Mythology, Meaning, Motivation, and Action

As someone with a keen interest in the relationship between the mental and physical world, especially the role of media and how media influences one's perspective on reality, the recent financial crisis and presidential elections in the United States have been very interesting to watch. Today's news are a form of mythology, and it is interesting how rapidly these myths are transmitted around the world and affect people's perception and attitudes. There was another story in the news that 8 out of 10 people say that their perception of the economy is a significant cause of stress. On the flip-side, the election of Barak Obama brought many African Americans to tears (of joy), with the older generation still able to recall the days of segregation less than fifty years ago.

I come from the perspective that language and media, just as science and religion, are methods for communicating conscious experience through the realm of the mind. If you examine what is around where you are sitting, standing, or lying right now, there are physical objects that you experience around you that take up space and time. Things are as they are. How you feel about what you see, whether they are agreeable to you, whether you like or dislike what you are experiencing at the time, etc. are in the realm of the mind. Just as the physical world seems to be made of structures and acted upon by forces (gravity, electro-magnetism, etc.), the mind is also made of structures (ideas connected by emotional attachments).

Emotions keep you physically safe. If a hungry lion walked into the room, most people would experience fear, triggering a "fight, flight, or freeze" response that will keep you as physically safe as possible given the circumstances. Emotional attachments to ideas (or "feelings") are not so clear, especially when negative or destructive emotions are involved. These become especially dangerous when they motivate action.

Media and especially the news stories do not evoke good feelings. A story, for example, of how an eight year old kid shot and killed two adults half-way around the world may not have any bearing on your physical well-being, but when you bring in empathy and consider the future of the family and those that were killed, what does it do to how you feel? From the perspective of your physical immediate surroundings, what sort of impact does such a story have? Serves as a good example for a blog entry? Gossip material? What happens when this story spreads (and I am guilty of this just by bringing it up)? How different is this vs. the role of mythology?

Anyone that has gone on an extended vacation or retreat knows that it is possible to survive and not make a conscious (in some cases obsessive) effort to find out about the latest news. There is a great line in "Dark Side of the Moon" by Pink Floyd that reads:

The lunatic is in the hall

The lunatics are in my hall

The paper holds their folded faces to the floor

And every day the paperboy brings more

I am not saying that you should completely avoid the news. What I am hoping to do is to make you more aware of how the news influences you emotionally (hence biochemically) and affects your perception and subsequent actions. There is also the flip-side of advertising and desire (how does porn work?).

For most people, if you just stop right now and look at or meditate on what is around you, most people will find that they are fine. There is really nothing to fear, physically. So where does the fear that you may experience come from? And how does this arise? This is why practices such as meditation, mindfulness, and presence are so beneficial.