So what is this Truth thing I am trying to get at? While I am interested in so many life themes, they all do revolve around one thing. Call it what you may (Divinity, Tao, Brahman, God), but simply put: it’s Truth.
As James Allen says, “Men formulate perishable dogmas, and call them Truth. Truth cannot be formulated; it is ineffable, and ever beyond the reach of intellect. It can only be experienced by practice; it can only be manifested as a stainless heart and a perfect life.”
So if Truth is ineffable, then what am I doing wasting my time writing this blog? It could be that if Truth is Eternal and can’t be talked about directly, then maybe how it shows up in the world can be. If we’re open to it, we can see the Eternal in the temporal. And it’s in this space where the horizontal can engage with the vertical.
“Truth is nothing if not unchangeable, and in so far as a man takes his stand upon Truth does he become steadfast in virtue, does he rise superior to his passions and emotions and changeable personality. (Allen)”
Well, I try. But some folks don’t even try. Take this interesting video between Stefan Molyneux and a caller. He is clearly a very left brain person, who prides himself on his logical articulation, and she is more intuitively right brain. You can see what happens when these two sides collide…
A strictly logical person can’t understand an intuitive person, while some intuitive persons can understand logic. In other words, the right-brain can contain the left brain but not vice versa. Both hemispheres need each other, but only the right side knows this.
In his superb book, Iain McGuilichrist mentions that “the left hemisphere has to blot out the right hemisphere in order to do its job at all. That is surely the import of the functional and anatomical evidence that left hemisphere superiority is based, not on a leap forward by the left hemisphere, but on a deliberate handicapping of the right.” And we can see Molyneux do exactly this in the video. By playing by his rules that are strictly logical, he is unable to take a leap to where the caller is pointing to.
Allen notes, “the outer conditions of a person's life will always be found to be harmoniously related to his inner state.” Molyneux’s inner state is clearly so overly rigid, he can suck the life out of life. He doesn’t realize “Entering into the Infinite is not a mere theory or sentiment. It is a vital experience which is the result of assiduous practice in inward purification.”
While logic serves a useful and needed purpose, it can lead to a dead end when in service to itself. Who cares how intelligent you are when you can’t even affirm the real Source of your intelligibility?
I’ll take childlike wisdom over lifeless rationalism any day.
We can never make others understand something unless they already, at some level, understand it. We cannot give them our understanding, only awaken their own, latent, understanding. — Iain McGuilichrist