the art of possibility

Kierkegaard's famous quote:

“If I were to wish for anything, I should not wish for wealth and power, but for the passionate sense of potential -- for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints; possibility never. And what wine is so sparkling, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility!"

Kierkegaard's 'existential' awareness of possibility, as all intoxicating things are, potentially dangerous, and ultimately depressing. All the things that one cannot do, even though it is 'possible', the feeling of an evanescent inertia, the burden that the possible puts on what is ... You get the idea. The idea, following the path of development of the existential philosophy, culminates in the possibility of God.

God is a possible, God is a contingency, so it bears its mark upon the world. If only it were not possible, if only it could not exist, then we would not have felt the terrible burden.

The imagery is that of the hanging thread, the worlds of possibilities along with God are hanging by the thread, so to speak, and the quantum bubbles of that primordial soup preceding the big bang - they are the constituents of that possibility.

The individual feels, when left to himself, that he could not under any circumstance trace the beginning, the initial condition of the universe, that which was created at the spur of the moment. And he heaves a sigh of relief, knowing that he could not possibly change the preordained order of things. But wait a second! What if he could? The inner demons of his psyche are pouncing on him, never letting the possibility of tracing the possible escape from him. Ah, sweet forgetfulness, the individual cries, the possibilities are expanding and multiplying, they are getting on top of each other! Sweet forgetfulness, he prays for: work your charm!

That possible God which preceded our barren World, the world of emptiness, the world of unfulfilled lives, he gives the world a thrust, and we feel the responsibility, the burden of an unhappy freedom, freedom to feel regret and to feel imprisoned !

Or so it would seem...

The cure may lie in the way of looking at these complicated feelings, and seeing them for what they truly are, a complex of emotions, that feedback on each other. They are a very unconstructive way of looking at the events surrounding us, they are the language bubbles, that are freely arising just as in that pre-big bang moment. And they DO NOT EXIST. Let us attack the beast of burden with its own emotional weapon: this mesh of unhappy feelings, they could exist, however, they are a possibility that was not granted growth into being, because before being they annihilated themselves, they are the ghosts of departed quantities à la Berkeley. It is not possible to dwell on them, because you cannot dwell on them.

That which came into being, in the meantime, has grown into a full-fledged flower, and it is up for grabs, it is yours for the taking.

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