"Something's happening because everything is moving."
...
I love
distinctions. The elegance of a great distinction is an elegance like
no other.
I love
the great minds that make great distinctions. And even though the
notion of "mind" may not be fitting here in the context of "making
distinctions", it's good enough for jazz (what may work
better is referring to distinctions as if made by "intellects" not by
"minds"?). Making a distinction is a
linguistic act.
It's the act of differentiating between some thing, and some other
thing.
I love
it that
human beings
have the capacity to make distinctions. Indeed, the capacity to make
distinctions may just be one of the highest qualities with which
human beings
are endowed. Two things happen for me when
I listen
someone making a great distinction. The first is I get a sense of
appreciation of the distinction itself, and the elegance with which
it's made, and the second is I get where the maker of the distinction
is coming from. The latter is telling.
That's something that's not quite the same as the two things which
happen for me when
I listen
someone making a great explanation. The first is I get a sense
of appreciation of the explanation itself, and the second is I get a
sense of the intelligence with which it's made. But there's a key
difference in what I get when
I listen
a great distinction, as opposed to what I get when
I listen
a great explanation. When
I listen
a great explanation, I'm captivated by the subject
mastery
it takes to make the explanation. But when
I listen
a great distinction, I'm captivated by where
the human being
making the distinction is coming from. An explanation comes from the
mind. A distinction comes from who we really are. So distinctions and
explanations occur in different domains.
I can listen
an explanation, and get nothing new about who I am. That's because an
explanation doesn't necessarily require who I really am to
be present (the general
idea is to say something about that which is being
explained) whereas a distinction comes from ie it goeswith
(as
Alan Watts
may have said) who
human beings
really are. Said another way, when
I listen
a great explanation, I get something about that which is being
explained. But when
I listen
a great distinction, I not only get the distinction: I also get a sense
of the endowment
human beings
have to distinguish, with no special knowledge required.
Werner
Erhard's
distinctions are intelligent,
brilliant,
priceless.
Being around Werner when
he's holding court making distinctions, is an experience like no other.
Here, for example, is
Werner
distinguishing "life" and "living", and differentiating between the two
when I asked him about it during one of
our visits:
<quote>
LIFE:
EVERYTHING THAT'S OUT-HERE; LIVING:
INTERACTING WITH LIFE.
<unquote>
There it is: in just
three words
each,
Werner
has distinguished "life" and "living" (no small potatoes, that) and
differentiated between the two. I just don't know anyone else who does
it better. Do you? With others, there may also be distinctions. With
Werner,
there's the simplicity of making distinctions via the shortest
possible, most direct route. He has the uncanny ability to look into
the space and say what's there, bypassing all the explanation and
commentary.
