Imbalance

Upon reflection concerning the notion of balance, I returned very quickly to the conclusion of Grant Morrison's run on Doom Patrol, a comic book series reinvigorated in the mid- to late Eighties. In it, Cliff Steele, a former racecar driver turned accidental superhuman thanks to a racing accident that crippled his body and led to his internment in a metal suit, experiences a fictitious world when presented with a powerful computer into which his neural circuitry has been sent. He discovers some of the imbalances, some of the fractured experiences the world he has created gives him before he is converted back into his metal body thanks to another character (who, proficient with sorcery, manages tor recapture his soul before it vanishes) sans brain, which the villain left callously on the floor. Cliff attempts to reconcile his now complete reliance on machinery with his personal sense of humanity (Alan Moore plays with this in the Swamp Thing series he, similarly, reinvents), but uses his irreconcilable notions of humanity and technology, his own imbalanced self as a weapon against a potentially globe-changing threat.

Imbalance, in this example and in others I have considered, proves to be the catalyst for reconciliation and resolution. If that is the case, I am hesitant to say that imbalance and balance are all that distinct. If imbalance is the means of re-establishing equilibrium, then the equilibrium is pre-existing or simultaneously coexistent with imbalance. If that is the case, then Zen Buddhism's (and notably in the writing of Eihei Dogen) breakdown of dichotomies, dichotomies we use to describe categories and organization in the world, is entirely in the right direction. Dogen focuses much of his writing on everyday tasks--cooking in particular, but he even writes on defecation--in order to appreciate way-seeking and meditation in the seemingly mundane chores of the day. It is through constantly practicing seeking and meditation that we are capable of understanding key aspects of the world and ourselves. Some of those are simply recognizing the limitations our own minds have on perception and experience--i.e. not extending our experiences into unsound conclusions. Beyond that, though, is the practical actualization of all things simultaneously, a key tenant for the tentative notion of enlightenment Zen tends toward. (Note: I am speaking out of my depth here, but do not feel that I am overextending myself in the wrong direction. I am not the best person to articulate these details, but am sort of feeling them out as best as I can.)

Personally, it is in the experiences of imbalance that we are spurred to grow and re-establish physical and mental stability. All the while, when--for example--a population of organisms is confronted with problematic instability, then that population's survival is dependant on adaptation and evolution. Homoestasis--the maintenance of bodily systems' stability to preserve life--goes through similar processes. Sickness is generally thought of as the instability of internal systems (the existence of pathogens, for example) which can be compensated by external modifications (taking pills, warming up, resting, etc.). Sickness can also take place the other way around, or they can be described in a reverse method: an unbalanced environment (the presence of dangerous chemicals, unhealthy food, anxiety-producing stimuli, etc.) results in a unbalanced internal stimuli; that is, the body attempts to respond in kind. The best response is to turn that around: we can function as positive actuators for environmental stability and the re-establishment of balance in our surroundings. I think of Thich Nhat Hanh with his advice to smile and maintain your breathing in order to respond to the gravest of environments, including his own wartorn country.

More and more I note the presence of imbalance in my world, the responses or interpretations of imbalance in the world around us (I just returned from seeing the film 9), the greater I feel the tug of that return to stability. I believe--rather seriously based on the aforementioned--that the something like the socio-psychic pull of our culture, ecology, and consciousness is in the direction of re-establishing homeostasis in ourselves and in the world, which is, after all, the same task. I am not overly optimistic about the success of such an endeavor, but I feel and encourage it all the same. It is in the work of practice and conversation, of meeting and cohabitation, of meditation and action that this wave gains energy, hopefully gains sufficient momentum to turn the tide. The tide, I will easily say, is potent and vast, widespread and also growing, but my own experience suggests that the growth has and will slow. Now, it is a matter of responding all the more powerfully with the abundant alternatives in order to halt that wave.

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This may have gotten a little pie in the sky, but I have been spending a good deal of my time considering how my life ought to look, how I ought to live in the world and what that lifestyle requires. Reading Hope, Human and Wild as well as my travels of late have been key in pushing those reflections. Simultaneously, it is my time home again that allows me the space to consider the importance of that reflection. Perhaps I am more sensitive to the vibrations (as my brother might put it) surrounding me than I have usually been able to be, I am uncertain, but I do feel that I am speaking honestly, and that will have to be enough for now.