Recalcitrant Facts

Reflections on the Challenge

When you become aware of a conflict, whether locally or in the news, pause and analyse its cause. Reflect on your emotional response, and bring your hands together in the prayer gesture.

• Experiences

  T had found herself faced with multiple conflicts over the course of the month, some of which she had recognised in real-time and others only in retrospect. On one occasion, she had been torn between adhering to a regular routine for meals and painting in natural light. She had brought her hands together in the prayer gesture, aware of her internal conflict and its relevance to the challenge. Her resolution had been to prioritise eating on schedule over painting in natural light. This decision had been motivated by a concern for her well-being, as she had realised that eating late would adversely affect her sleep and, subsequently, her overall health. In making this choice, she had safeguarded her physical health in both the present and the future. Additionally, she had found a way to practice her art in artificial light, thereby maintaining a sustainable routine. Another instance of conflict had involved a direct conversation with a neighbour displaying antisocial behaviour, which had been necessary for maintaining her usual quality of life.

  L noted that conflicts often result from people not recognising the truth of the matter. During a holiday trip in his electric car, he experienced contention for spots at charging stations. Although there was a general camaraderie among the people vying to charge their cars, he thought that ideology was a hindrance to the widespread adoption of the technology. He felt that if market forces were allowed to operate freely, electric cars would have been adopted more readily, like mobile phones. The expression of the ideology was extremely prevalent. For example although August had been one of the coldest ever, that morning's paper was reporting that it had been warmer than usual.

  N had encountered conflicts with clients who displayed aggressive and manipulative tendencies. Being mindful of the complexities and underlying motives, he initially maintained his composure during interactions. As he navigated through the engagements, he recognized the emotional tactics being deployed. It was like children squabbling over sweets. Throughout, he discerned the root causes of the conflicts and maintained emotional equilibrium.

• Responses

  L drew a parallel between N's account and the Gurdjieff Work. The clients he described were like life's distractions that try to divert one from understanding what is truly occurring. It was important to maintain balance and detachment, like Beelzebub observing Earth from a distance through his teskooano.

  N responded to T, saying there was a learning process involved, in prioritising between eating times and capturing natural light for painting. Such conflicts provide opportunities to make judgement calls on what holds primary importance. T advocated a balanced approach to pursuing one's calling. She emphasised that maintaining physical well-being was a prerequisite for any other activity. Especially in the context of aging, health could no longer be taken for granted, making her more aware of its significance. L said what T described was not necessarily a conflict, but perhaps a confluence of natural events like the earth's rotation and the human digestive system. In his view, these were not conflicts arising from human actions but coincidences shaped by natural truths.

Beelzebub’s Tales, Chapter 30 cont.

With acknowledgements to Harold Good

• Passage

  He begins from a natural feeling of self-preservation to strive with all his Being to destroy as many as possible of the existences of the beings of the enemy side in order to have the greater chance of saving his own existence. And gradually progressing in this feeling of self-preservation of theirs, they then reach the state, as they themselves say, of ‘bestiality.’

  But as regards that means of the destruction of the existence of other beings similar to themselves which I then saw, it was now impossible to apply to it this logical confrontation at which I had just arrived, simply because I then clearly saw that the enemy sides stood fairly far apart, that all warring beings were among their own, and that in these semifavorable conditions, they quietly and absolutely cold-bloodedly, out of boredom as it were, did something with the help of a ‘something’ and thereby destroyed the existence of other beings similar to themselves.

• Discussion

  N said technology had significantly altered the nature of conflict. Where battles once occurred in close quarters, modern weaponry allowed for life-taking at a great distance, often detached from any personal engagement or understanding of the enemy.

  T emphasised how bureaucracy and technology abstract individuals from the immediate consequences of their actions.

  L raised the ethical questions tied to technological warfare, saying that people knowingly chose to engage in developing and using these systems.