The Origins Of Wonder

I was just cycling home a few minutes ago, my mind racing as I pedalled, not so much in tune with the motion but rather with the fact that I'll be leaving in a few days for my yearly retreat and, as always, there's a lot of stuff that I want to do before I go.
Actually, one of the big advantages of doing a yearly retreat is that, at least once a year, you have to get your life in order. From living space to head space.
And this, in conjunction with the film I saw last night, Elegy, the Manga I want to read for Mondays discussion and considerations about people I know, prompted this wonder musing in my mind.

And this is why we're here, right?

As I found myself thinking about all the different Manga series I was carrying I started wondering if I'd actually enjoy any of them (in the sense, would I like to read more of the series or not?), if I could actually relate to the stories and themes revolving around pre-teens, most likely set in contemporary Japan... it seemed a bit far fetched as I cycled but, I thought, even if I don't relate, it's definitely something I'm curious on doing, something I think I will benefit, be more in touch with the cultural here and now so to speak.
And, if I was lucky, perhaps I would feel that sense of wonder that I experienced so many times as kid. That's what it means to me to be a kid. To be imbued of that sense of all pervasive wonder which we tend to equate with intense happiness.

In doing some research today for covers for the Jack Of Tales comics series, I ended up bumping into an Alan Moore interview on a comics website and there he talked about League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen and how Philip José Farmer had had such a massive influence on the title. He mentioned one of Philip's books: Tarzan Lives! to exemplify the mutability of his writing. Alan said something like "as if it had been written by two Burroughs". Meaning Edgar Rice Burroughs (the creator of Tarzan) and William S. Burroughs (a writer that explore writing through drug induced states and whose life was one big, dangerous experiment).
I've read them both and, for different and similar reasons, I've enjoyed them both immensely. Tarzan was obviously a childhood hero, with plenty of righteous fights and nature and damsels in distress. William Burroughs was the first person to safely take me into the realms of the deeply altered human mind. He was using his own hallucinations and surrealism to bring us one step closer to reality. A bit like observing a madman will give you insight into the true nature of madness and thus broaden your perception of yourself and the humanity at the same time.
All this to say that I could feel through Alan's words his own sense of teen wonder when he too read those authors.

And this took me to muse on how that sense of wonder had developed in me? Why does it surface at all?

"We think in absolutes"

I believe this was the sentence that simply popped into my mind. Meaning, we experience in absolutes, rather than thinking. I knew what I meant even though my mind tends towards words I use only too often...

The idea here is that when we experience something, at the root of our senses, there is no comparing of that experience with anything else. Things just are. Each and every single experience is complete. And every single one feels like the first time. Each is unique. Each is complete.
To me, this is the physiological root of wonder.
We have it all the time. At each passing moment. But, because our degree of integration with ourselves, with our body and senses is frail, we rarely perceive this completeness.
We only experience what comes after.
Which is the comparison between this experience and many others that have happened before.

I felt very happy and alive (as I always do) when this happened.
My mind was racing now in order to observe more of this perception. I found myself traveling back in time in my own memories trying to see where the perception of that feeling had started and had grown into a more conceptual form.
The thing I came up with were some very old animation series from the late seventies, early eighties. Namely Future Boy Conan and The Mysterious Cities Of Gold.
This was where fantasy, wonder and spirituality started to become connected the way they have been since.

For years I had an image in my head: there's a young kid staring at the horizon, perhaps on top of a hill and, suddenly, the ground beneath his feet starts to shake, everything begins to collapse and a huge ship, as big as a city but in the shape of a manta ray, lifts from under the ground and hovers high above him, amidst all the destruction.
That image was so powerful that it stayed with me for years and years. It's still here. I had forgotten the name of the series to such an extent that in my early teens I had started to doubt the actual existence of such a series. I'd asked around but no one seemed to remember.
It was only in my mid twenties that I found out that it belonged to the animation series called Future Boy Conan. As soon as I saw some images I realized it was that boy on the screen that I had seen in that image many many years ago.
I still haven't seen the series again but one day I will and, when I do, I'm sure that image, or something close to it (after all memory does change with time) will be there waiting for me.

The other thing that I realised was that even though these series had such an incredible sense of fantasy and wonder in them because they were being shown on television, because schedules kept changing (television was quite irregular when I was a little kid, shows would be announced simply on the day, not be aired at all, delayed for an hour, anything was possible in those, still early, days) I'd often miss good chunks of series altogether.
I remember watching a re-run of The Mysterious Cities Of Gold when I was about sixteen or seventeen. And even with a regular schedule, I'd often miss an episode here or there.
And, because of this haphazard nature of television, we were not presented with a continuous, smooth flow of plot and story development. No. We were presented with parts of the story. Some episodes you'd see many times. Some you never did watch.
I think this had a curious effect on my mind.
I had to fill in the gaps.
So even though watching television is a pretty passive activity, the way you watch it can also truly engage with your imagination.
Besides the obvious daydreaming about your favourite series...

This somehow took me to think about the main theme of the film I saw yesterday (Elegy): ageing and the realisation of life.

Why does something so obvious and omni-present as growing old surprise us so much? This in the sense of the film, more clearly expressed in Tolstoy's immortal words:
"A man's greatest surprise is age."
Why is it such a life changing realisation? Why is it so painful? Shouldn't we slowly grow accustomed to it?
I'm not talking about rational, logical explanations here. I'm talking about the emotional side of it, so seemingly uncontrollable.

Here's perhaps the glimpse of an answer.
I think the basis for this confusion stems from our good old, root perception versus conceptual perception.
At a sensory level perception is always complete and immutable. One's perception of heat surely depends on the amount of heat sensors one has in the skin but, however many, however accurate, the information they provide is always complete. Remember, there is no comparison at this level. That touch consciousness is always perfect from an internal perspective.
This means that, at every moment of awareness, on a root level we are always complete, full and fully present.
But then the mind starts to decipher all this information.
It starts separating it, trying to make "sense" out of it. Fitting it in boxes so it can create based on it, so it can more easily create a bridge between this moment of awareness and the next.
This is when the "problems" start...

That splitting up of information in many different possibilities (and/or meanings) creates waves of neuronal comparison. The sensory stimulus interacts with the brain, expanding the original inflow of information with the one that the brain is creating through its interaction with it.
Memory is naturally engaged with this. And by memory I don't mean necessarily experiences we remember. Actually, I believe that most of this mnemonic engagement is with forms (I have no better word to try and define these structures) we don't even know we have as part of our mind space.
So, this second stage is all about creating a different state. Of, apparently, noticing the differences. Therefore, and because this is usually the state we begin to pay attention to (the sole state where we are "awakened") this means we only consider this one side of the equation. We see the distance rather than what's there.
This is the origin between the still "being young inside" (the raw sensory information reaching us spontaneously at every moment) and the "feeling old" when one looks at the mirror or observes how much more difficult it is now to move or have energy or whatever (but this is the comparative state given by the mind, observing the differences).

Obviously, because we haven't integrated these two seemingly opposing perceptions into a single experience (non-dual, constant, continuous, etc), we tend only to focus (somewhat unconsciously) on the difference between what was and what is.
And this causes us pain.
But, as always, this pain is mainly present because of our ignorance about our own conditions. Because we aren't truly awake. Ie, we cannot contemplate and be aware of the simultaneity of both perceptions. One non-dual in nature (raw sensory data) and the other wholly dualistic (our mind comparison mechanisms based on sensory and brain data).

In sum, we feel the pain of being old because we aren't truly in touch with ourselves within the moment.
When we are our age has no pain, regret, loss or whatever negative feeling attached to it. Because we are in touch with the raw sensory data streaming in. We are in touch with the feeling of completeness it entails. With its timeless quality (time only exists by comparison, ie, this moment is different from that one. Within the moment, there is only the moment, there is nothing else).
We are neither young or old.
We are timeless.
We are closer to our truth and to its all pervasive qualities.
We are fully awake in being.

Peace.