<status: wild thoughts, expressing the ineffable, writing style corrupted by Hamilton rap>
I was asked what my goals are now, in fact I had a thought then, of what goals are, connect to, what lies beneath them. Most goals are dreams, visions of concrete objectives, status to reach, missions to accomplish. Happiness traps, the "that must be it" of "if X" then... that will be enough. But achievement is a fleeting moment that passes, and enjoyment the process, the moments leading up to it. Living out my values is the layer underneath, and those are the valuations that typically make me, me. We author our values, even as they author us. But what I thought, really what I saw, is something underneath.
Now values don't have reasons, they are there for their own sake. We value them because we do, as goals they're fundamental. Wired in our utility function, it's everything else that's incidental. That's the way the story goes, our values are our values, but what I saw is what might be a layer underneath. If you take a value and interrogate it, ask it why it's there, we can often spot a reason, something that caused our care. Sometimes it's a trauma, or something that we lack, we value what we've missed before and crave it to be whole.
That wholeness is a state of being. Being-ness, moment-to-moment, a stance, a relation. There is nothing other than this moment after all, sliced down in the extreme. Multiple dreams could serve the same values. In the same way, multiple values can serve the same state of being. Being whole, being nothing and everything both, being at peace and in peace and freedom and seeing.
The goals that I have, the motivation that moves me, seems to reside now at that deeper layer of being. The dreams of happy endings are a proxy metric, not the real thing. The values of happy self-hood are a proxy metric, not the real thing. Those are all reified targets, things that can be named. Dreams are a hope of fulfilling our values. Values are a hope of fulfilling a whole state of being. I have goals of being-ness, and I see three.
I: Being in right relation to myself. A complete stance, all is welcome, encompassing polarities, containing multitudes. Being in the qualities I've tasted and want to live inside: spaciousness, egolessness, love and freedom, radical acceptance, wholeness of imperfect perfection.
We: Being in right relation to others. Flowing from my self of wholeness, extending out to people. One to one relationships, authentic love and healing. Resonance and connection, knowing and being known.
It: Being in right relation to the whole. The system of systems, everything woven together, I and we are part of it yet it's another thing. Animate but lifeless, everything is connected, whole-in-part and part-in-whole, society and system. All people, our constructs, the planet, our descendants and our future.
All three are states of being-ness, they can be fulfilled within me. If to be in a state full of awareness and comprehension, full of seeing and knowing, of "enlightenment" - if to be that is called "love", my goals are to love myself, love others, and love the world.
I am responsible for my self, my awareness, my reactions, my stance, my actions. I am responsible for being my enlightened self inside myself, for living in acceptance and harmony with all the parts that are not "I".
I am responsible for being my enlightened self towards the system, the whole. I am not responsible "for" the system, I don't control it. When I zoom in and don't see the whole, then I don't experience right relation to the system and act as if I am not a part of it.
I am responsible for being my enlightened self in stance towards others. I am not responsible for others, what they do or say or experience. When I lose openness and empathy, then I don't experience right relation to them and act as if we are not united.
I am responsible for holding a higher loop of awareness and enlightenment. I am not responsible for my emotions and impulses. When the shrinking passenger of "I" get swept up unconscious inside them, then I don't experience the spaciousness of being in right relation to my unconscious pieces of bodymind.
<sigh> I don't know if this is a word package that can be received or applied, both in my fumbling delivery, and in the ears to hear. To me it's a connection between a single moment and the whole timeline. Between the perfect acceptance of what is, and the desire to impact the future. Between the weight of full responsibility and the boundaries of health and sanity. Between hopes and dreams and long-term plans, and the ability to just be.