listen to your heart
There are few things more frustrating to me right now than the belief that the chief end of humanity is rational certitude... or that rational certitude is a precondition for loving-kindness.
Loving-kindness is the starting and ending point. It is the filter through which all propositional belief must pass. If your heart tells you that something is unloving or unkind, then all rational discourse to the contrary is WRONG. It's possibly even evil.
This is why I find theological and philosophical "discussions" to be so frustrating. Because when you come right down to it, it's often just two people sitting across from each other with angry grimaces on their faces, using every semantic and logical-mathematical trick in the book to argue that it's okay for them to act like a jerk.
Instead of asking, "What is the kindest action I could be taking in this situation? What's the most loving word I could speak?" it becomes a contest of who can be more precise in their justification of unkindness, and more fine-sounding in their clarification of the death of love.
How do you fight against that? Do you take up their own weapons of logic against them? Do you try to use the brute force of word-bludgeoning to convince them to start listening to the still, small voice of love?
I think not.
I think, rather, that you fight against it with stories.
Stories, love, kindness, more love, and maybe even a little bit of Roxette.
- - -
Whazzat? You say you really enjoyed reading this blog post? Well, perhaps someone you know would enjoy it, as well. I sure would appreciate it if you'd share it with them on your social internets.
Or maybe support my writing habit with one of the options at the top of the sidebar to the right. Like, by grabbing a copy of my short story collection. Or picking an option and paying for a custom blog post. Cheerios, Josh. -->
Loving-kindness is the starting and ending point. It is the filter through which all propositional belief must pass. If your heart tells you that something is unloving or unkind, then all rational discourse to the contrary is WRONG. It's possibly even evil.
This is why I find theological and philosophical "discussions" to be so frustrating. Because when you come right down to it, it's often just two people sitting across from each other with angry grimaces on their faces, using every semantic and logical-mathematical trick in the book to argue that it's okay for them to act like a jerk.
Instead of asking, "What is the kindest action I could be taking in this situation? What's the most loving word I could speak?" it becomes a contest of who can be more precise in their justification of unkindness, and more fine-sounding in their clarification of the death of love.
How do you fight against that? Do you take up their own weapons of logic against them? Do you try to use the brute force of word-bludgeoning to convince them to start listening to the still, small voice of love?
I think not.
I think, rather, that you fight against it with stories.
Stories, love, kindness, more love, and maybe even a little bit of Roxette.
- - -
Whazzat? You say you really enjoyed reading this blog post? Well, perhaps someone you know would enjoy it, as well. I sure would appreciate it if you'd share it with them on your social internets.
Or maybe support my writing habit with one of the options at the top of the sidebar to the right. Like, by grabbing a copy of my short story collection. Or picking an option and paying for a custom blog post. Cheerios, Josh. -->
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