Help
Sign In
community
February 2008 
I F*cking hate Zaadz!
Ewan
I love sitting with people around a table, talking, feeling, sensing, reacting, resonating and growing. I want to buy my friend a beer, I want to hug them when I greet them, smell their breath that's pushed through unbrushed teeth, see the curry stain on their shirt, breath in their emotion when they tell me about the pain and joy of their relationships, embody the feeling of what they say, even when I don't resonate with it. I want to know who I'm talking to with my entire being.
I don't want to belittle the grandiosity of life's connection, by talking to someone through a bloody computer; I hate the materiality of it. I can't enter into it fully; I find it hard to concentrate, to participate.
My own person, my living, pulsing self, my sentient holonic form - compete with passion, shadow and wisdom; with old jeans, an addiction to tobacco and a love of beer; with spots on my face and hair on my toes; with a nuanced ability to read peoples energy, to enter into their energy - to receive it; with my deep seated insecurities and neuroticisms; with my love and adoration of other human bodies - this chaotic mix of brilliance and paradox creates an artifact; a thing, a holon with no inside - no interior, no feeling, no intersubjective mix of unconscious cultural conformity or trans cultural creativity; no intention, no emotion; no consciousness. Welcome to the world of the online blog. I have created this thing, it bears the makers mark from my soul, it reflects my genius and my shadow - but it is only a partiality - a snap-shot of my glorious complexity, the astounding quality of the human form. It is my creation, but it is not me.
This artifact, this blog, will be read, it will experienced by another glorious human being, a human being complete with four quadrants, insides, outsides, love and shit. Do they experience me? No. They see a momentary photograph of my soul - a glimpse of the holonic me, now passed into the AQAL matrix of the past moment, they see the object, but never the subject.
How can this be integral? How can this be the fullest expression of human ‘we space', the miracle of ‘we'? How can we truly know ourselves and each other in the flowing currents of sangha if we communicate via objects?
Shadows hide in this warehouse of objects, this archive of blogs and forums. I cannot resonate with my community, I cannot vibrate with their bodily transmissions, I cannot fully see into their minds, see their beauty and their scars, I cannot hold their hand when the pain engulfs them, laugh when their radiance shines forth. I cannot touch and feel my friends when our interobjective space - our LR quadrant - is a f*cking website.
I cannot seek out their Kosmic address, hold discernment without attachment, seek the blind spots of my perspective with my whole body, and their whole body. I cannot enter into them, use every last inch and angle of my wonderfully integrated and partial lens to know them truly, as truly as I am capable. In this temple of objects I am castrated, stripped of my full spiritual gift, imprisoned behind the bars of objective communication - never seeing, never feeling.
The problem is, I'm really, really hungry for Integral love and embrace, Integral pain and suffering, Integral relationship - the sharing of our 1st persons in an exchange of emotion, projection, and understanding. I yearn for this every morning when I wake up. I'm famished, starved of this community of soul food. And there simply isn't enough food to go around -the menu is too damned small, the spattering of vertically enlightened torch bearers is so tiny that this online graveyard is the biggest scrap we have been collectively thrown. So I'm stuck with you all. And although I hate this flat, 2-D cut-out of your enormity and beauty - I'd rather eat integral cardboard than let my teal self die of hunger.
Access: Public
Oh, Ewan – this is so beautiful.
And I know what you mean.
Eating the “integral cardboard” actually whetted my hunger for more communion – and eventually had me traveling (road-tripping with Liz twice!) to meet up with several integral peeps face-to-face. As will likely happen again, at the integral gathering in 2008!
There are benefits, however, to online interaction in forums and blogs that don't always emerge in face-to-face meetings. Introverts, shy people, those who tend to hold themselves back in physical groupspace can shine through their written words in ways that just wouldn't happen face to face. When writing, people can take their time with what they want to say, edit and revise, sharpen and refine, and express themselves in a manner that live in-person discussion might not allow. Of course there are two sides to that coin – lack of physical presence, gestures, vocal intonations, and facial expressions can lead to “disconnects.” It's harder to tell jokes or be sarcastic through written words on a screen. Harder to dance and hug, too! And easier to fabricate a persona and shadow-project, etc. And some people are better talkers than writers.
You'll just have to start going to meetups! And / or create your own. And if folks can start skyping now and then, that may help some – although sometimes the phone weirds me out. I'd rather write to people or see them face to face. All or nothing for me. Well, not really nothing. Enough to keep from starving!
Again, thank you for this passionate post, Ewan!
Salud,
Mary
Hi Mary
Thanks for your kind words :)
Yes, for me too, online connection has led me onto face to face connection - and some wonderful freindships! Which makes it worth it just for that reason.
And, yes I'm in total agreement with you about the benefits of black and white communication - the careful construction of just what you want to say has been really very useful for me.
The blog was a rather empassioned flow, was never going to be very balanced really ;)
In terms of online space and shy people - I think your spot on there too, its a lot easier to post stuff if your not face to face, or confronted by a big group, which can be really important for people. But I think this also makes it easier for people to hide behind their shadows - I'm speaking from past experience, which is not such a good thing. I would hope that a good real life integral sangha would be able to cope with introverted energy - help it have its own space, and find its voice.
I'm on the case with local Integral groups…watch this space!
Keep on eating!
Ewan
Just to be clear - I also f*cking love zaadz to bits. Its the most fantastic social networking website out there, I gain a huge amount out of it every day I participate in it, and I've made some great friends through it.
The blog was a passionate flow of frustration…I meant every word of it, but its only one half… Just wanted to make that clear.
I feel your hunger for more Ewan, I experience it too.
I love the passion and flow you express!
Connections are being formed in this space that will lead to more tangible interactions in the future. Call me a dreamer, I don't give a fuck :)
peace
pelle
Ewan!!
Man, I tell ya, the particles that your wave drops here for us to roll around in are often sublime! Empassioned flow…Love it! Dude, seriously, I was brought close to tears a couple of times while reading. That's no cardboard there!
I do get what you're saying; I feel it too. The ache for MORE. The desire for touching in ways that are impossible in an online forum. Though I also want to agree with Mary: There are ways that one can feel free to express oneself online that don't arise as often in person, unless you are with people that you know from in-person contact and trust has deepened. The immediate intimacy is something that I love about the I-I pod. In my experience, my shadow comes rushing forth when meeting new people live and I contract a bit. Part of that is intrinsic to being human in this age: boundaries are healthy when you are first getting to know someone in person. But it does take longer to get to the depths that we are able to explore here.
I love your feeling self; transrational is great, isn't it! I used to be so damn serious, most of the time. Now I am rarely SERIOUS. I see that level of play in your particles!
IN view of the fact that we are never going to be able to get ALL 6.5 billion FACE 2 FACE in one room - other than in a process of visualisation and/or simulation of same - & further to my input @ I-I + zaadz - perhaps you could ALL get your MINDs around this 3D use of a 2D web log - & IF you loose your way refer to IT's AlphaINDEX
Ewan, I found this while checking for your new post. I love your energy and your final paragrapg had me in tears.
I am off this weekend to meet Marianthi and Steven in Florence, so my little circle of face to face interactions widens. The greatest joy is that there will be no disappointment, because you are absolutely right, when real people meet in real space, there is so much more and connections deepen.
So this weekend I will be raisng a glass to all of you, in excellent company. If we are lucky, we may even have our company extended slightly. That really will be a case of the more, the merrier.
Liz
Ewan, you young prince of integral starvation and delight - all in the same mouthful.
come around for a social visit again soon.
you never know, you could end up sitting next to transmitting guru’s or dancing the fandango.
love
Lisa
I don't think I would have been able to write any more than how you've expressed in words my exact frustrations with interacting with people via computer and wires.
It really sucks!
I'm going to meet you one day. I'm sure about that.
Thank you for sharing. I feel exactly like you do/did then, only in German :)