(This is Part 27 of a series. Go back to Part 26.)
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, the profound 18th century author of Faust, is considered the greatest German writer. It was he who coined the phrase, "Less is more."
At the level of reality where we appear to be separate beings making personal decisions about life, it might be useful to ask what he meant by that.
If we look around us, we perhaps can see many examples where "less" can become "more."
For instance, the media is currently obsessed with Gulf War II, just as it was obsessed before with the Clinton impeachment and, before that, the O.J. trial. The media likes to become obsessed because it sells media. That serves the media's purposes, but not necessarily yours. "Less media" might be an idea whose time has come.
Pulling back from the media doesn't mean that we should bury our heads in the sand and become know-nothings about the state of the world. Rather, it simply means that the media's obsession need not be ours. Too much focus on media right now can be dangerous to our emotional and spiritual health. Less media can mean greater balance and presence and joy in our life. Spring has begun.
It's easy to focus on the external war in Iraq, but perhaps the real question is: Can we lessen the internal war going on inside ourselves—between internal parts of ourselves, between ourselves and others, between ourselves and reality-as-it-is? Can we lessen our own obsessions with being "right" about the war, whether pro or con?
As these pages have advocated before, if we want peace in the world it must begin with us. Where else could it begin? How can we bring peace and justice to the world if we can't bring it to our internal world? Because our human world is just our internal world with its passions and obsessions—or peace—multiplied six billion times.
As another example, we might consider how less is more could look in our diet. It's a fact that the only scientifically verified way to increase lifespan is to reduce the intake of calories. As Tony Robbins put it very well: "Do you like to eat a lot? Then eat a little. That way you'll get to live a long time and eat a lot."
That's not even to mention what less fat, protein, sugar and salt, less refined, fractionated and synthetic pseudo-foods could do for us. We'd then have more of what's left: fresh fruits and vegetables, which a number of research avenues are converging on as the most beneficial foods we can eat.
How about less information overload? Today we tend to be bombarded with information, commercials, upgrades, bulletins, emails, on and on—as if masses of information were the same as depth and understanding.
We tend to be deluged with an avalanch of input and output of all kinds—what Stephen Covey calls "being lost in the thick of thin things." Yet what would happen if we dialed back, let go of some of our need to be involved and in-the-know, and just consciously focused on a few important matters?
What are important matters? Perhaps loving one another in spite of our differences, as Jesus said. Perhaps projects that turn us on and/or contribute to the common good. And perhaps: Eating an apple. Appreciating the stars in the sky. Smiling at a friend. Smiling at an enemy. Falling to our knees inside at the awesome majesty of existence—at the existence of existence, if you will.
And: Watching a flight of blackbirds. Making a meal. Appriciating our lover, and the existence of love and compassion in this world. Picking up a common stone on the banks of a river in summer. Feeling our cold ears in winter. Caring for each other. Maybe these are some of the truly important things.
A last example might be letting ourselves quiet down in prayer or meditation. Not necessarily the kind of prayer where we're talking to the All, but perhaps the kind where we're listening intently. Not lstening for anything in particular, not listening for "a message," but listening to the infinite, wordless message embodied in something as basic as the sound of the rain, or the silence of true spaciousness.
Not necessarily the kind of meditation where we're imagining ourselves on a sandy beach, and not necessarily the kind where we're repeating a rosary or a mantra, staying busy, but perhaps the kind that just listens—to something much vaster and emptier than thought, to something as humble and mysterious as a harvest of corn or a meadow of grass or a stumbling-over of love inside.
(This is the end of Part 27. Go to Part 28.)
—jim sloman, 3.26.03 for 7.14.03
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