There is nothing as important as being aware of who we really are - where we're going - what it's all about; in the final analysis, the last judgment. To remain asleep is a sad state of affairs because it's an existence of
waking-sleep, of inconscience, not knowing, not knowing who we truly are - what our purpose is for living - of life's meaning as in ontology, which deals with the first principle, with the question of
being; truly nothing else is more important in the scheme of things than to develop our consciousness evermore fully.
It is always a struggle to become more aware in the process of developing a new consciousness, of recreating life in a sacramental brotherhood, in a unity of knowledge - not simply rationally and fragmentally but totally...
...I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thought; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwellng is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man -
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things.
- Wordsworth
Man and society must, of course, become evermore aware and more and more thoroughly universal if they are to genuinely progress toward peace and freedom. And, today, more than ever, one's ultimatum should - and must - originate from the depths of being if we are to become truly enlightened and free men by overcoming the limitations set by our circumscribed, oppressive existence - socioeconomic, politico-cultural, and religious - in the spirit of humanitas, of arete, of educere, which is to draw out our humanity to the maximum, to the optimum degree.
Obviously, we must leave the cave and sever all symbiotic, submisive ties of blood and soil - smash the idols - defy the gods - and get to the root, the heart, the very core of our nature as human beings, which is the real problem and crisis - and, ultimately, the only revolution.
The great teachers and enlightened critics of the human condition cite feelings and emotions as the behavioral mainspring and that man's highest aim is to become fully human, and if he is to realize his own spiritual and cultural heritage to the fullest, he is first to master his irrational self - namely, fear, hostility, pride, greed, impatience, anger, folly. (I.e., change of heart...the only sole, efective basis for reform.)
This idea of freedom is as old as human speculation. It is present in the Sanskrit texts, in Aristotle, Epicurus, Epictetus, Augustine, and Descartes. Perhaps, its best expression can be found in Plato's allegory of the cave. What would freedom be if not the effort at breaking one's chains, climbing with great caution and difficulty the steep walls of the cave, and finally seeing the sun? What would fredom be if the Philosopher, after seeing the sun, did not return to the back of the cave to tell men that what they see is an illusion; that real freedom lies in the awareness of truth?
- Fromm & Xirau, The Nature of Man