The Lessons of Rona. Part 9: The Great Awakening?

People are already talking about the kind of world we will inhabit A.C. (After Corona). I think this is premature, not least because we are very likely to get Corona 2: The Sequel and Corona 3: Attack of the Zombies.

TV talking heads have already gone full tilt on the New Normal, and (recalling a previous email) if that’s not a propaganda phrase I don’t know what is.

Other people are convinced that we are in the Dawning of the Age Aquarius. This might be so, but don’t get too excited, for like all signs Aquarius has a Dark Side, and, in the words of an astrologer friend of mine “The Dark Side of Aquarius is all the darker for thinking that it opposes darkness”. This is a reality which many refuse to see…

Others point to examples of how people have come together to help each other in the last few months as positive signs for a more compassionate and co-operative future. This seems to have happened at least in part, but let’s see how things are over the next few years when the social, political, and economic implications of the decisions taken really start to bite.

Others say that you always have a choice between optimism and pessimism, and because thoughts create reality you should always hope for the best and keep your eyes on the prize. This is of course true, but no amount of positive thinking will keep a sandcastle intact when the tide comes in. There are forces at play here greater than us...

And we also should not forget that 2020 isn’t over yet. There’s more change to come…

So, what kind of world are we headed to? The answer is that it will be better, or worse, depending on where you look….

Let’s explore this a bit more with our old friend Plato and his famous Allegory of the Cave. It’s an allegory, rather than a straight story, because it can be interpreted to reveal a hidden meaning.

Plato’s teacher, Socrates, is trying to describe the nature of what it means to be human to Plato’s brother, Glaucon. He asks Glaucon to imagine some people imprisoned in a vast underground cave. They have been there since childhood and are tied up so that they can only look straight ahead, unable to turn around or see the cave entrance far away behind them. Also, behind them, which they also cannot see, is a burning fire, and in between the backs of these prisoners and the fire there is a ledge or walkway. On this ledge there passes all sorts of people, carrying all sorts of things, statues, animals, models, any and everything you could possibly imagine. As people pass along the ledge some of them talk and others are silent.

The prisoners, forced to stare straight ahead, can only see shadows from the parade of activity behind them, and can only hear echoes rebounding from the walls of the cave. As far as the prisoners are concerned these shadows can talk and this is the only reality they know. One day one of the prisoner’s escapes. He slips his chains and stands up, turning first to the fire behind him, which blinds and confuses him. After a while his eyes become accustomed to this new vision, but he is very confused, for he is now seeing real objects and real people for the first time. This is incredibly challenging for him, especially when he realises that the shadows and echoes that he has been watching and listening to all his life are not real. Initially he refuses to accept this and wants to believe that the people on the ledge and the fire are the fiction and his familiar shadows the reality. But his protests are to no avail because he is then dragged forcibly out of the cave and into the sunlight outside.

This now seems too much for him and his eyes are completely overwhelmed by the sunlight. But after a while his vision becomes accustomed to the reality of the outside world and he starts to move about in it, examine it and learn about it. Occasionally he remembers his former state, wretched and ignorant in the cave, and feels sad for his friends who are still imprisoned there. But he also smiles when he recalls how they used to give awards to each other for recognising the shadows as they passed by or for predicting which ones would appear next. The escaped prisoner remembers that he and his fellow prisoners once thought themselves so clever.

Socrates then asks us to speculate on what might happen if the man, for good and noble reasons, decides to return to his imprisonment in the cave. How would he feel? How quickly would his eyes re-adjust? And if he tried to resume his previous activities of interpreting the shadows on the wall would he not seem foolish to his companions? Socrates suggests that they might mock him for having faulty eyesight as a result of leaving the cave. Certainly, some would treat his disappearance and return with suspicion, and many would draw the conclusion that going outside was bad for you and should be resisted at all costs. Socrates suggests that the prisoners may well attempt to kill anyone who forced this experience on them.

Now, this nearly two and a half thousand-year-old story tells us that people awaken individually, but herd together in darkness. It is about how so much of life is a projection, a mere shadow of reality and how encounters with reality are always resisted. It is about how prisoners come to love their prison and about how those who see the truth are not always welcomed in society. But above all it is about how difficult the escape from darkness is, and how challenging, disorientating and confusing it is to leave comfortable ignorance and venture out into the Light.

The man undergoes two awakenings, to the fire behind him, which he first thinks is reality and then to the sunlight outside which he then finds is the bigger reality. In other words, in all things there is the truth, and then there is the truth behind the truth…

The moral of the tale here, I think, is that awakening, where it happens at all, occurs in two stages. First you get a negative realisation, that things are not what you thought they were, and this can be very disturbing. Then, if you are lucky (or worthy, or determined enough, or crazy), you get a second realisation, an awakening to something bigger and better, the truth behind the truth. The second awakening, to what IS, rather than to what is NOT is often so great that everything else fades into insignificance.

So, who is awake? Well, if the whole Rona experience has disturbed you and left you confused and disorientated then that’s probably a good sign, that you have escaped from your chains (or that you have awakened enough to see that you have chains). If, on the other hand, you are just as certain of everything as you were before then that might be good news or bad. It could be that you already made the journey to the Sun outside the cave long ago. Or it might mean that you are sat firmly in your seat watching the shadows on the wall…

This story is only a story but it’s important and helpful because a Great Awakening requires billions of Little Awakenings, where individuals, one at a time, by themselves, first realise what things are NOT, before finally realising what they ARE…

In other words, nothing changes until you do…

UPDATE: Now re-read Plato’s Allegory of the Cave with the idea that social media, Netflix and the internet are the shadows on the cave wall….