The universe is constant change

How to deal with change? As David vanWyngaarden says below, this is a big philosophical and existential question. Heck, maybe the only question.

Because if change didn't exist, neither would life. So we wouldn't be around to wonder about life. Or change.

David emailed his thoughts to me and said it'd be fine to share them if I wanted. Which, I do.

When I read David's mention of "flow" in competitive karate, I wrote back and told him that I'd had similar intuitions during my nine years of Shotokan training -- which continued with my migration to mixed style martial arts, and now, Tai Chi.

Interestingly, David told me that Shotokan also was his style, but currently his focus is on Tai Chi's Yang long form of 108 movements, which I also practice.

So we've got quite a bit in common, including a view that moving with change (in contrast to trying to stop it) is the way to go in life -- as if we had any choice.

I don't think we do, except, as David notes, conceptually. This is one area where I do disagree some with him, since he says that religions urge us to accept change and live within it.

Yes, that's true, insofar as we're told to accept God's (or karma's) will. But virtually every religion, and maybe I should have left out "virtually," posits an unchanging realm that awaits us at the end of the Change Road if we do the right religious things.

Salvation. Eternal life. Enlightenment. Nirvana.

These steady-states are contrasted with the ebb and flow of earthly existence, which is considered to be less desirable than a changeless something-or-other.

Well, if change is life, and life is change, perhaps there's no escaping changing. Except by death, and we're not there yet.

Here's David's essay:
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The Universe is constant change. Life = Change.
by David vanWyngaarden

Nothing original here. But this observation is the deepest we've been able to go, philosophically. There's no logic beyond this point.

We don't know why it changes, just that it does. Constantly.  Speculation for the reason for the change is God, and then religion. We've seen how far this can go.

Two paths from here:
1. Stop the change.
2. Accept the change and live within it.

1. Stop the change.

Knowing. Language is the process of taking a snapshot of reality and labeling it. Form a mental concept, affix a word to it. The more you know, the more unchanging mind concepts you have. The more you've stopped change.

But you can't stop the universe from changing. So you're just creating a comforting and minimally effective illusion that you have. The universe goes on changing. And now you've separated yourself from it. Or so you think...

Aristotle hit the same wall and said to know something in a world of constant change is to answer four questions about it. Answering these four questions has become the basis for our civilization, our science, our technology, medicine, law, everything.

Holy cow!

2. Accept the change and live within it.

All spiritual practices and religions seem to have this at the core.

A 'master' says surrender to the change, surrender to God, accept suffering; the result is salvation, enlightenment, awakening. A better way to live.  We have to take the word of those who have gone before.

Faith.

After 5+ years of competitive karate, I found myself getting 'in the zone' a few times. This was such a transcendent state that I ended up concluding that it's the same state as the Buddhist concept of Awakening. Satori.

It never lasted long, but, hey, I'm convinced, it IS a much better way to live. It IS real.
But why?

If the universe is constant change, or to use another slightly different phrase, constant manifestation, then the aforementioned separation results from your trying to stop the change.

Aligning simply requires surrendering and accepting what is. Then you're no longer separate from it. The universe can manifest through you instead of you trying to drive the change yourself.

That's what the universe does, it manifests. Constantly. One of its manifestations is YOU!  Why not let it continue manifesting, THROUGH YOU? Transcendence!  Lol.

Unfortunately, we have to give up the idea of controlling our own fate, which may be why it's so difficult. Everything, every mental concept, every logical proof, every cherished belief must be surrendered in favour of what IS.

Yikes!

But regardless, there's no logic beyond the basic observation of the 'problem of change.' It all comes down to this: do you want to try to stop the change or live in the change?

If the decision is to live in the change, the task then becomes undoing the massive accumulation of mental concepts.  Unlearning something every day.

The easier(?) approach is to change what you identify with. Instead of the usual identification with your mind-concepts, it is apparently possible to identify as nothing more than consciousness, awareness.

Simple Being.

I could give details, but Eckhart Tolle has already done it extraordinarily well, without religious baggage.  If you haven't read his books, I'd highly recommend them. They're not the 'pop' spirituality I thought they'd be. Completely authentic; extraordinarily deep, and very readable.

Another good one is William Samuel. Less known, but equally sensible and deep.

Well, there it is. A brief history of the world. With homework. Took me 40 years to research and a week to write.

Could use another re-write, but I'm sure you get the point.

David

Comments

[Phil]

I have trouble with the statement that the universe is in constant change. Change implies time variable and time is far from being defined.

Consider the simple statement that the Universe is 14.7 billion years old (or whatever is latest accepted age).

This implies that some reference (mental) clock beats out units of earthly years from the moment of big bang to today, and 14.7 billion beats later, here we are! As a mental exercise, where could this clock exist?

Only one place, outside of the universe. A reference plane for the Standard Model is assumed to exist, a reference plane containing dimensions of space and beating the moments of time. Within this reference plane exists the Universe, seething with motion, and providing us with the feeling of time passing.

Science has inadvertently created a God, outside of the Universe, omnipresent, controlling everything, and called it time.

So what could all this motion and change actually be if we discard the idea of a clock outside of the Universe?

We know from experience (and from Einstein) that motion is relative, it can be the world moving past us, or us moving through the world, effect is the same.

If time did not exist, if everything was still, infinite, stationary, has existed and will always exist, then what would be the effect of our consciousness focusing moment by moment on different aspects, different 'nows' ?

We may experience a slowing down of time when our consciousness is not occupied and a speeding up of time when our consciousness is focused on something. The experience of Time would be variable, depending upon the level of conscious awareness.

This is not intended as a deep discussion on this topic, merely a taster of an idea that has some credibility even in small science circles (see works of Julian Barbour "The End of Time").
http://www.platonia.com/ideas.html

[Brian]

Phil, You raise some interesting points. I suspect that most physicists would agree that change = time. Yet as you (and Barbour) note, Einstein's universe of space/time, along with quantum mechanics, implies a different view of time than the one we're familiar with.

Time does seem to be a human construct. Change happens whether or not conscious beings are around to be aware of it, but I wonder whether time would.

This is sort of like the "does a tree falling in the forest make a sound?" question. No, because sound is subjective, while vibrations in the atmosphere are objective -- but not sound as we use that term.