Mirror Mirror

I was stunned…

…when political satirist Bill Maher, shortly after the 9/11 attacks, asked if the terrorists might be considered heroes.

However, trying to keep an open mind, I questioned my resistance to that idea.

Could those men possibly fit our current definition of hero?  Shouldn’t a hero or heroine believe in a cause that goes beyond personal interest?  Shouldn’t heroes be willing to sacrifice their lives for an ideal?

But what if we define “hero” as the ancient Greeks did?  If we define “hero” not as one who does “good” acts, but as one who does acts of monumental consequence…

…then perhaps these angry men qualify.

On the other hand, maybe their anger disqualifies them.  If a hero acts out of anger, then is he not acting from fear?

But what if the anger is justified?

I would say that if someone projects his hatred onto someone or something else…

…without looking into the mirror, without examining himself, without questioning the source of his feelings…

…then he is acting out of fear.

A hero may be afraid, but does not act out of fear.

As our hero looks into the mirror, he must be willing to see the one he would call “enemy” in his reflection.

I think we now have two different societies, two different cultures, looking at each other and not comprehending what they see—or at least, not very well.

They do not realize that they’re staring into a mirror.

© 2009, Michael R. Patton
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A Better Heroic

From the look of the movie trailers…

…Amelia, the new biopic about Amelia Earhart, appears to take a heroic approach to the aviator’s life…

…which disappoints me.

What do I mean by “heroic approach”?

Well, I expect the movie to play fast and loose with the facts of the heroine’s life in order to create an idealized image.

But with Amerlia Earhart, the truth is more fascinating than any romanticized rewriting.

She was not the best female aviator of her time.  But she knew how to promote herself.  Her marriage, it is generally acknowledged, was more a business deal than a romance.  In any case, it worked.

If Amelia Earhart had been better prepared for her round-the-world flight, she might have made it, might have even been able to land on that dot of an island.  But a series of fund-raising appearances and tours had left her burnt-out before she even began.

Public legend and actual fact seem to agree on one point: she had something to prove—about herself, about all women.  And she proved it.  This is what she gave us.

To the ancient Greeks, a hero was not necessarily one who did good acts, but one who lived big.  When their heroes erred, they erred big—just as Amelia did.

Did Amelia fly too close to the sun?  I won’t make such a pretentious statement.  In any case, the stories of our new mythology need not reflect earlier tales.  We need to keep some of the old stories, but also add new ones.  New stories of heroism can help us address the questions particular to our times.  These stories will help us see our past, but more importantly, help us see our present, as well as the possibilities of our future.

Yes, the story of Amelia Earhart can provide inspiration for women, for anyone who feels stymied by what others believe she/he can not/should not do.  However…

…to me, she presents a difficult question—a dilemma.

Earhart was a good pilot, but an even better promoter.  By promoting herself, she ended up doing a lot for all of us.  She helped us to see our world—with its yin-yang dance of male and female—just a little differently.  On the other hand…

…if she’d focused more on improving her skills as an aviator, and on preparing for her trip, she might have completed her flight around the world.  No telling what she might have accomplished afterwards.

What I see now, in my country, are businesses and people putting much energy into promoting themselves…

…which is so necessary, these days.  We live in a culture of abundance, of creativity.  It’s hard to be heard in the din.

However, I often see promotion being stressed over product.  The amount of effort put into hype frequently subtracts from the effort put into development—development of the product, of the art, the craft, the concept, the invention.

However, I don’t want to make the story of Amelia Earhart into a cautionary tale.  The best stories don’t provide us with answers, don’t tell us what to do…

…but drive us to question, then perhaps, to change our behavior based on what we find, on what we learn.

As for the mystery of her disappearance…

…I’m all for mystery—our new mythology needs to open us to mystery.  But her disappearance is no mystery at all.  To those who are still searching…

…I would ask, “What are you really looking for?  What have you lost?”  Such questions, too, belong in our new mythology.

© 2009, Michael R. Patton
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Service Station

The moment I wake up
Before I put on my make-up
I say a little prayer for you.
While combing my hair now
And wond’ring what dress to wear now
I say a little prayer for you…

I run for the bus now, dear
While riding I think of us, dear
I say a little prayer for you.
At work I just take time
and all through my coffee break time
I say a little prayer for you…

— from I Say a Little Prayer for You, by Burt Bacharach & Hal David

Listening to Dionne Warwick sing this song the other morning, I thought of a story told by Joseph Campbell…

…recounted by Bill Moyers in his introduction to The Power of Myth:

“One story he especially liked told of the troubled woman who came to the Indian sage and saint Ramakrishna, saying, ‘O Master, I do not find that I love God.’  And he asked, ‘Is there nothing, then, that you do love?’  To this she answered, ‘My little nephew.’  And he said to her, ‘There is your love and service to God, in your love and service to that child.’ ”

A good story for our new mythology.  Of course, our love and service to God can be found in many places.  However, for the sake of argument, I had to ask myself, “Could we even find our love and service in, say, a sports car?”

The question sounds ridiculous, but in our consumer society, perhaps not so ridiculous.

Well, a sports car is an inanimate thing, not a living being.  How could we find our love and service to God in something inanimate?

However, a mountain is also inanimate.  Yet I think we would do well to find our love and service in such wondrous creations—our world will be a much better place if we do.

So, to return to our question: could we—should we—find God in a sports car?  If we see beauty in the sleek design and mechanical power of a Porsche…

…couldn’t maintaining that beauty be a service?

I say, judge the value of any action by what results from that action.

© 2009, Michael R. Patton
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Our Ambivalence Regarding Ambivalence

I have re-evaluated Rick Steves.

After reading his most recent book, Travel as a Political Act, I have changed my opinion of this travel writer, tour operator, and travel show host/producer.

Rick Steves usually gives advice about such matters as the pros and cons of buying an all-day bus pass in Copenhagen.

However, in Travel as a Political Act, he asks us to travel in a way that will challenge our preconceptions about the world…

…not only our preconceptions regarding other nations and cultures, but our preconceptions regarding our own country.

His story of a trip to Iran includes the thoughtful passage below…

…a passage that shows a flexibility of perspective essential to our new mythology.

After videotaping an Islamic prayer service in a Iranian mosque, he writes…

“Leaving the mosque, our crew pondered how easily the footage we’d just shot could be cut and edited to appear either menacing or heartwarming, depending on our agenda.

“Our mosque shots could be juxtaposed with guerillas leaping over barbed wire and accompanied by jihadist music to be frightening.

“Instead, we planned to edit it to match our actual experience: showing the guards and ‘Death to Israel’ banner, but focusing on the men with warm faces praying with their sons at their sides, and the children outside scrambling for mulberries.

“It occurred to me that the segregation of the sexes—men in the center and women behind a giant hanging carpet at the side—contributes to the negative image many Western Christians have of Islam.

“Then, playing the old anthropologist’s game of changing my perspective, I considered how the predominantly male-led Christian services that I’m so comfortable with could also be edited to look ominous to those unfamiliar with the rituals.

“At important Roman Catholic Masses, you ‘ll see a dozen priests—all male—in robes before a bowing audience.

“The leader of a billion Catholics is chosen by a secretive, ritual-filled gathering of old men in strange hats and robes with chanting incense, and the ceremonial drinking of human blood.  It could be filled with majesty, or with menace…depending on what you show and how you show it.”

Steves’ description of the mosque service, with its signs of fear mixed with shows of love, stirs up feelings of ambivalence.  I can neither fully reject nor fully accept that scenario.

Such feelings of ambivalence are troublesome.  But to deny such feelings creates a conflict within.  To alleviate this conflict, we may try to see the service as either totally evil or totally good…

…or else turn away completely and lose the good along with the bad.

If the service is seen as evil, then all who participate further this evil.  If the service is seen as good, then the displays of hatred are condoned.  Either way leads away from peace and towards conflict and war.  The inner conflict is projected outward.  And inner conflicts can never be resolved out there.

Any new mythology must help us to become aware of these natural feelings of ambivalence…

…of the internal pressure that results from our failure to deal with them…

…and of how we deceive ourselves through projection.

My ambivalence may not feel very peaceful, but, ironically, acceptance of this ambivalence leads me towards peace.  Acceptance of ambivalence can actually make me stronger, since it requires a herculean effort to develop and maintain such an inner balance.

For the record, I’m still falling off the beam far too often.

© 2009, Michael R. Patton
sky rope (subterranean rappel)
dream steps