The Connected Self
January 31, 2012
Another excerpt was by Catherine Keller on the self and God. She argues for a connective, relational-process view of the self which I found very refreshing. Here are some excerpts:
What is the self-timing of connective selves? They participate in spirals of becoming and perishing, of micromoments and of montly periods, of moon cycles and solar rounds, of daily and seasonal metamorpohosis. The complex continuum--not the simple line--of a flow of events finally excludes no moment of human history nor any wriggle of worm or burst of star in its timing; through this continuum the groundswell of the past empowers the present. The present self may adjust the tempo to its own desire, but first I meet these complex rhythms as an immanent choreography. The cannot be evaded. If, however, I move consciously with the wider dance of nature and history, I may find the knots of my personal compulsion, my patterns of mistiming, easing into an ampler grace.
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For with every moment, the self becomes another. It come to be a different self. And if I can live with the light, butterfly continuity of soul, and the amassed, changing commune of body, forfeiting the rigid self-identities of the ego, I become not less but more responsible. Rhythmically entraining with my world, I can respond to its desires. I become ever more skillful in the space-time dance of self with other, of same with different, of here with there. Freed realy to feel the others in their claims upon my future, I will need neither to tense up in defensive rebellion against their influence nor to comply in self-aborting imitation of their impulses. Moving in synchronism with others, community is created and communication not only relays information but effects transformation.
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As I flow into my next moment of self, I take place: I am a space-time event.
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How far I have come cannot be counted in years and miles. What counts is only the incalculable integrity of what I am becoming.
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