Attention

On a boulevard in Paris, a café and bad music, sun and many people. So many people want to be seen. They present themselves as busy, sexy, cool, knowing, adventurous, athletic, educated, cultivated, or indifferent. Many want the others to take notice. They see this as what they want to be. Perhaps they live their lives in a particular way, happy and content, or controlled by others and bored, cast out or privileged. That is the beautiful thing about Paris and other big cities, that people show themselves as they want to be, as they want to be seen.

Free Spaces

Of course, a kind of alienation, a dissonance, also shows itself here. The free spaces we claim for ourselves contrast with the—usually larger—spaces in which we are not as we want to be. A whole industry arises out of this. You want to be different? Try this, for a price. Express your individuality by buying something quite special that others have not bought. This is capitalism and a critique of consumption. This is familiar, and we all think we are above it, and of course we are not.

I find the urge to show oneself, to be perceived, to receive attention much more exciting. Why do we do this? We probably seek encounters, want to greet the other—Namaste. We probably want to overcome a loneliness, or at least interrupt it. We do not really want to participate in capitalism at all; we want to partake in the adventure of consciousness, celebrate it with others, share it. And we want to dissolve in it—in intoxication and ecstasy, Dionysian. We want to put the logic of the system, functioning, efficiency up for discussion. Nietzsche sends his regards, but so does Bataille.

So I sit in a café in Paris, my backpack packed; tonight I fly to Auroville. And of course I wonder why I have to write this in a blog now. And why I have to fly to the other side of the world. Check your privilege. And why do I write so much in the first person?

Goodbye

Apparently I am serious about this. Many years ago I told everyone who wanted to hear it that I was done with capitalism. Just as I had, for even longer, taken leave of Christianity’s circle of thought. Yet for me this meant a life in what is wrong, for I did not succeed in developing a real alternative for myself. There are not many places on our planet where this is attempted either. It is no longer enough for me to have a critical attitude, and I do not find it acceptable for myself to gather resources within the system in order to redistribute them individually. Offering consolation is not my way either.

Surely we must act; things cannot go on like this. It is bad for the environment, but also bad for us. This is so often left unspoken in today’s debate. It is not only about saving the planet, but ourselves. We need new ideas not only from engineers, but also from philosophers and spiritual thinkers and seers. Perhaps we do not need any new ideas at all, but could remember old ideas and think about how to adapt them in an increasingly complex civilization. What would a world look like without capitalism and without colonialism and crusades? Why do so few people think seriously about this?

I have no idea what awaits me on the next stage. On verra, we will see. Aurobindo sang of fire; it is essential for seeing. I hope I will not arise again as a phoenix from the ashes, as the same as before. That would truly be a tragedy. Rather, I want to become fire myself, remember that we are made of melted stars.