Rest and Trust

September 1, 2023September 21, 2023

What is a Name According to the Inklings? A Label or A Portal into Being?

What is a name according to the Inklings?

When Frodo stabs a Ringwraith at Weathertop with his sword and cries out in Elvish, “O Elbereth Gilthoniel!” he doesn’t know what he is doing. Later, Aragorn explains what happened at that moment,

More deadly to him [the Witch-king] was the name of Elbereth.

But why is the name of Elbereth (Varda) so deadly to the Witch-king? Isn’t it just a sound?

It turns out, it’s not. In our divided consciousness, we tend to separate the name from its bearer. We do so subconsciously because modern consciousness perceives everything in fragments. We think that the name is merely a sound, and the thing it denotes is a physical object that exists separately from its name. But that’s not what we find in the Inklings.

In Tolkien’s legendarium, the Elvish languages seem to represent the one proper language, or “language as it should be.” It is the primal proto-language not yet divided by the curse of Babel. It proceeds from the consciousness that perceives the world as a Whole, and in it, words are always one with what they name. In fact, words contain what they name as in a “house.”

The German philosopher Martin Heidegger spoke of words as “the house of being,” not labels or tags on things. He said,

For words and language are not wrappings in which things are packed for the commerce of those who write and speak. It is in words and language that things first come into being and are.

So, what is a name according to the Inklings? It is a portal that ushers the invocator into the invisible realm concealed behind the sound.

For the Inklings, the name and the named are one. The named one is IN the name. The Lord of the Rings was written from a different consciousness than ours as Tolkien himself seems to indicate – it was the consciousness of participation, not separation. Tolkien said,

I have long ceased to invent… I wait till I seem to know what really happened. Or till it writes itself.

For a participated consciousness, there is no difference between the name of a thing and the thing itself. The thing exists in its name. That’s why words always effect what they name. The name is not a denotation; it’s an invocation. That’s why Elbereth was really there at Frodo’s call. There is no other explanation for Frodo’s survival – if Varda wasn’t there, Frodo would have been consumed by the Darkness. But she was there fully present in her name.

What was the theology of St. Gregory Palamas?

Gregory Palamas, an Orthodox monk of the 13th century, came up with curious teachings about uncreated divine energies present, as it were, in the invocation of the divine name.

For him, the Name was not merely an empty sound or a denotation but a living symbol that ushered the invocator into the power behind the sound shape. The true name has the potency to awaken, revitalize, and reveal meaning.

Incidentally, Tolkien’s Middle-earth started with a name when the author came across the name of Earendel in an old Anglo-Saxon poem. Reading the first few lines of the poem produced in him “a curious thrill, as if something had stirred in me, half wakened from sleep. There was something very remote and strange and beautiful behind those words.”

An early 20th-century Russian theologian Pavel Florensky (the founder of Onomatodoxia) was keenly aware of the power of words to engage the invocator into sacramental communion with Logos. According to Florensky, true words do not just communicate; they change. The message is not just information; it is transformation.

At the dawn of the Soviet era, in post-revolution Russia, one of the ways the new regime sought to “create the new Soviet man” was by changing the language and vocabulary.

They literally changed the grammar, spelling, syntax, morphology, and vocabulary of the Russian language to expel certain words and supplant them with a new vocabulary introduced by Bolshevik party ideologists. A whole body of abbreviations and contractions was enforced which, according to Florensky, sounded more “like a splinter in the tongue.”

This practice was, in his vernacular, “linguistic deformity,” the “mangling of words through deliberate disfigurement.” The maimed lexicon of the Soviet machine had its purpose – reducing reality to something less than it is to obtain control.

Who are our modern-day language-makers? They are not poets, monks, or myth-makers. They are technology gurus and people with divided consciousness. So, our language gets inundated with technogenic expressions like “He can really push my buttons,” as if we were devices.

All reductionism is ultimately aimed at gaining control. For example, when we “name names,” we reduce a person to a caricatured controllable state. It is a will to dominate.

Just as Mordor’s black speech by its very sound summoned the reality of domination and oppression, so the reductive language of our day brings with it a less-than-human lifestyle.

The purpose of fragmented language is quite deducible from its effect – the loss of wonder. The ancient Lethe was wonderful; “water resources” are not. They are manageable, to be sure, if that’s what is desired. And often that’s exactly what is desired.

The world has shrunk in our contracted language. Most of it we can’t see because our consciousness often sets limits to our perceptions. We don’t see the giant behind the world. The world doesn’t loom large for us. To reverse the curse, we need to reverse the language. How do you do it?

C.S. Lewis said,

“And if true verse but lift the curse, they (words) feel in dreams their native Sun.”

The art of naming, the art of coining true metaphors, will do the trick.

As we find proper words, our speech will regain its fiery Pentecostal power. The curse will be lifted, and we will tremble at the sound. We will wake up.

June 13, 2023June 13, 2023

Death by AI: The Fundamental Flaw of AI According to Goethe

What is the fundamental flaw of AI?

Recently, someone sent me AI-generated art and said, “How cool is that?” I looked at it, showed it to my wife, and we both said, “It looks kind of dead.”

It’s so mathematically perfect that there’s no life in it.

I immediately imagined myself seeing that picture in an art gallery hanging next to Monet. No comparison.

No doubt, AI-generated art is okay in the sense that it looks like art. But it’s not properly art. Because art is not created mathematically. It’s created inspirationally. It has a soul.

AI-generated “art” may look perfect, but it’s dead because it’s soulless. It cannot have a soul because no one inspired it.

It takes inspiration to have a soul. AI-generated content may read fine, even perfect, but is it food for the soul?

I experimented with ChatGPT, asking it to create a short story based on Russian folklore. It came out fine, readable, passable, recognizable characters that I knew from my childhood, but it was drab and meaningless.

But why? What is the fundamental flaw of AI?

The answer is deeply philosophical and spiritual – not technical or mathematical.

According to Martin Buber, there are two ways of relating to the world. One is called “I-It,” and the other “I-Thou.”

The “I-It” model is seeing the world as separate from myself. It’s literally “I” and “It.” There’s no connection. I am a subject, and the world is an object out there.

I can only observe it from the outside, gather data about it, measure it, and conceptualize it.

In the “I-It” pattern, we believe we only know something when we have studied it externally by amassing data about it. If I gather all the data about the Sun, I know what the Sun is. If I gather all the data about that person, I know what that person is.

But do I really know that person by collecting data about them? No. I have only created a mental concept of that person based on the data collected and mistaken that concept for reality.

May 1, 2023September 21, 2023

What Happens When Your Heal Your Inner Child?

How do you heal your inner child? What is it in the first place?

Your inner child is your inner guidance system that tells you what you need to be happy.

Your inner child is that part of you that always knows what you would have been if you had been loved perfectly.

It’s an inner sensor of love or its absence.

Your inner child is a flower inside you that blooms or fades depending on how much love you feel.

The inner child is that part of me that always tells me the absolute truth about how I feel right now.

If I feel bad inside but keep smiling on the outside, my inner child will be kicking and screaming – and I will feel inner conflict.

If I neglect him for too long and he feels desperate, he will hide – making me feel sad and lost.

If I really hate doing something but try to convince myself otherwise, my inner child will not be fooled. He will break the truth quite bluntly:

“I want to get out of here!”

You may ignore this still small voice for a long time – or even try to silence it entirely – but it will ALWAYS manifest itself in your subconscious through feelings, dreams, and those serendipitous moments when life catches you unawares.

Your inner child is your inner GPS system to always guide you towards perfect love.

The inner child knows what it feels like to be loved perfectly and always protests when you acquiesce to something less.

The more we neglect that voice, the further away we are from perfect love.

The more we want to control, the more inner conflict we feel.

Inner conflict indicates a struggle between what your inner child feels and what your controlling mind craves.

The difference between my inner child and me is that I can lie to myself, and he cannot.

He is my innermost treasure to point me to what I need to be truly happy.

But if I want to connect to this inner GPS system and allow it to lead me to real joy and fulfillment, I need to first recognize my inner child and start listening to him.

It’s not easy at first – the inner child has been hurt. He doesn’t trust me. I have been mistreating him for so many years.

Why would he go out of hiding? Why would he crawl from under the bed?

He will, eventually, if I keep showing up for him with RELENTLESS EMPATHY.

That’s what a loving parent does! They give the child RELENTLESS EMPATHY and UNCONDITIONAL ACCEPTANCE.

We need to become our own loving parents.

The child is attracted to love like moths are attracted to light.

Listen to your inner child. What does he or she tell you? You know it by how you feel. The inner child uses the language to feeling to show you what’s really going on inside.

If you feel bad in a certain situation but do nothing or just keep pushing through, you neglect your inner child.

But if you feel bad in a situation and ask yourself, “What needs to change for you to feel better”? your inner child will respond very quickly.

He or she might say:

“Get out.”

Or: “Don’t do this.”

Or: “I don’t like that person.”

Or: “I want this.”

Listen to this still small voice. It’s your soul telling you what it needs to be happy.

The moment we give our inner child the love that it craves our own feelings change immediately.

This is reparenting. We feel that WE HAVE BEEN LOVED.

Listening to our inner child rewards us with a sense of wholeness we never knew.

The wisdom of the inner child is one of the deepest mysteries of human existence that saints of old praised.

St. Catherine used to run through the streets of Genoa shouting,

My deepest me is God! My deepest me is God!

Connecting with your inner child is connecting with your Divine self.

Rumi said,

I looked for myself and found only God; I looked for God and found only myself.

What does it mean to heal your inner child? Read this short fairy-tale and see what happens when you recognize your true self.

April 26, 2023June 5, 2023

The Effect of the “Distant Forest” in J.R.R. Tolkien’s Leaf by Niggle – Whispers Amplified by Imagination

As I got off the phone with an old friend this morning, I couldn’t shake the feeling of being under some spell.

He had shared a video with me from 12 years ago when we were much younger, my daughter was 10, and my son was 6.

We had a picnic around a fire, cooking hotdogs, chatting, and enjoying a warm summer evening in Siberia.

As I watched my daughter’s cute chubby face chewing on the hotdog and my son’s frantic hopping and jumping over the fire, I teared up.

“This is Paradise,” I thought. “Why didn’t I see it then?”

“Paradise,” echoed my friend on the other side of the conversation.

“Hmm…,” I thought to myself after I hung up. “Why is it that we tend to see an experience as ordinary when we are in the middle of it? And when there’s some distance between us – whether it’s time or geography – it transforms into something else.

Why didn’t I see all that before? It was an ordinary evening. Yes, I enjoyed it very much, but now I almost see it as a doorway into some inexplicable magic. A picture of another world.

Is my memory playing a trick on me, so am I imagining something that wasn’t there?

Or maybe it’s the other way around – my memory shows me something that was there, but I was too close to it to see it for what it is.

“You can’t recognize a person’s face when you are too close to it,” said the Russian poet Sergey Esenin.

But how do I know that my memory is not deceiving me?

Owen Barfield said in his poem The Tower:

But many times, the secret-breathing world
Whispers to thee, yet whispers with a voice
Which memory shall warehouse as a shout.

This world is breathing secrets, but we often don’t hear its whispers until something amplifies them for us into a shout.

Our memory is that shout that amplifies the whispers that we didn’t hear.

But what are those secrets that we tend to overlook because we are too close to reality to recognize its face?

March 28, 2023March 28, 2023

The Magic of Lothlórien – How Tolkien Used Vertical Speech to Allure us into the Silence Around Words

The magic of Lothlórien in The Lord of the Rings is a fine example of how the Inklings use the power of vertical speech.

Quoting Max Picard from The Worlds of Silence, Peter Kreeft said that in modern writing, words have lost their vertical static quality:

The architecture of the Hebrew language is vertical. Each word sinks down vertically, column-wise, into the sentence. In language today we have lost the static quality of the ancient tongues. The sentence has become dynamic; every word in every sentence speeds on quickly to the next … each word comes more from the preceding word than from the silence and moves on more to the next word in front of it than to the silence.

In modern writing, words are used primarily as communication tools. People use words to get their message across. This type of speech is message-driven, not meaning-driven.

You look for words just to move the reader along as quickly as possible from one word to the next horizontally. Words are whips to get the reader going.

The Inklings use words vertically, not horizontally.

For them, each word is alive. Each word speaks through a particular sound shape – and needs to be heard.

When you “hear” the word’s speech, the curtain of the world is drawn for a second or two and you see… what the words dimly point to.

The Inklings use words to allure the reader to the silence around the words – not to get the message across. As Treebeard said:

You must understand, young Hobbit, it takes a long time to say anything in Old Entish. And we never say anything unless it is worth taking a long time to say.

To use words vertically means to find words that make the reader spellbound for a second or two. Preferably longer.

The right words are inspired by Mercury himself – they descend from heaven like fire and become “proper names” in the mouth of the herald.

Like a piercing line of poetry, they make you stop breathing the air of the world and plunge into a meditative reverie as you breathe in the fragrance from beyond the walls of the world.

Tolkien’s description of the magic of Lothlórien is a case in point.

How does Tolkien describe Lothlórien?

Just like Tom Bombadil, Lothlórien could easily have been left out of the plot. Linearly speaking, nothing “happened” there except that the fellowship felt the magic of Lothlórien and got some rest.

Technically, the chapter about Lothlórien is just as extraneous as the chapter on Tom Bombadil.

But it’s a fine example of vertical speech that introduces the reader to the perilous realm of Faerie.

The effect of entering the realm of the Lady is such that all the company feels the presence of some inexplicable magic.

For some, it is a delight. For some, it is torment.

Tolkien seems to suggest that the whole land was Galadriel’s mirror – not just the stone mirror itself. As the fellowship walked through the enchanted wood, they saw their secret thoughts and desires revealed as if in a mirror.

Some liked it; some hated it. But they couldn’t hide from it.

They stepped into a land of the Last Judgement unfolding 24/7.

March 21, 2023March 23, 2023

How Can You Change Your Energy in 5 Minutes – the “Expecto Patronum” charm

In Harry Potter, J.K. Rowling came up with a powerful metaphor for how to deal with hopelessness and fear when your soul is engulfed by bad news. And it helps you to change your energy in 5 minutes.

In the Harry Potter universe, Dementors are entities that feed on human joy.

As someone who has battled with depression for many years, Joanne Rowling captured her experience of dealing with hopelessness in the “Expecto Patronum” charm – a powerful magic that repels negative energy.

There’s only one power Dementors cannot withstand – the power of a person’s inner light informed by their happy memories. This inner light doesn’t allow one’s soul to be engulfed by darkness.

Those in whom this inner light is strong repel Dementors – joylessness, hopelessness, sadness, despondency. And they can change their energy in 5 minutes!

But where does this inner light come from?

Remember the scene where Harry Potter is learning the art of Expecto Patronum from Professor Lupin?

Lupin asked him to look for a happy memory with the potential to transform his present moment into a celebration.

Harry tried hard several times but all in vain – even with a Boggart (a shape-shifter taking the form of a Dementor) he would still faint.

“By the way, what were you thinking of?” Lupin asked after Harry regained his senses.

“The first time I flew on my broom.”

“No, no. It’s not strong enough. Think of something else.”

And then, suddenly, Harry thought of his mother and father talking to him and felt his heart leaping with joy.

This time, the charm worked!

A powerful light flashed out of his wand as he thought of his mom and dad. The “Dementor” was pushed back into his chest.

Are Dementors real?

Just turn on the news, and you will know.

What do we do when our souls are engulfed by bad news – from outside and inside?

We need to master the Expecto Patronum charm!

January 30, 2023January 30, 2023

The Great Dance in C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Owen Barfield

When I first read C.S. Lewis’s Perelandra years ago, I was a bit confused at the end. Especially, when I got to the part about the Great Dance, in which “there seems no centre because it is all centre.”

As Ransom was listening to the Eldils delivering long speeches about the nature of the Great Dance, I thought these speeches sounded more like doxologies than explanations – as if the speakers didn’t care about making anything clear but rather were weaving songs of praise out of thin air.

And then, Ransom actually SAW their speech turn into SIGHT. The speeches of the Eldils became The Great Dance before his eyes:

“He thought he saw the Great Dance. It seemed to be woven out of the intertwining undulation of many cords or bands of light, leaping over and under one another and mutually embraced in arabesques and flower-like subtleties.”
C.S. Lewis, Perelandra

What a strange ending, I thought. But somehow, at least in Ransom’s mind, it was a fitting resolution to the plot.

December 28, 2022March 17, 2023

How Gratitude Changes Brain Chemistry and Heals the Brain

Ancient wisdom says: “Give thanks in all circumstances.” What the ancients knew in their guts we are slowly discovering through neuroscience – the attitude of gratitude changes brain chemistry.

Practicing gratitude is one of the most powerful ways to counter chronic stress and addiction to negative thinking.

The most recent scientific findings confirm the ancient wisdom about thanksgiving – it is the best way to improve your mental and physical health.

How does it work?

When we are grateful, our body has a way of thanking us back.

Just like a negative train of thought – complaining, self-pity, anger, guilt, fear, envy, anxiety, sadness, depression, etc. – causes the body to release stress hormones into the bloodstream so also positive thoughts release hormones of love, happiness, and satisfaction (oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin).

One recent study from the University of California San Diego’s School of Medicine found that people who practiced gratitude had better heart health, specifically less inflammation and healthier heart rhythms.

“They showed a better well-being, a less depressed mood, less fatigue, and they slept better,” said the study’s author Paul J. Mills.

December 6, 2022March 17, 2023

Why Did Arda Become Round, or How Was Sauron Made by the One Ring?

Why did Arda become round? Originally, it was flat. It was made round only after the fall of Numenor.

Its roundness was its curse. The consequence of leaving the “Straight Way.”

Thus in after days, what by the voyages of ships, what by lore and starcraft, the kings of Men knew that the world was indeed made round…

Is there any significance in this roundness?

Deceived by Sauron, the Numenorians craved immortality. They rejected the strange gifts of Iluvatar given to Men – the gifts of mortality – the ability to leave the Circles of the world through letting go.

The Númenóreans began to murmur, at first in their hearts, and then in open words, against the doom of Men…

Why did Arda become round?

The downfall of Numenor led to the reshaping of Arda. Around the year 3319 of the Second Age, the world was changed. It became round. A circle. A ring.

Like a ring, the world became closed upon itself. Thus ended Men’s desperate search for immortality. It ended in creating bad infinity, the non-stop repetition of the same, a rat race of life, never coming to the destination.

People were still trying to find the Straight Way to the Blessed Realm but soon found that all roads were now bent. There was no longer a Straight Way to the blessed realm geographically. All roads were going in circles.

Their great mariners would still search for the Isle of Meneltarma because many believed that from the summit of the Meneltarma, the Pillar of Heaven, one could still see a glimpse of the Deathless shores.

But they found it not. And those that sailed far came only to the new lands, and found them like to the old lands, and subject to death. And those that sailed furthest set but a girdle… and they said: ‘All roads are now bent.’

With bad infinity, no matter where you go, you come to where you started – to the old lands, subject to death. It is the curse of the Ring.

November 19, 2022June 27, 2023

What Does It Mean to Accept the Present Moment as It Is?

What happens if I accept the present moment as it is?

The present moment is always a present.

It’s a gift – if we accept it.

It’s always rich if we don’t check out of it.

If we abandon it for the sake of gaining something later, we will lose the “greatest of gains.”

In the final analysis, it all boils down to relinquishing control.

When I let go of my idea of what my future should be like, I start seeing what I have in the present.

The moment I stop needing, I ALREADY have. And more will be given.

How do you accept present reality?

If I accept the present moment as my highest reward, it turns into a celebration – I will find joy in what I am doing right now.

And then, suddenly, my eyes open, and I see more things to celebrate.

A bright star hanging over my window in the silver glow of the full moon.

The great audiobook I am listening to.

An interesting project I am enjoying.

My son saying to me this morning: “Hey, Dad, haven’t seen you for ages.”

Someone on Facebook thanking me for an answer I shared.

The parsley seeds I planted outside that sprouted!

A Harry Potter binge-watch party I am planning to have with my sons next Friday.

There’s more and more to celebrate.

Is there a feeling of abundance in my emotional reality at the moment? If so, I will see it with my physical eyes too. It will become a reality in my visible world.

Is there a feeling of lack and discontent in my emotional reality at the moment? If so, I will see it with my physical eyes too. My visible world will be defined by lack.