The Paradoxical Nature of Human Existence
How to Use Apparent Paradoxes to Your Advantage
When looking at the world, one can easily get the impression that human beings act, on a foundational level, as if they were not only physically invincible, but also as if every living and non-living element around them was untouched by their egoic impact.
What does this mean exactly?
It means that humanity has an inherent propensity for self-destruction — but without necessarily being aware of that self-destructive potential!
This curiously doesn’t stand in opposition to humanity’s inherent drive for evolution and creative ingenuity.
But it does place us collectively in a non-harmonious, anti-life, anti-spiritual plane of existence.
This is exactly the problem that swims around in these troubled waters that we call life: The human ego is a marvelous tool that emerged out of the nanoscopic and microscopic (interconnected) complexity residing in the organic structures of the brain.
It is there to accomplish a multitude of tasks, almost in a self-administered, self-confident, self-deifying manner. It is by nature a mechanism of duality.
And duality — although a quintessential ingredient in the cooking pot of human experience — aims for separation.
The mind loves to separate, categorize and filter sensory information based on individual egoic bias.
Nobody is free from this mode of operation. No body. Not no soul. The soul, as the core, the essence — the light — does not operate within membranes of duality. It operates on the level of wholeness, oneness and universal love.
You can imagine the ego as a fragment that — somewhere down the line — got disconnected from the oneness and now swirls around in the form of small, individual clouds. Those clouds live in people’s heads.
Everyone has a cloud.
And it seems to feed into an even bigger one: the collective ego.
I believe there is a subjective, singular ego that is tied to an individual’s field of perception; and there is a collective, mass ego, which hovers above humanity like a megalomaniac zeppelin casting a large shadow on the face of civilization.
Imagine the ego talking like a creature to itself; somewhat with the syntax of Gollum from Lord of the Rings:
1. Must protect human at all costs
2. Must propagate own opinion as much as possible
3. Must reproduce own kind
4. Must have status and societal approval
5. Must have forceful power
6. Must show that we are better than the Hobbitses…
7. Must have more, more, more!
…and so on and so forth…
Now, this sounds all fun and doom.
But what about the paradoxical nature of humanity and the suggested advantage this paradoxicality contains?
Don’t worry. We’ll get there. But first — we have to look a bit more at what I actually mean by the term paradox, and why I feel like it’s a good idea to put a distinction between the word paradoxical and contradiction.
Paradoxical vs. contradictory
Note: These paragraphs are taken from my work Ode to Love: A book for all times and all emotions, specifically a passage from page 89–90 from the chapter ‘The difference between contradictory and paradoxical’.
Individually, it can be said, that paradoxical thinking is a precursor to contradictory thinking (and behavior) or a precursor to learning and understanding.
It really can go both ways.
When an individual is capable of holding two different viewpoints in their viewport without feeling the need to annihilate one of them, but engaging in a neutral perspective that looks at both sides with childlike curiosity, then the way for learning is pathed.
When an individual is not capable of this act, then the next thoughts might lead down a road of biased conviction, creating a contradictory belief (opposing the internal truth of the higher self).
Collectively, it can be said, that paradoxicality can lead to contradiction more easily than if engaged in it individually.
Paradoxicality in the science community can show both sides of the coin: One scientist brings forth an argument for a certain theory or hypothesis and another scientist brings forth an argument against that same theory or hypothesis.
If curiosity rules (which is often the primary driving force behind scientific exploration), then the paradoxicality in the community can be upheld, and can be looked at from all sides through different lenses — taxonomically, technically, theoretically, practically etc.
This offers a mode of investigation, while not slipping down the waterfalls of contradiction and exclusionary thinking, behavior and interaction.
If a paradoxical element is introduced in a large collective body (let’s say the society of a city), then the result may very well be different:
Contradictory thinking, with certain exceptions, is much more amplified in a group than at an individual level: The resulting unconsciousness and anti-awareness of a human collective stems from not seeing the contradictory energy in the propagating idea, belief or frame of reference.
Usually, the collective contradiction is promoted by one egoic agent, who carries a strong gravitational center and who is able to influence plenty of people.
It can also be the case that multiple institutions, agents or otherwise gravitationally strong centers (that propagate belief systems and philosophies) are the main energetic propellants and the collective contradiction is a reaction to those propellants.
How to use paradoxes to your advantage
The best way to see the proactive, constructive potential of paradoxicality is if we refer back to the example of the scientists and ask ourselves the questions:
- Am I capable of holding two opposing thoughts in my head without feeling the need to negate one of them? (at least immediately, on a whim)
- Can I learn something from both sides, even if there can be only one truth?
- Am I in a position to judge both arguments/sides equally? Or am I not knowledgeable enough to do so?
- What parameters can I use to know when I’m out of my field of knowledge?
- What reference-points do I keep coming back to? Am I embracing novelty in the discussion (internally & externally, when interacting with others)? Or am I habitually focusing more on the tried and tested arguments that make up my opinion?
Now, one can immediately see that these questions open up many, many alleys that can lead to deep self-observation and analysis of society and the world at large.
Practically speaking, what you can use for yourself, as a directly applicable method, are questions like these in relation to your own opinion.
Ask yourself if you are merely repeating someone else’s thoughts and ideas without adding your subjective voice…
Or, a different self-inquiry: Are you basing your viewpoint on a substantial truth of the universe, where you can only act as a ‘channel’ of that truth?
Let’s look at a concise list of the immediate constructive potential paradoxes can generate:
- The advantage of paradoxes lies mainly in the recognition as such. To hold two (or more) different, seemingly opposing ideas in your head can lead to great creativity and creational power. You are becoming more attuned to the links and associations between seemingly unrelated elements. This enables you to combine things that, on the surface-level, appear to have no combinatory potential.
- To comprehend where your own limitations are, when looking at paradoxical occurrences (within and around you), can help you traverse those exact limitations, because your perception for new possibilities opens up. An opening of your perspective means that your surroundings present you with ‘new’ elements — elements that you have not recognized or considered before, but that were always there.
- Recognizing paradoxes can help you to recognize your feelings. Not only the feelings that a certain topic, a person, or an environment triggers. But also the feelings that are ‘simply there’. For example, when you feel the need to say something, just to say something (to bring across your view on a subject), then you can try to observe what comes up, when you refrain from doing so. And as a productive consequence you can reformulate your convictions, readjust your perspective and retune your parameters for proactive thinking. This can lead to great insights and reconnects you with your innate capabilities and intrinsic wisdom.
I hope you enjoyed this article, and if you are interested in a longer, deeper and more poetic observation & discussion filled with inspirational and motivational energy, I recommend my book ‘Ode to Love: A book for all times & all emotions’ to you!
— Michael
(Sidenote: I originally published this post on Medium two years ago, almost to the day, but felt it is just as relevant now as then - and perhaps a discussion of equal importance for the near future)