Like a Glitch in the Matrix.....

Whenever something goes wrong at work, and someone asks me why a certain thing fails/ is failing, I normally just shrug and say “Dont worry about it, it's just a glitch in The Matrix". It is self explanatory for anyone who has actually seen The Matrix (1999). If you haven't, I recommend it. But what happens when you say that to someone who hasn't seen it? Then you have to explain what the phrase means, and then how you mean it, and so on.

Without ruining the plot of the movie too much, I always say that there is a glitch in the Matrix when something just happens even though everything should be ok. It's like a computer program that is working fine, but all of a sudden, there's some sort of bug, and it stops working, and you don't know why.

But the deeper meaning, both in the movie, and in real life, is that such glitches reveal the nature of life, which is that of a very sophisticated illusion, and only glitches raise the veil and make you ponder.

Recently I've become more and more aware of the illusory nature of life (reading Emerson really helps, as do crises that shake you to the very core of your being), and I'm beginning to wonder what it is I'm actually doing to work for the real, real life, ie, the one to follow.

The illusion breaks for me in random places. It's like a glimpse with the heart - instinctive gestalt, not easy to describe, and the best way I can explain it... is that you're looking at a series of dots on a piece of paper, and suddenly you see all the dots joined up and a perfectly clear image is rendered, and then when you look again, it's just a series of dots on a piece of paper. Yet you still can't forget what you saw, and you rack your brains trying to think of what it was. Only your brain cannot help...you didn't see it with your eyes...you felt it with your heart, and the heart does not give up its secrets easily - and you have to tease it out almost, and use metaphors and stories and poetry to only hint at what you feel.

And what do I feel? That, more than ever, this life is illusory, transient, and fragile, and that I need to do what I can everyday to reinforce and truly internalise it. There is more, but I have to tease it out, and be patient. This could take years.

Pray for me, please.

2012

7 days into 2012 and one of the longest running traditions on my blog is now broken. There was no long review of 2011, or an equally lengthy set of resolutions or plans for 2012. For those who loved my long, pontificatory entries, where I gave myself high-ish undeserved grades for the year gone past, and set myself beautifully abstract goals for the year ahead...well, I might still do one (or indeed, two) of those. I have a good idea of what such posts would contain, so it wouldnt be hard, but I just dont feel like doing them right now. If I do end up doing them, then it will be by January, or else it won't happen at all.

It's hard to explain (but I guess I'll try anyway, lol). I've read two accounts of a trip to Ziyarat, to visting the holy shrines in Karbala and Najaf, and they, more than anything awake this longing in me to go visit. Please read them (I and II). Next to these, all else pales in comparison. My own personal struggles and failings, and disappointments and frustrations, (of which there are many), my own haphazard attempts to navigate the course of my life, and various other banalities, all fade away. What they write so beautifully and eloquently, that, that is what I want, and nothing more.

In my moments of quietness and peace, which have been few and far between recently, they are what I keep on coming back to. In the end, this is what it is all about, and I hope one day soon to be invited there. All else is secondary.