory; but in fact, if I really think about it, I don't have this memory at all, or at least I don't have the faculty to truly experience it in my own memory. I was probably too young. But because it has been repeated to me again and again, I "remember" it. I can actually see myself in my memory there in that place doing the thing I've been told that I've done, and that, my friends, is that. For me, for years it has been real and it really happened, and for years I have repeated the story... but then one day, I think it was about 2 weeks ago, I was telling the story and I realized that I actually had no memory of it at all. It was just something people have told me about my life, and on faith I accepted it as true. But, I really don't know if it is true at all.
I suppose I could go to a relative and ask them, "Is this true?" And they could convince me that, yes, because they were there and saw it, it happened; and yet, their memory of it is still not my own and I have to once again rely on another's perception of my reality as my truth.
If I repeat the story I now feel like a fake and it's hardly relevant so I won't tell it, but it made me realize how it's not just my personal myth, but the myths that people hold so much faith in without question, how these same stories can and probably are the repeated memories of those who were never even there to witness, yet, they become certain truth without any conscious query into the actual reality of them.
posted by SPOA | 11:12 PM
9 Comments:
So you feel fake, never to repeat the story again. You have moved out of the 'mist'. Not accepting the untruth that puzzled you when you use to hear it or tell it. You now feel lost, feel sick, feel fake. Those feelings are meant to heighten your conciousness of your past, help you focus on the truth of the present and future....I think u know wat I mean....
Oh hi there Mark, good to see you here, too :).
No, I don't feel fake at all. Not at all, it's that if I were to repeat the story now as a truth, then I would feel fake..or actually more like a liar. It's not a story I can relay now with any confidence in it's truth. Because even though I was convinced of it as a memory of mine for most of my life, I now recognize I don't have any recollection of it at all.
It's much like losing a religion, I think.
I don't think it, the post I wrote, has to do with my personal past or present, it has more to do with identifying a common general myth as truth with no actual proof, only the experience of a memory that has been over time accepted as truth, you see? Like this: We are told something is true, we are convinced from an early age of it as real, and as we develop we continue to accept it as our experience, even to the point of "seeing" it.
It's so interesting to realize how our minds can create our realities, even with things that aren't real.
When I was thinking about it, it had something to do with a crush that I have recently developed which is really an admiration for the writer Christopher Hitchens who is this delectable atheist who I would bang in a minute. Smartest man in the world to me, at the moment. Here is an interview:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200707u/christopher-hitchens
I've been thinking about that kind of stuff today, since I'm reading this: http://books.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1983095,00.html
Maybe consciousness is not what it's trumped up to be. I find it a hard sometimes to distinguish my own memories from the second hand ones, those that I've been told by others. You could say that these are not mine, but aren't they, really, now that I remember them?
It's even harder to say which are the most "true." All we've got to go by is what feels true to us, I guess. That may be different things at different times, and some second hand memories may feel more true than real ones. Damn. It's confusing.
I'm still on the fence about Hitchens. I don't think that I'd bang him, frankly, atheist or not :)
Hi Did we talk about this on messenger? I don't think we did. We will talk about it more when you get home.
That's what I was thinking too :)
The internet has been down here, so I couldn't get online. Now that it's working again, I'm leaving. Just had lunch at the Brasserie Centrale; I'm on my way to the car now.
Is that Mark from the JungChurch? Sheesh.
"this delectable atheist who I would bang in a minute."
LOL spoken like a true Scorpio.
Get thee to confession madam, to correct thine Fallen soul.
Now that's what I call a dead JESUS
here you go K, even with a cool British accent
It just occurred to me that myths don't require proof to be truthful.
But it should be our own myth, not someone else's that's been forced down our throat. Most common general myths are like that, I think.
Yeah and it remains a truth as long as it isn't concretized into "truth."
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