Month: November 2019
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The Weirdness Of Nonduality #3: Could Consciousness Be Eternal?
I just published a meditation of sorts on Medium. It begins like so: Central Question Through meditation, how can one test whether time is ultimately real? Path There are many ways of speaking about the path to enlightenment. In a recent satsang (questions with the teacher), Advaita Vedanta teacher Francis Lucille suggests that — you can begin…
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The 5 Phases People Go Through To Turn Away From The Full Implications Of Total Work
Since 2017, I’ve been exploring the nature and significance of Total Work. I define Total Work as the process, starting at the end of the medieval period, by which human beings have been transformed into Workers as more and more aspects of life have been transformed into work. My approach has been to offer a…
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A ‘Global Community,’ Utter Bullshit, Is A Contradiction In Terms
Building a Global Community In 2017, Mark Zuckerberg wrote a long form blog post on Facebook in which he redefined Facebook’s mission thusly: our goal is to contribute to creating “a global community that works for everyone.” It sounds nice–very Green meme-y (community, inclusiveness, etc.)–but is it true? My suggestion, notwithstanding the possibility that he is being…
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Examining ‘Inevitable To Life Is Death And Not Inevitable To Death Is Life’
Of the human condition, the writer Jamaica Kincaid once wrote, “Inevitable to life is death and not inevitable to death is life.” It’s beautiful–symmetrical, epigrammatic, prima facie enigmatic–but is it true? Is it true that life, having arise, must end? And is it also true that it’s not knowable whether there’s any further life after death–be…
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The Main Lesson Of The Upanishads
The main lesson of The Upanishads, a book I just read for the first time, is that the body must be stilled and the mind quieted in order for the ascent to Brahman, or ultimate reality, to be possible. For someone who hasn’t had any mystical experiences or who hasn’t meditated much, The Upanishads (or The Daodejing or, for…
Andrew Taggart, Ph.D. 