The “civilizing-of-man”,
(going from a life driven purely by animalistic instinct
to one wherein conscious thought has the power to override same),
is more than a collective-size metaphor for 
an individual man’s desire to, “wake up,”
it is a working metaphor,
a parallel reality in which the mass ensemble of humanity is constantly playing out on
 the whole stage that is Earth
the individual drama that is being performed in
one man’s struggle for Enlightenment.

Simply Put: Humanity’s collective move to a life that is increasingly civilized, 
(which is one that is led by conscious thought rather than by  physical instinct),
is a larger, slower and cruder version of an 
individual man’s effort to 
awaken to an expanded state of consciousness,
(as such activity has been historically, 
and commonly called).

Man’s collective, everyday state of consciousness is still too dominated by physical instinct to suit life,
and thus even as barbaric atrocities are still being committed in one place, 
the always-present, reactive verbal outrage in another 
evidences life’s endless efforts to move mortals to live a life directed more by thought, than by the gut.
History is nothing but the record of mankind’s slow, but inexorable tango dance,
one step forward, half a step back,
rather than a straight ahead march toward this goal,
and none but the deeply asleep and deluded
can fail to recognize this.

It is one thing to be stabbed and robbed, 
and to take it personally
but quite another to see mass versions of same 
taking place outside your own skin as proof of mankind’s future being mugged.

Simply Put #2: Regardless of local examples to the seeming contrary,
if you cannot stabilize your thinking long enough to
clearly recognize that the overall life of man continues
to become safer, more comfortable, 
and more enjoyable
then you are terminally blind to the very reality that The Enlightened see.
 
 

To carry forward my ad hoc model for today
I give this expedient premise:
The civilizing of man is mankind’s version of
 an individual man’s struggle to awaken.
 

In the herd of humanity it is only the collective herd that seeks to wake up,
which in their collective mind is the desire to 
live a more civilized life,
but life does not require ordinary members of the herd to make any
individual, specific efforts toward this end.
The civilizing of mankind occurs gradually,
and is experienced en mass,
while it could be said that 
what an individual man experiences who, “wakes up” 
is a “civilizing” that is immediate, radical,
and entirely personal.

If you entertain the thoughts that appear in your head that are critical of humanity,
you haven’t got even a small clue as to what is actually going on in life.
All around you life is pushing everyone toward an enriched, less savage, 
less parochial & prejudicial state of consciousness,
quite slowly, and with obvious stumbles and changes of direction,
but so too does it do with a strain of wild berries that it is steadily improving.
Clear your head and just look:
acting collectively, and with no individual awareness of their roles,
people all around you are trying to wake up
(in quotation marks of course);
belief-in and worship-of a god is a weak, diffused attempt to expand consciousness;
so are all the arts;
so is all science,
and so too is all purely intellectual activity.

A sincere priest and secular philosopher alike are being pushed by life to 
expand their consciousness.
So are peace-makers, and all doers-of-good-deeds,
but they have no individual understanding of their motivation, 
and no personal aim beyond solving the physical problem before them.
Humanity may eventually & mechanically, “wake up”,
but an individual never will unless
that be his present, specific, and abiding goal.
 

As things stand now,
ordinary men are not individually bothered by their own state of consciousness --
--  only by that of others.
A believer in Religion X sees nothing untoward in his
fanatical hatred of those who believe in Religion Y.
His state of consciousness in this matter is right,
and theirs, wrong.
Thus is his enmity for them also right.
To a more awakened consciousness, 
such thoughts as these are not “wrong”,
they are simply meaningless.
It is a predictable example of humanity’s collective level & state of consciousness.
It is a state of consciousness that  is totally dependent on binary thought,
which by its very nature is preference & prejudicial.
Thus, for an ordinary man’s mind to believe in Religion X, 
Philosophy X, or Political Party X,
his consciousness must prefer it to all others,
and must find the thoughts that define his beliefs,
and on which their very existence entirely depends,
to be “right”, and all conflicting ones, “wrong.”
Ordinary thought can only operate by
4 being the only “right” sum of: 2 plus 2,
and any other answer being, “wrong.”
This is the beginning & conclusive statement regarding humanity’s present,
collective state of consciousness,
and it has served him well in the physical realm.
It is in the intangible world of thoughts and words that the problems arise which
life works on gradually,
but which so trouble a few that they seek to 
individually push beyond mankind’s present, collective position.
 

To a more conscious mind,
one not hobbled by the parochial, and prejudicial, 
the thoughts, and words of collective humanity are foolishness  --  not wrong -- 
--  just vacuous -- 
without substance or significance.
They treat human thoughts and words as reality,
when they are but sounds and signals 
pointing TO reality.
How can Religion X be superior to Religion Y when they are both nothing but
imaginary structures conjured up by human thoughts.
Who is the tallest: 
The Mad Hatter or The White Rabbit?
 

Even though life ceaselessly pushes man’s consciousness toward 
ever increasing complexity
it is obviously satisfied in general, at any given time
with its instant state, (or else the instant state would not BE the, “instant state”),
but a man with the virus to “wake up” does not have the patience of life;
he wants his consciousness freed NOW of
the blinding, strangling, nauseous restrictions of binary,
this-or-that, 
pardon-me-while-my-own-thoughts-
poke-my-own-I-out,
consciousness.
 

The unrecognized poster boy for, Civilization
should be an awakened man,
(and collectively, humanity has given it a 
watered-down shot on several occasions),
but a man actually awake to what’s going on in life
is beyond measurements of either being 
civilized or not,
same as he is past the point of either being 
awake or not.
Collective humanity will forever proceed at 
its own designated pace, 
(about which any individual’s criticism is proof of their sleep),
and the few, here-&-there, 
wired up instinctively to be in a hurry
will apparently forever be around
privately engaged in what is arguably the only
actually PRIVATE activity available to man.

For those with the bug,
there’s nothing else like it,
and nothing else will do,
but don’t forever tarry in the time wasting zone of mistaking what it actually is,
and overestimating its importance at the expense
of how you think about your fellow man.
 

I leave you today with this:
if life had a sense of humor as perverse and sarcastic as do some of you
it would have arranged things so that those who  --  want to wake up
are forever prevented from doing so
as long as they see the rest of humanity as  --  being asleep.
 

(For any of you up to The Advanced Version:
stick what I just said
entirely in your own head.
Apply it strictly to you and your own desire to 
wake-up,
and see where that may lead you.

…..[some where profitable, I guarantee].)
 
 

The Indian Ocean too seductively calls.
    A quick, “Splash, splash!” and it’s all over.

        Come on --  take the plunge.

                                            Jan