2.9 KiB
| title | date | tags | techne | episteme | slug | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A Little Requiem to a Successful Suicide | 1970-01-01 |
|
:wip | :speculation | ?p=666 |
Back in early 2010, I already attempted to work through my experiences with mysticism. Some traces of that can be seen in my writing at the time. Recently, I actually finished this project and found closure. But I noticed an odd thing. Back then, I was still able to work from memory. I could still feel what it was like, still had the old persona linger around in my mind.
Not anymore. If it weren't for the notes I made, I would've had a hard time reconstructing the Ayahuasca experience. Some pieces already are a mystery to me and I had to leave them out, could not address them at all. (I faintly remember being in the desert.) In my memory, I can feel a difference between first-person reconstructions and second-hand stories I keep around. They are not strictly separated, of course, but some pieces are me and others are just knowledge about other people.
What remained of the person who took Ayahuasca is just that now - something that happened to someone else.
What is a person? H. (that person) used to think it was the unbroken stream of consciousness. I don't think I agree anymore. Awareness comes and goes. It is fragmented. Continuity is a useful fiction, one that it is possible to stop telling, if one wants.
A person is patterns, ideas, names. These things are gone now. H. has taken care not to leave many notes, has deliberately destroyed most of them to prevent being revived. He knew I would be interested in him, would search for him. He made it impossible to find him. H. wanted to cease, wanted to die. His connections are gone, his thoughts have stopped, his memories are that of a stranger.
I have found some of H.'s later writing, 2005-06. (I will not link to it.) I don't recognize the person. It's horribly confused, for one thing. It doesn't try to understand anything. It just claims. This pattern now annoys me. You present it with an idea and within seconds it has a position, knows whether to be for or against it. If you don't see yourself pre-enlightenment, you won't believe how much you have changed.
I am not H. anymore. H. is dead. His memories have faded, and what remains, I don't trust. I know too much about the fragility of memory now, know how unreliable eyewitnesses are. Why should I trust one just because we share a legal identity?
H. had a curious desire. He wanted to die, but also to know what the world would be like once he was dead. I can answer this question now. Out of his ashes, I became flesh, inherited his desires, deal now with his choices. After me, no-one will. I have accepted my responsibility, will prevent further value drift, will not fracture again. In me, incarnation stops.
May Kali devour us all.