Logos versus Mythos – The World versus my world
Devdutt Pattanaik in a Ted talk posted November, 2009 entitled “East vs. West – the myths that mystify discusses the differences between my world and the world. He suggests that: “If you understand the difference between 'the world' and 'my world,' you understand the difference between logos and mythos. 'The ‘world' is objective, logical, universal, factual, scientific. 'My world' is subjective. It's emotional. It's personal. It's perceptions, thoughts, feelings, dreams. It is the belief system that we carry. It's the myth that we live in.” Although in this day of more sophisticated methods for determining scientific truth, we may be discovering that what we thought was a truth or a complete truth was in fact not “the truth” or only part of a truth. Most of us would agree that the more we open our eyes and the broaden our experience of the world the closer we come to a larger truth. Sadly, many of us will continue to confuse the “facts” of our very limited personal world of emotions, perceptions, thoughts, feelings, dreams and the limited view of the framework of our religious and/or spiritual beliefs with eternal truths or rules by which one judges people or behavior. Cultures such as the largely Hindu culture of India which embrace more diverse views of behavior and even the nature of God can be very confusing to those of us who are accustomed to very precise commandments and huge lists of ethical rules which will determine the rightness or wrongness of particular behaviors. At times, many of us even use these commandments or rules to judge the worth of individuals. Allowing for rituals such as the “Hindu ritual of Darshan,” Hindus don't have the concept of commandments. So, there is nothing right or wrong in what you do in life. So, you're not really sure how you stand in front of God. So, when you go to the temple, all you seek is an audience with God. You want to see God. And you want God to see you, and hence the gods have very large eyes, large unblinking eyes, sometimes made of silver, so they look at you. Because you don't know whether you're right or wrong, and so all you seek is divine empathy. "Just know where I came from, why I did the Jugaad." (Laughter) "Why did I do the setting, why I don't care for the processes. Just understand me, please."
If this is a foreign way of thinking for you the reader as it is for many of us, you might have to read this several times before beginning to grasp the essence of the concept. One might even need to look up the term Jugaard but even then one may have think outside one’s box. Wikipedia explains that the term Jugaard moves from a literal meaning of machinery to that of “a mechanical solution to a problem, work around to skip or solve a problem.” (not to be confused with the same term which may be used to “objectify women or their body parts” or “to have sex”).
On the other hand, my understanding of the words and behavior attributed to Jesus are, at times, more consistent with this goal of attaining the empathy of God. Whether He was talking to the prostitute, to Judas or the others one notes that aside from a momentary lapse into the very human angry response, his primary response is one of empathy. He is quite aware of the “fact” humans are not Gods. We are very fallible and often very short-term oriented problem solvers. We may in fact steal, tell a lie, or take some other short cut to achieving a goal. Interesting if one studies the teachings of Buddha one might be invited to explore letting go of the use of dualities when viewing behaviors – right, wrong, good or bad. Often one is guided to explore opening one’s eyes to “see” the behavior and just notice it. One can then decide if one want to repeat that behavior or let go of it.
The irony or even paradox is that the more accepting we are of the logos view of each other and the world the more we are able to come to an acceptance of and even identification with each other which then allows for the orthodox or unorthodox approach to problem solving. Mr. Pattanaik then goes on to talk about leadership. He described a ritual for leaders: “we created a ritual for leaders. After a leader completes his training and is about to take over the store, we blindfold him, we surround him with the stakeholders, the customer, his family, his team, his boss. You read out his KRA, his KPI, you give him the keys, and then you remove the blindfold. And invariably, you see a tear, because the penny has dropped. He realizes that to succeed, he does not have to be a "professional," he does not have to cut out his emotions, he has to include all these people in his world to succeed, to make them happy, to make the boss happy, to make everyone happy. The customer is happy, because the customer is God.” (KRA – Key result area; KPI – Key performance indicators.)
We have now circled back to a KPI of the Christian tradition. Is the behavior pleasing to God? Perhaps the notion of God has to be examined. Is He/She/It operating in the world or my world? Have we envisioned or conceptualized a God which is limited by our very tiny, personal beliefs, thoughts, feeling, perceptions, and dreams?
On this 31st of October, 2016 in a world which is dominated by violent conflicts over the world versus my world, perhaps we could ponder this question. Or not!
Written October 31, 2016
Logos versus Mythos – The World versus my world
Devdutt Pattanaik in a Ted talk posted November, 2009 entitled “East vs. West – the myths that mystify discusses the differences between my world and the world. He suggests that: “If you understand the difference between 'the world' and 'my world,' you understand the difference between logos and mythos. 'The ‘world' is objective, logical, universal, factual, scientific. 'My world' is subjective. It's emotional. It's personal. It's perceptions, thoughts, feelings, dreams. It is the belief system that we carry. It's the myth that we live in.” Although in this day of more sophisticated methods for determining scientific truth, we may be discovering that what we thought was a truth or a complete truth was in fact not “the truth” or only part of a truth. Most of us would agree that the more we open our eyes and the broaden our experience of the world the closer we come to a larger truth. Sadly, many of us will continue to confuse the “facts” of our very limited personal world of emotions, perceptions, thoughts, feelings, dreams and the limited view of the framework of our religious and/or spiritual beliefs with eternal truths or rules by which one judges people or behavior. Cultures such as the largely Hindu culture of India which embrace more diverse views of behavior and even the nature of God can be very confusing to those of us who are accustomed to very precise commandments and huge lists of ethical rules which will determine the rightness or wrongness of particular behaviors. At times, many of us even use these commandments or rules to judge the worth of individuals. Allowing for rituals such as the “Hindu ritual of Darshan,” Hindus don't have the concept of commandments. So, there is nothing right or wrong in what you do in life. So, you're not really sure how you stand in front of God. So, when you go to the temple, all you seek is an audience with God. You want to see God. And you want God to see you, and hence the gods have very large eyes, large unblinking eyes, sometimes made of silver, so they look at you. Because you don't know whether you're right or wrong, and so all you seek is divine empathy. "Just know where I came from, why I did the Jugaad." (Laughter) "Why did I do the setting, why I don't care for the processes. Just understand me, please."
If this is a foreign way of thinking for you the reader as it is for many of us, you might have to read this several times before beginning to grasp the essence of the concept. One might even need to look up the term Jugaard but even then one may have think outside one’s box. Wikipedia explains that the term Jugaard moves from a literal meaning of machinery to that of “a mechanical solution to a problem, work around to skip or solve a problem.” (not to be confused with the same term which may be used to “objectify women or their body parts” or “to have sex”).
On the other hand, my understanding of the words and behavior attributed to Jesus are, at times, more consistent with this goal of attaining the empathy of God. Whether He was talking to the prostitute, to Judas or the others one notes that aside from a momentary lapse into the very human angry response, his primary response is one of empathy. He is quite aware of the “fact” humans are not Gods. We are very fallible and often very short-term oriented problem solvers. We may in fact steal, tell a lie, or take some other short cut to achieving a goal. Interesting if one studies the teachings of Buddha one might be invited to explore letting go of the use of dualities when viewing behaviors – right, wrong, good or bad. Often one is guided to explore opening one’s eyes to “see” the behavior and just notice it. One can then decide if one want to repeat that behavior or let go of it.
The irony or even paradox is that the more accepting we are of the logos view of each other and the world the more we are able to come to an acceptance of and even identification with each other which then allows for the orthodox or unorthodox approach to problem solving. Mr. Pattanaik then goes on to talk about leadership. He described a ritual for leaders: “we created a ritual for leaders. After a leader completes his training and is about to take over the store, we blindfold him, we surround him with the stakeholders, the customer, his family, his team, his boss. You read out his KRA, his KPI, you give him the keys, and then you remove the blindfold. And invariably, you see a tear, because the penny has dropped. He realizes that to succeed, he does not have to be a "professional," he does not have to cut out his emotions, he has to include all these people in his world to succeed, to make them happy, to make the boss happy, to make everyone happy. The customer is happy, because the customer is God.” (KRA – Key result area; KPI – Key performance indicators.)
We have now circled back to a KPI of the Christian tradition. Is the behavior pleasing to God? Perhaps the notion of God has to be examined. Is He/She/It operating in the world or my world? Have we envisioned or conceptualized a God which is limited by our very tiny, personal beliefs, thoughts, feeling, perceptions, and dreams?
On this 31st of October, 2016 in a world which is dominated by violent conflicts over the world versus my world, perhaps we could ponder this question. Or not!
Written October 31, 2016
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