Same Days Mail

After ethics, MacIntyre argued, truth only becomes accessible if we’re in communion, religious or fundamentally integrated in everyday discourse, in ordinary action. Does this sound possible? As policy prescription, with all the merit that renovation (and revisionism) deserves, the economics and social implications of living together are increasingly integrated into wider narratives about growth, greed and virtue. Does the debate end where Alasdair thought the last remnants of pragmatic exchange flourished?

I’m more interested in the individual account, the kind of self-awareness and acrimony that today comes with loneliness in the sphere of work, family or relationships, the kind of emotion and support for the better or worse that is rooted in the simple fact of labor and capital. Make it twice. For what other sight can we tolerate other than wages, improvement and the restless need for more of this, less of that? We’re definitely past the point where questions centered on the government of truth, because rights is all we have left. Our imagination, long before terminated, was promised to the “best of” possible worlds for fear of trial, tribulation and reprisal.

Within a range of neoliberal accomplishment, where freedoms are identical to outcomes and the existential paralysis of dread seems vacuumed into the numbers that translate welfare to order, what other benefits can we look for when we’re dealing with happiness and us? Do we have access to some forlorn metaphor for rest or faith, or does strength resemble loss more than it does justice? Living with chronic anxiety, for example, leads you to examine the ways in which effort can be misleading and painless faith can morph into a blank stare from the other side of the sea, the strain behind the earth’s surface.

If I’m mistaken to think that integrity and salvation are, indeed, conflicting, then we should be able to make something of our wealth of techniques, our mounts of data and streams of information: why does real life feel separated from the ability to use this power to productive or personal ends, why do we become increasingly estranged from the very option of finish? From calorie calculations to fitness goals and from mortgages to bus routes, optimizations seem to pile on without any form of audit into what they really offer and how they actually work. Of course, I’m not avoiding the costs of meaningful whatever (engagement, resistance, adoption or even death), but to surmise from our point of view the possibility of liberty is to expect from behavior what we cannot: our conscience is decidedly antagonistic to control.

For now, let’s just hope that the nitty gritty of interaction will put enough pressure on notions of sufficiency and time that belonging remains an issue for the studious affection torn between them and I, country and aim. For the vast, remaining qualities of identity, even if formation is qualified through angst and deliverance, I suppose that the good and the bad, in tune or in discord, are in themselves variables of a different order than how well we sleep or if we get a raise. In fact, there is not much to pursuing a fulfilling career compared to asking questions or raising children. But the barrier between reason and light remains: we either reckon how metrics are unable to provide comfort or size, or remain trapped in the rather rude idea that we’re born for greatness, sour or sweet.

From the outskirts of our common view, given the proximity of our hearts to chaos and conflict, showing progress to ignore depth is cuss and, at minimum, counter-productive. Whether we gain weight, divorce, steal or miss the train, there seems to be infinitely greater amounts of space for change, delight or remorse if we tend to the parts of our experience which are bound up with doubt, complain or relief. To be fair to our wiser counsel, which by default wants to hold evidence that it can later switch for another place in memory, uncertainty is hugely diverse and wildly unpopular, because peace generates its semblance. From the perspective of will, however, there isn’t an expanse more generous or amenable to volition than choosing or accepting limits, demarcating avenues and using language itself to handle this.

While it may look worthwhile and pretty smart to hold on to miniscule items such as wellness, me, or fortune when inquiring into our position in the cosmos, single or single-minded attributes of our ethical commitment to fortitude and growth are always baked into thin, redundant straws drawing from the absurd and feeding into an absolute need for answers. We’re built for blood and beauty, which is what we’re missing when things like “done”, “if”, or “then” take over.

Rather than stand with the inward collapse of our ability to tell right from wrong and useful from evil, I’d rather tell myself the same story again and again: goodness is abundant, effort depends on circumstance, tomorrow never ends and the day was credited to us terminally, despite how necessary sleep can be. Focusing on the little, fine opportunities to be truthful, nicer or accommodating is the only path to meaning that’s sustainable and non-destructive. Grand theories may be flashy, or incredibly coherent -maybe they also display longer accomplishments and much more interesting or intriguing lineage, but the bottom line is that teeth cut both ways.

For the foreseeable future, the only acknowledgment against excess is keeping in accordance with our own lack of “others”. Respecting this peculiar and omnipotent poverty means accepting that wholeness is but an endless dream and our means are exactly identical to our potential: our wretched fists of anger and (demands) are perfectly fit for whatever comes readily and gently, from the books we read to the fashion we like to wear, depending on priority, courage or luck. For every normative assessment of supply, demand and worth, for every credit and every figure, for nearly every final say on ability and want, we can refuse to ruminate ourselves and push integrity off the pedestal too much thinking ideates.

Politically and programmatically, this sounds atrocious if we consider what capitalism has done to generations of people incoming and alive, triumphant or dead. For the pure joy of the journey, the warm wrapping our destination performs and the palpable confirmation that struggling can provide, recalling that silence is the first and foremost escape from injustice can root us all back into the sound of community. To forget about unnecessary inputs is to replenish your stamina. Meetings are allowed in expectation and demise when conflated with proof.