Directory of Lost Causes (By Quentin S. Crisp)

And who can bear to be forgotten?

I've just received an e-mail containing some astrological news regarding a 'webinar' given by Oprah Winfrey and Eckhart Tolle. (A 'webinar'? Is that a new Doctor Who monster?) Apparently, because more than half a million people tried to tune in (or whatever the computer term is) at the same time, the site crashed.

Once again at the innovative edge, multi-Aquarian Oprah is using technology to share enlightening ideas. She broke out of her own book club "box" of memoirs and novels with her choice of Eckhart Tolle's The New Earth, a book about humanity's turningpoint -- in his words, to "evolve or die." Oprah is lending her star power to this surge of consciousness by teaming up with Tolle for a 10-week webinar, with so many taking part that it zapped her site's server on Monday night.

I got to the phrase "evolve or die", and suddenly found myself experiencing turbulence. I think at that point, or soon after, I recalled that I had today, in another e-mail, quoted a phrase from Bowie's song Ricochet: "Who can bear to be forgotten?" In the e-mail I suggested it might be a relief to me.



Anyway, I had a sinking feeling, reading that phrase, that, well, if it comes to that, actually, I'm going to take the latter option. Not by choice, just by destiny or something like that. It's not the first time I've encountered the 'evolve or die' ultimatum, and not the first time I've had a sinking feeling about it as I look around my room, full of urgently scribbled manuscripts that perhaps no one will ever read. For all the fact that I mumble about turning points, awakenings and enlightenment with cyclical frequency on this blog, I tend to feel that, when it comes right down to it, I'm really more in the chaff category than the wheat. I am, indeed, a lost cause, in all that I think, feel, do, see, hope, remember, fear, recontextualise, worship, abominate and sniff. I am on the losing side - you know, the one that doesn't write history, or make it. I am not one of those whom Noah the Second will be ushering onto the Ark. I am a solo unicorn, tossing my horn in a resigned sort of manner as the flood waters rise higher and, after shutting the Ark-door thing behind the two loved-up silverfish, Noah II slaps his forehead and says, "Hang on, I think I've forgotten something. Oh well, I suppose it wasn't important."

That's me, that is.

By the way, I have noticed that a lot of the people coming to my blog via a Google search are doing the search 'Eckhart Tolle skeptic/sceptic'. Maybe I should explain that I'm not a skeptic as such. I'm someone who's pretty interested in Tolle in a profoundly uncomitted sort of way. But I am not, and never have been 'a skeptic' - probably not about anything, if it comes to that. I mean, I've been skeptical, but not 'a skeptic', which sounds like another Doctor Who monster. Doctor Who and the Invasion of the Skeptics, or something. There's even a Skeptic's Dictionary online. You're probably best off going there if you're looking for full-on skeptic stuff, where you can be guaranteed that whatever the entry is, the definition of it will be a supercilious declaration of disbelief. I mean, who are these people who spend their whole lives going around looking for things not to believe in, and then putting them in alphabetical order? So, I'm not really a skeptic. If Tolle is sincere in what he says then he doesn't want to be treated as a guru anyway, and if he's not sincere in what he says then... Please finish that sentence on your own.

So, to get back to what I was saying, I have encountered this 'evolve or die' thing before, largely in the work of one of my favourite writers, housewives' favourite, Mr William Burroughs. I quote:

Desperation is the raw material of drastic change. Only those who can leave behind everything they have ever believed in can hope to escape.

Again, the sinking feeling. A very big sinking feeling. A sinking feeling, in fact, the size of the Titanic.



Oh well.

I don't think I can leave behind everything I've ever believed in. I have tried. I tried last Wednesday. It didn't work. Pathetic, isn't it?

And then, I think, maybe it's not so bad dying with all these beliefs I have, which also have to die. Maybe it's not so bad standing on the deck of the ship which is my soul, and of which I am captain, and saluting to no one at all as I go down with it.

That's the way I shall die. I shall die with the wind in my heart and dust in my hair.

I shall die and be forgotten.

Labels: David Bowie, Eckhart Tolle, my death, Oprah Winfrey, William Burroughs