Clouds of Glory [antikvár]

CHAPTER ONE One of the most extraordinary things about being a human being is that we just wake up in the world and fmd ourselves here, though what 'here' is is something we never discover. Existence is something that happens to us, and then remains a mystery. There is no question of our having any say in it: a light comes on in a new centre of consciousness, and it is another one of us. We fmd ourselves not awarenesses only, but bodies also, and perhaps other things besides - whatever we are, it is certainly complex. And we inherit a going concern. We know nothing about any of it until after it is well under way, by which time we are already a particular person, born a while back to two other persons embedded in particular circumstances; and everything that has happened to us since then constitutes what is already a life; and already we are partially-formed personalities. Everything about the situation is specific in the highest degree, a fate, a destiny, already in full swing when it is imposed on us, so that we ourselves are a fait accompli with which we are presented. Later this will confront many of us with the question: 'What is this "I" that I am?' But to begin with, at any rate, our consciousness is not a consciousness of self. The reality of the situation is not that our awareness starts by being an awareness of our own existence as unique persons, and then extends outwards from this as a starting point to become an awareness of the world around us. The process moves in the opposite direction: we start by being