Saturday, January 14, 2012

Viral Liberation - The Machine is Changing Us

Liberation is going mainstream.  As a whole, we may just be waking up.

This isn't about the spiritual community or gurus helping to enlighten the world, it's about the world, life, waking itself up.  And the mechanism seems to be working through our incessant "Me-ing", the narcissism we're witnessing through new technologies..... our favorite self-centered mediums:

YouTube
Facebook
and blogs like this one




















Kansas State University professor, Michael Wesch, in addressing the topic of YouTube and the The Politics of Authenticity, has unwittingly laid out a path to a possible increase in the number of people taking a natural course to liberation from the self.  It seems an unlikely description of a route to realization, but this video  appears to offer an unintended message, one very much in line with every sage's admonitions.

Why is this a message about liberation?

Because the void, the No Thing everything springs from, is inherently balanced.  There is nothing to tip any scales.  As a matter of fact, there are no scales.   The world, as it appears, is based on this balanced principle....light doesn't exist without darkness, wrong without right, here without there.


So what's this got to do with the world waking up, despite itself?

Through social media and reality television, we are intently examining our selves.  At this point in human evolution, things seem to be moving in the direction of extreme and exaggerated Selfing.   Millions of people are now sharing very personal stories with the masses, exposing their ideas of self to both praise and criticism.  Selves are publicly created, propped, and torn down at a rapidly increasing rate.


There are two ways this new trend could contribute to the world waking itself up:

The first way is in life's tendency to behave like a pendulum swing.  As a society, we tend to tear down whatever it is we layer with a false esteem.  Media stars are born and die at a rapidly increasing rate, and with the proliferation of social media and reality tv, everyone has the opportunity attempt stardom, to have at least 15 minutes of fame.  This focus on the creation and maintenance of a well-considered and groomed sense of Self is destined to fall as fast and hard as it's risen.  It's simply about balance.

The second way is in the fact that we are now reflecting upon or focusing on the Selves with an intensity never seen before.  We are becoming aware, in ways both subtle and overt, that the face we present to the world is wholly fabricated. The creation of a Facebook, YouTube, or blog site is an exercise in rapid self construction, self tweaking, and self reflection.


Following the void's rules of balance, eventually, this selfing will implode.

This video above is 33 minutes long.  The speaker has no ties to No Self, talks nothing about spirituality, awakening, or enlightenment.  But he's got a lot to say about liberation, right up to the end where he shows us scores of people send a message into the void (webcam).   Individually, behind cameras all over the world, they point to the same thing.  Wake up.

4 comments:

  1. Will it implode all the way through though, or just corrupt into something worse?

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  2. Not worse, but what if it's not better either? Seeing this is just another aspect of life itself. Nothing lost or gained.

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  3. What I mean is, without access to the very specific information about no-self, I don't think people will "waking up."

    Even if it becomes obvious that we're all being fake, people will rationalize that into meaning it's time to express their "true selves", which are just as fake, and the whole thing will continue on again.

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  4. Interesting point. It really could go that way, but there are lots of cases of spontaneous liberation happening to people who've never heard of no self. Now that there are groups getting the word out virally, on the internet, we should see a lot more waking up.

    Question is... will it make a difference in the way the world flows? I don't think so. Life continues.

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thanks for the thoughts...