NETEN

I need to be focusing on winding things down and bringing things to an end. I need to face up to what I have to do and just do it. Instead, I'm watching Chris Nolan's Tenet on HBO. I had heard about it being confusing and near-incomprehensible and that's one of the reasons I didn't see it in theaters. The main reason is simply that I don't see movies in theaters anymore, but I was considering it as an exception since Chris Nolan films are meant to be experienced and not just watched, that's why he shoots in IMAX. But why disrupt my dearly-held daily routine and pry myself from my hermit-like existence to experience a movie that I'm not going to understand and will require multiple viewings, yo'm sayin'? 

So when I saw it on the HBO schedule (old habit, I really don't watch movies at all anymore) I decided to watch the movie initially without trying to understand or make sense of it, just get the scenes into my eyes. I may have even drifted off once or twice, didn't matter, and I had the TV volume too low – it wasn't my imagination as I later learned the poor sound design of the movie is a recurring complaint. Then before it aired again I binge-watched as many explanatory, expository videos on YouTube as possible to get as good an understanding what was going on for when I watched it again. I don't think it's possible to spoil this movie. If a video didn't say *spoiler alert*, I wouldn't have watched it. 

You wouldn't believe how many videos have been made about Tenet. Binge-watch I did and probably watched only about half of what got recommended to me on YouTube. They could be a subgenre of their own. They cover all sorts of things like the timeline, time inversion, the front/backstory plot, who's who as well as who might be who and who's who in what scene and where and who knows what when, etc. They run scenes backwards, forwards and backwards again because like Steven Tyler you don't want to miss a thing, they stitch scenes together chronologically or from character-specific perspectives or from parallel but different time viewpoints. They use graphics, snake diagrams, line drawings, animated 3D renderings, Feynman diagrams, bell curves, sign language, semaphore and finger puppets (OK, calm down, get a grip). I think I spent more time watching Tenet YouTube videos than the running time of the movie. All useful, mind you. Insane, confounding, incomprehensible, but strangely useful and brilliant.

I know, I know, latching onto a movie and exhibiting quasi-obsessed behavior like this is stupid when I'm supposed to be winding things down and bringing them to an end. It's not conducive to lessening ego-attachment and finalizing any realizations about the nature of reality. Maybe it's a vain distraction from all that. Maybe it's something to occupy time during de facto lockdown (which has been extended to mid-July despite daily cases falling under 100 for several days; better safe than sorry and to keep our guard up). Maybe it's a last hoorah reminding me of when I did watch movies quite a lot and held value in them. Silly me thinking I had something to say about movies when kids these days are making videos about them that are far more astute and sophisticated. Even John of the cancer blog wrote an entry towards the end about his love for film and created a video montage of his favorite films. I didn't even know he had the technical facility to make that; I sure don't (although his paltry montage can't compare to the geek-supreme monstrosity that is the collection of my mix-CDs-of-every-year-of-my-life vanity project). 

Film for me is one of modern civilization's greatest accomplishments in terms of art and expression. How it encapsulates life and all the many and diverse facets of meaning, subtle and obvious. I'm pretty out of touch with popular movies today and with exceptions generally don't think I'd think very highly of them. I know there is art being created by people who actually have something to say or a vision to express, but those don't reach me. 

Christopher Nolan I imagine will enter the pantheon of greatest directors. Tenet? It's definitely art, high-concept art. There are a lot of people calling it a masterpiece and it may be so, but I wouldn't be so quick to bestow that rank on a film that requires multiple viewings to understand, if not hours of explanatory YouTube videos. There's a difference between a film that invites multiple viewings because it's so good and a film that requires multiple viewings to even understand. On the other hand if it's a film that so many people are willing to view multiple times just to understand it, the director is doing something compelling at the least. That I think Tenet is. Still, by no means is it in any way near perfect. There are elements in the concept that are a stretch to work or make sense and that's unsatisfying. For people willing to watch it multiple times to get it, I think one group of viewers will grow to appreciate and love it more and more while another group might still like it, but find perceived faults becoming amplified. I won't venture to guess which category I fall in.

Yesterday was the first day in weeks that the daily number of infections by the Wuhan Communist China Covid-19 virus fell below 200 (175 cases reported). The infection rate had been fluctuating between 200-400 cases per day, neither increasing out of control nor definitively declining. While the reasons can't be stated with certainty, it might optimistically be a combination of Level 3 restrictions plus seemingly the vast majority of people voluntarily treating it as a lockdown. It would mean we can get a handle on this. 

Imagine if by hunkering down we can get the infection spread completely contained within a month or two. That would certainly be a statement to the international community what Taiwan is capable of. Personally I definitely do not have two months worth of funds left to see the outcome. 

It's been mildly inconvenient for me with only slight changes in my routine, no big deal. The increased time staying home hasn't translated to an increase in alcohol intake as far as I can tell *hic*. The restrictions are tolerable but they also annoyingly effect how and what I eat. I have a love-hate relationship with western fast food (clown, king and colonel all represented in my neighborhood). It's disgusting but as an expat I'll take most excuses to spring for it. And I'm under no delusion that when ordering a McDonald's salad, the emphasis is on "McDonald's", not "salad". "McDonald's" still does not mean "healthy", just that "salad" means "roughage". Tasty, not-really-healthy roughage.

The arrival of plum rains in all their daily afternoon squall glory also contributed to my restricted movements as I stay closer to home when it's raining. The rains also brought down temperatures proving I was right about summer arriving early in May with unseasonable heat. They made it reasonably comfortable for a bit as June should or could be, but now more heat is expected and A/C use already allowable. The plum rains also brought relief to southland reservoirs and the two-days-per-week-of-no-water rationing has been lifted, thank goodness for them. I don't know how I would have dealt with my water turned off two days per week. Not pretty.

I've been watching Sadhguru videos regularly since I discovered them in February, almost daily along with cat videos. He still hasn't said anything that has put me off and has said much more that I quite like. I avoid videos with titles that seem to have no meaning or relevance like what to name a child or about wearing black clothes. It's very possible the content contains just as much wisdom as other videos, but I'm a little scared, I suppose, that I'll come across him saying something truly brow-furrowing that I couldn't accept. 

I've already come across him telling jokes that weren't that funny which puts doubt on his spiritual advancedness. Granted he's a mystic, not a rabbi or a comedian (although I think maybe an inordinate amount of spiritual teachers are closet aspiring stand-ups). He's told funny jokes I've heard before. And one funny one I hadn't heard before about an actor doing Shakespeare. The punchline was: What do you expect from material this terrible?! That's a good punchline, the joke almost writes itself!

Not to toot my own horn, and although thinking or filtering things this way may be detrimental, I hear him mentioning things that resonate with things I've come up before on my own and I can't help but feel the teeniest, tiniest bit of affirmation. In no way do I think I'm advanced nor that I don't need a guru.

For instance a video that reminds me of my joy-generating meditations/exercises. Ironically the video is about "being joyful", but what resonated was when he takes a strange left turn and he's talking about "love". What he talks about doing with love is basically my joy-generating meditation, words substituted. Joy/Love that is the result of external circumstances is fleeting and will pass, but if joy can be generated within oneself just through concentration and realization that it's there and that it's always there, and not relying on external factors, that's not something anything or anyone can take away. I guess it works with love if that's the focus. I've interpreted Tibetan monks doing the same thing with compassion.

He also touches upon a musing I've blogged about regarding how much energy it takes to be social and an active participant in this world. It's exhausting compared to the relatively small amount of energy I expend just living a flawed, urban-hermit like existence. People don't notice how much energy it takes because it's just normal and even desirable for most people. You wouldn't notice it until you start withdrawing from society but then get thrust back into it by merely meeting up with an old acquaintance. But most wouldn't even like the withdrawing part that calms energies because of psychological hang-ups of being lonely or getting restless.

I've also mentioned long-term mindfulness practice as being effective in dealing  with mental health issues to varying degrees depending upon the individual. I have to be modest about it and can't speak for anyone else. For me, I found that when old mental health issues would arise, mindfulness practice would intervene like a gatekeeper. The mental health issue would announce itself like it had all the right in the world to be here, but then mindfulness practice would begin its withering interrogation of how's and why's and for what purpose? and what do you hope to accomplish? Eventually the mental health issue would reveal itself as a crutch that I wanted and had summoned, but was a failing in its unproductive, self-destructive nature and was unnecessary from a logical point of view (Suicide conveniently withstands the inquiry. Mindfulness practice arrives with its articles of inquisition and suicide begins presenting its case with "exhibit A:" and gestures palms extended at my entire life, and ends with "he's gonna die anyway". Mindfulness practice forgets about the droids and lets the boy go about his business). 

One concept he mentions that was completely new to me is that human beings are born with a certain amount of energy that must be exhausted before being able to "die well". That's why it's better not to die prematurely like in an accident or by suicide; one's natural energy hasn't dissipated. This is not a concept I've recognized in the so-called Tibetan Book of the Dead or in any of my Vajrayana readings (I may not have the spiritual aptitude to recognize it). Dying well with energies properly exhausted helps lead quickly to a good, natural rebirth. Dying with energy remaining requires that energy to still be dissipated before being reborn, which could take years or decades (or longer) in human time. 

I don't know what basis there is to believe in that, but . . . same goes with the Tibetan teachings. If you're not on board with Tibetan Buddhism there's no reason to believe in any of it, but I've already tentatively gotten on board with Sadhguru, so I can afford him some benefits of doubt. His mention of "better not die by suicide" is OK with me because it's in the same context as "better not die in a tragic accident". Like you can prevent that?! These aren't judgments, just assessments of dying without natural life energies being depleted. 

I suspect whatever he has to say about suicide would be in general discouraging, presumably regarding typical suicides and fair assumptions about them, and would not necessarily apply to me. What teachers say about suicide and how is often a litmus test for me and nothing he's said about suicide has been offensive or insulting. I still get a sense he knows what he's talking about even with blanket statements or assumptions. 

It very well may be that all my years of chronic suicidal ideation by nature have been dissipating my reserve of life energy. If you keep death that mindfully close to you, perhaps the energies are drained that much quicker than if you expend them doing worldly things, not at all aware of them. It may have been by instinct that I've failed in the past because they hadn't been drained sufficiently enough (I know I'm giving my instincts a lot of uncalled for credit here, emphasis on the 'may have been'). It may be that if Sadhguru were my teacher, he'd give me a sadhana to work on that suicide is forbidden and not an option. That I would have to take seriously. And maybe why he's not my teacher in this lifetime.

My Sadhguru playlist (videos that had particular resonance for me).