Experience vs. Exisitence
I was listening to The Way of Zen again today, and I was thinking about the same thing I touched on in this post. Namely that there are no things in and of themselves, but instead only experiences. (At the same time I was thinking that I should have some direction, and write down a long term set of goals so I could start working on getting to wherever it is I want to go, but one thing at a time.)
It seems to me that I got more out of it this time, and that it really clicked with me that it doesn’t matter what is in an objective sense, and it doesn’t matter if there even is an objective is. A person relates to the universe that she perceives. What that universe is like in some objective sense is not important. In some ways it is unfair, if you ask me, because unlike animals, as far as we know, we can sense that there is some kind of greater organization around us. We can describe it using science and math, and discuss it’s meaning with religion and philosophy, but we don’t really know what it is. My analogy is of an alien watching a baseball game from 5000 feet in the sky. He can, if he is observant, get an understanding of the rules of the game. He could, after some time watching, even make predictions about what was likely to happen. He couldn’t tell you why the pitcher threw the ball, or explain the infield fly rule.
Such are we in our universe. We just don’t know enough of the rules. All we know is what we can experience, and even that is tainted by our memories.