Young children often uncover the world they inhabit with curiosity, entertained by the incredible things they see, learning how it all works along the way. To them, everything is unusual and undiscovered until they notice it and recognize it. Existence without complications.

The perceptive tools to articulate the great philosophical questions that consume thoughts from an introspective search are presumed underdeveloped. All of which assumes that maturity in some way uncovers secrets not seen when cognitive skills are developing.

Perception of time, often endless when very young, speeds up as developmental stages progress, creating a sense that life is much shorter - a reasonable assumption since mortal life is limited and therefore more precious. As expectations and responsibility increase, constraints and compromise unfold, stress does as well. The inability to deal with the conflicts created by challenge can interfere with choice by encouraging procrastination, distorting the prospect for failure or success.

Dreams, all that “stuff” made possible by imagination, begin as children, ever evolving as more is absorbed, then forgotten as reason, logic and culture become part of one’s nature until something in the present triggers that “stuff” that was lost by time. Finally rediscovering that looking through the eyes of a child is the fountain of youth.

History is a look back, a reflection of what has already happened, that can rarely be interpreted objectively. The hope is to achieve a coherent, articulate understanding that makes sense. A balanced approach putting together images and events experienced into an impression, also a basis for making reasonable choices that effect the way the future will play out, recognizing that many different patterns also make sense.

Wherever the passage of time leads, its vastness is filled with infinite potential, precluding knowing precisely how events  converge to produce a particular vision. However  it may be possible to sense trends, identify habits or tendencies whether personal or cultural that can be helpful in speculating the likely path that will occur when everything necessary to happen, to make a future possible, happens.  Perhaps as long as dispassionate objectivity is maintained. Then, variations in trends that imply other milestones along a fork in the road appears out of nowhere.

Inspiration often comes out of left field, eluded by repetitive notions of solitary thinking,  blinded by the denial of reflexive habit. A flow of thoughts, only  transcended by a confident leap of faith beyond consecutive logic that elevates the stage captured in imagery to a different level.

Introspective thought, often liberating, allows individual insight  of external reality, also revealing the willingness to acknowledge the difference between what is seen and how it can be exaggerated by personal perspective, one’s relationship with observable events and a basis for honesty or self-delusion.

It can also be a trap, devoid of new insight if the same elements are the sole basis, regurgitated without new combinations as circular thinking returns to the same spot relying on tested formula.

Spiral thought, circular in nature, leads to another level where the goal is achieving productive change is  primarily   a function of absorbing different external elements into the process, allowing new solutions, usually made possible by communication. Always recognizing that the change in thinking produced by instilling different factors into the equation doesn’t determine illumination, but only increases its potential.

Chosen to argue the optimistic aspects of the current financial collapse at Harvard Law School, I was hard pressed to find something positive to orate,  not knowing anything about Economics and finding the subject incredibly boring. One consolation at the very least, it would be unnecessary to go to the library for research. Enough information could be obtained from the Internet to sound scholarly and well informed at the podium. Discuss trends, be very philosophic, not too specific and answer questions well, also a good way to get elected president.

Perhaps a healthy dose of absurdity, a sound use of satire, with or without humor, maybe an analogy with a memorable cinematic masterpiece, a classic novel, or an odd situation filled with paradoxical choices, especially if the objective is to provoke thought. Whether those ideas are credible or outrageous is for the audience to decide.

Often, after having been accused of pointing out the obvious, I would respond with a twinkle in my eye and an inner smile, “it’s the obvious that becomes invisible and overlooked, camouflaged by all the other things in its constellation.” Now all I had to do was relate this to Economics, the financial collapse and find something reassuring to say about it.

I contemplated my thoughts, looking out at my fellow students and distinguished professors in the audience and said, ” Depression is never having to say your in need of an antidepressant.”

What happens after death is perhaps akin to speculating about black holes (or the current stock market), something now thought to be at the center of every galaxy. What they may  contain is at present, unknowable, and a reminder that time, although infinite, is also finite, the reflection of mortality.

The reason it’s called a black hole is because no one knows how to articulate what the experience of being in one is like, since anyone or anything that goes through it never returns.

The concept of a singularity at its center suggests the symbolism of the microscopic macrocosm, a state where all the laws of time, space and gravity, don’t apply, at least as we  define them from this side.  A dilemma for science that would have to create new laws of physics to elucidate the inconceivable. Perhaps there is a connection here between the way science explains things and religion, identifying the singularity as “the divine spark” which sounds more like revelation influenced by biblical text, or visa versa.

Science Fiction is a way to speculate “scientifically” without the presence of enough supportable facts except to assert assumptions that what isn’t known can be manifested as anything since nothing can be definitively excluded from being imagined, usually using advanced technology that hasn’t been developed yet to embellish the possibilities. When invented, fiction then becomes fact.

Of course, all this is predicated on the assumption that “it” requires an explanation that language in the form of symbols is adequate enough to convey that whatever happens on the other side of the black hole is not nothing.

There are very few subjects that evoke the same kind of emotional reactions as the final outcome. Fear of the unknown, of the potential pain and suffering lurking in the background increases as cycles pass knowing that finiteness is inevitable especially when a close shave with death forces the subject to become a source of profound thought and inspiration.

The question always returns to what is left when the physical is dissolved. Philosophy raises questions, structures thought, but it is still difficult to relate to a non-physical existence, an irreconcilable perception from this side of life evoking the image of a black hole from where nothing returns unchanged, let alone with memory. The hope that something does occur, if firm, trusts that some kind of order or infinite potential exists but still not allowing it to be easily envisioned from this perspective.

There are so many theological explanations that it is difficult to isolate and accept just one. They are often intertwined with culture, language and history while portraying some kind of earthly reflection of what occurs, instilled as part of early development until the time that revelation transforms belief into knowledge. Commonalities of defined divinity offer clues on at least how the accumulation of life transforms; it nevertheless leaves a conscious residue of uncertainty. This turns out to be a very difficult subject with many answers dependent on the kinds of insights that are perceived on the path that leads beyond the event horizon.

How uncertainty in life is faced will help in dealing with anything with confident instinctive spirituality. The choice is whether the view of the void is feared more than the alternative of lingering with illness in an existence that has lost meaning to the one living it. That decision should not be left to others who themselves fear surrendering to the other side of life.

“This Little Pond of Goo,” is the overly simplistic description of the mix of amino acids, the building blocks that combine to form the origin of all earthly life, eloquently coined by Q in “All Good Things“, the series finale of Star Trek - The Next Generation. An oozing mix of gook dripping from Q’s hand as he conveys to a perplexed Captain Picard that it was his actions that would lead to the impending destruction of all life.

Another analogy can apply to this descriptive portraiture, a stretch comprising the delusion of a fictional Imp or perhaps the ideas of a writer on  a satirical romp through reality’s imagination not constructed from a science fiction format. All that is needed is a clear observation to see folly reminiscent of The Little Pond of Goo in real life. A political quagmire of misinformation, ideological failure and greedy self interest for nearly eight years, waiting for history to judge the direction the leader and his crew dictated, an execution of unscrupulous ethics and unsuccessful philosophy. A predicament, moving towards the precipice, unable to stop its path toward the cliff, the only control of which is the speed of approach as a wingless bird attempts flight.

A mess of events created by the Captain in a reflection of his demise. His impending doom approaching as hope broadens with simultaneous anticipation of further potential transformation  in the time left before change, resulting in the quiet  patience within the Pond Of Goo, hoping the precipitation of new possibilities would define a better direction for a more promising future as his destructive impact begins to dissipate.

As Moses led the Hebrews down the path revealed by the parting of the Red Sea, I wonder how the water on either side must have looked.

Perhaps the way Cecil B. DeMille depicted it in his biblical epic film: The Ten Commandments (1956). Walking briskly along the moist seabed littered with gasping fish that sacrificed their lives to point the path to cross. Looking left then right, seeing all the aquatic life floating behind the halted sea walls, alive and held in place, watching all of us passing by, also waiting for it all to be over.

Looking back, seeing the chariots of angry Egyptians following the path into the land between the water, a cloud of dust created by the moving army pressing ever closer. All held by the force and control of the sea, parted according to biblical text, by divine intervention.

Most caught in this situation, especially those faint of heart, would probably have feared that the water would collapse at any time and result in imminent death from its crushing force, the walls rippling its weight, towering all on the path. The sky, dark with low clouds, strong wind, thunder and lightening, blasting above by He who has no name.

Others might recognize the opportunity to transcend personal concerns and strengthen the focus of inner surrender and peace to whatever happens, especially in a chaotic situation such as this, looking forward to becoming one with the sea.

Either way, if you are in the middle of all this, chances are you have no control over the event, nor of the outcome, so why not just relax and enjoy the view, a milieu of turbulent experience while humming a somber tune or a transcendental AUM, perhaps in the presence of a miracle, without ever getting wet.

At times, it feels as if awareness is a repetitive dream and the unconscious is the real me.

The problem is not remembering enough of it when waking up but also having no control while in them.

A comparable analogy is being submerged in the ocean, face up, looking at the sky visible through the distortions of the surface while physically constrained by the weight of the water.

Sound is created by thought and images flowing in all directions.

Sometimes, aware of the approach of consciousness, sensing that although still unconscious, the point of awakening is perceived and I become what I think I am.

Although residue of a lost abstract haunt what I consider.

All that is elusive is not asleep.

“You know we are living in a material world” is more than lyrics from Madonna’s signature song. It is something everyone is doing, consciously or not, molded by cultural impressions and symbols. The learned connotations suggest that limits can be broken by expanding imagination. A visualized horizon realized from the wisdom learned about the material world.

How soon children adapt to their external reality while developing cognitive skills is what allows them to comprehend their surroundings by mastering talents in what has been ascribed as geniuses. Walking at 6 months, talking in complete sentences at 18 months, or writing great works of music at 36 are early reflections of what is absorbed by the five senses, as the development of physical and mental coordination proceed.

Perhaps the purpose of a material existence is to learn the laws by which physicality is governed since being part of it is undeniable while knowing the difference between what is thought to be, from what really is, enhances knowledge. Everything that isn’t corporeal probably defines the ethereal without suggesting whether there is just one spiritual reality or many with infinite levels.

Whatever the void is, divine revelation or unanticipated existence or nothing at all, a residue must be left behind, if only as thoughts, memories impressed as the footnote of one’s life, as each one, individually unique, is part of the continuity represented by an endless string of pearls: a descriptive eastern analogy. Whatever the personal experience, its inclusion is part of a range of possibilities that we all are capable of being subjected to or creating, depending on unidentified circumstances. Respecting differences reflects the knowledge of how easy another life could become our own. A clear assessment when formulating a judgement, a basis for prejudice, is not allowed to influence the process.

Karma, the law of attraction, proposes that elements of correlating force can attract or repel each other based on the nature of the confluence of interacting energies. The magnetism initiated by the field, however defined, exerts influence on all that lie within its orbit. Perhaps thoughts also apply since they can effect outcome, though they remain very difficult to measure.

Cause and Effect generates the arc that instigates more thoughts and actions. Increased awareness of the pattern and its direction can empower one with the ability to challenge, change or reinforce the course by choice. Free will is less about control than the inner knowledge of those things that determine the way events relate by allowing consciousness within interacting energies to exert independent will. Listening to one’s resonance can reveal a reasonable path while courage allows action without needing to know the outcome.