This would be the core of my first Death Café spiel on June 2nd ,2013 at the Cobscook Community Learning Center. We had a group of five persons, three women and two men, then fate delivered one thirsty young man who stopped in for a glass of water and was immediately recruited. Our first official group activity was to rope this fellow into our discussion. He complied by rendering a tale of such loss (eleven friends and family over the past twelve months) despair and desperation (and drugs)that we were all set well back on our heels as he took his leave with a tip of the hat and a promise to return to our next meeting. He did say that he felt better after having had his say for which I am sure we all were grateful.

     As we continued our discussion, in addition to the troubles of troubled youth, three other topics came to the fore which I would like to address just briefly herein: death in poetry, the death of companion animals and the continuation of spirit after death.

In my role as a nominal co-host for this fledgling down east Death Café. I feel compelled to review and analyze our efforts such that we might find that common thread which connects our seemingly diverse perspectives and create a cohesive unity from our joint ruminations. As I ponder some of the more common beliefs about death, one keeps rising to the fore -- Death as the Great Equalizer - be ye a Queen or a pauper, a chipmunk without pants or a regular Josephine, you, that is ‘we’, all seem to have a pending death in common, be it our own or that of a loved one.  So, I am straightaway led to question, “What, then, would be the Great Differentiation Factor?”  My first answer, and I will not defend it overly much just yet, (I’ll leave that up to some more ambitious persons) anyways, my first response to what makes us all seem so very different from each other would be Ego. Ego constitutes that elemental force of our consciousness which focuses on those many distinctions found in life and then continues on to apply judgment and value (or the lack thereof) to these otherwise arbitrary differences. The ego is forever crying out for recognition and distinction and deeply denies any attempt to create equality amongst the many diverse peoples who people the planet. Ego feeds on distinction an dreads the leveling effect of Death. 

     So, how does ego relate to poetry in particular and art in general? Simple -- ego impedes art, thereby creating such things as writer’s block and causing painting artists to muddy their paints and jerk their lines about as if they were being drawn by a deeply hooked largemouth bass flailing about in the lily pads. I have heard that Barbara Streisand has a great stage-fright (an ego based malady common to many who must face the crowd and deliver the goods). Then she steps on stage and her ego dies a small death as she sings those wonderful songs which have been transporting people the world over beyond the limiting parameters of their own small and confining egos. We love art because it hacks the ego for both the artist and the audience thereby allowing us both to reach beyond our so-called  ‘selves’ and enjoy the freedom of subjective immersion into the universal ambiance as created by the artist. Just as a brief aside, one might claim that the world of artists boasts some of the largest and most maladaptive egos the world has ever seen. This is perhaps the result of a phenomena  which I call “ego-rebound”. During the actual production of the art or singing of the song or playing of the part, the ego is suspended and then comes the applause, the big bucks and the corresponding swollen head -- and so forth.    

     And how do companion animals fit into this ego-based relationship with death? For the most part our animal friends are not overly troubled with the onus of Ego (or Fear of Death) and lack that limiting human characteristic of self-consciousness. They simply are what they are and live life without a lot of second guessing. They also love us without a lot of judgmental second guessing which we certainly wish more human people were capable of doing. So, our companions love us as unconditionally as we can hope for and we in turn love them back, oftentimes just as unconditionally and this creates a truly  powerful connection. More on unconditional love as it relates to death later…

     The continuing spirit, ego and death? Of this I know very little. However I have a really strong feeling about at least one thing: if spirit does indeed continue on after death, which I see no reason not to believe, what I do have a reason to disbelieve is that our eternal spirit would be eternally plagued by that fractious element of human psychology, the Ego. So, I see a good chance that we continue on in some spirit form, perhaps of our choosing, perhaps not. I see no chance of that thing called ego making it to the next level. I mean, who would you be ‘better than’ in Heaven? who would you be ‘worse than’ in Hell? Anywhere else you might land in the Spirit Realm, who cares about your precious ego? Hence, Ego dreads Death because it is ego that dies alongside of the flesh and blood portion of our beings.

     I have dealt with the above  subjects rapidly and in a rather offhand matter in my haste to get the topic of youth, ego and death. Adolescence is that age of awakening into a dream within a dream when the real ‘Sleeping Giant‘ is roused from his slumber -- the Ego. From the subjective, tribal security of childhood wherein, for better or worse, we fully inhabited the world in which we lived we are thrust, as Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, into an existence where we become both the judge and the judged. That is, we develop an acute awareness of our objective existence and a corresponding self-consciousness. As all adults know from first hand experience and from the experiences of our dearest friends, this elevated gift of self-consciousness can be a terrible and crippling burden. We become aware of ourselves as objects always under the scrutinizing “Look” (see Sartre, Being and Nothingness) of others who would use and manipulate us to their own ends and we begin to objectify others and judge accordingly. At some point we look within, in a sense attempting to objectify ourselves and our consciousness thereby effects a “psychic cleavage or nothingness, between  its self and the object(s) of which it was conscious.” (Sartre, Search for a Method) And, surrounded by this horrifying “shell of Nothingness” we step outside of the undifferentiated plentitude of Being into Modern Western Civilization. God save us all!

     Before we go a step further and fill the pages with polemic infective regarding our egos let us first agree that the ego is a fundamental and essential part of human psychology without which we would not be on our present path of spiritual and intellectual development. Nor would we be able to make value based distinctions and the resulting amoral ambiance  would not be developmentally constructive--as Wittgenstein says “When an ego is born it must shoulder the burden of morality” (hence we become legally culpable for our actions at the expected onset of adulthood -circa 18 or 21 or so.) We have an ego -- a very powerful ego -- and as such we are under the onus of making choices and judgments which are critical to the well-being of ourselves, out loved ones and the well being of the entire planet itself. I am not now questioning the validity of the ego -- just our misunderstanding and general misuse of this critical psychological phenomenon.

     Why my interest and passion on this subject - this subject of an enormously powerful feature of our beings and about which there is virtually no comprehensive information whatsoever available to the average developing child? Even the adult population must pan far and wide to get any significant data on anything “psychological” beyond late night comedy and daytime talk shows with Dr. Phil. I was born in the Boom of the Boom when life was good all round -- the big wars done and plenty of good times to look forward to -- just ask Beaver Cleaver if you don’t believe me. A happy young lad in a fine Connecticut village community, lots of laughs, lots of learning and more than enough love to tuck me in at night, that was me. Made the rank of Star Scout, played trumpet in the high school marching band and got straight A’s in Mrs. Sharples’ Latin class -that was me alright. Until--the boom of adolescence dropped full and heavy with no warning like a beaver felled tree on a sleeping toad. My A’s dropped rapidly to B’s then C’s then straight down to F’s as I was called out of Mrs. Sharples’ class to receive a sentence of Infinitely Indefinite Detention for my increasingly rowdy behaviors.  I may still be on the  detention list, I’m not sure. This fall from Grace put a sure dent in my college prep scholastic career and was accompanied by too much adolescent indiscretion to list here. Today I would no doubt be hauled off to the nearest overworked psychologist and pronounced to have the dread disease, CONDUCT DISORDER!

     “Balderdash!” I say. I was simply a young man isolated and lost in the great abyss of confusion and nothingness created through the development of self-consciousness and I was fighting the those bastard angels who wield swords of flame to keep us from re-entering the subjective paradise of our youth. And the battles continued until one day, me and my buddy, Homer, were sitting in a tree watching a brigade of State Police search for us -- bullhorns, dogs and high-powered rifles at the ready - next day Homer went to jail and I decided it might be a good idea to join up with the Marine Corps. And, Boy, let me tell you, that’s one gang of green clad maniacs who know all about creating community and hacking the ego.

     And still we are dogged by yet another “Why?”. Why as a society are we so fixated on our personal egos that we let our children die of drugs, guns and car wrecks? Why do we continue to preen before the mirror while the very earth beneath our feet writhes in desperation from the abuse we heap upon it? Why do we queue up in long lines at fast food burger stands the world over when we know the damage done by our constant encroachment and exploitation of the animal people who we share the world with -- who we drive to the brink of extinction and beyond? I had one word to answer this question, but I shall now use two words instead --  Bad Capitalism. Long Time Ago Aristotle made a simple yet profound distinction between the only two types of Government that existed then or have existed since -- that is, a bad government wherein the ruling party, whether a single despot or a small oligarchy or a great group of self serving majorities makes decisions based on their own interests. Then there is good government in which, regardless of the size of the ruling party, all decisions are made based on the good of the people of that state. So, bad capitalism is that in which the sole intent is to accrue wealth and there is no regard whatsoever for the good of the community (sometimes referred to as “corporate greed“ although it is certainly not confined to corporations only) or the health of the people and the planet ; good capitalism (and I know Marx would not agree but I really don’t want to get started up with him right now), anyways, good capitalism yearns to see all peoples and all people creatures of the planet we share prosper and thrive.

     Through a process of economic evolution we have succeeded in developing a form of bad capitalism which has been with us for a long time -- bad enough to see millions and millions of people die in wars caused largely by monetary concerns,  bad enough to feed people the world over booze and tobacco and fat and sugar at a virtually homicidal rate, bad enough to encroach on beasts to the point of displacing them from the planet altogether and bad enough to disturb the very air we breath and water we drink  until the whole world is polluted and dangerously poisonous. Now, most of us know that this has been going on for quite some time, and most of us go right along with it because we didn’t start it and we can’t stop in and we oftentimes have hopes that one day we will be the winners of the lottery and get our chance on the top of the heap ( and I suspect it might well be a heap of shit by the time most of us get there). Yet most of us are also decent people and disclaim any such nonsense-- we would all use our wealth and power to create a better world, just like the Fords and Kennedys and DuPonts and Clintons and all the rest of the rich and powerful who ‘feel our pain’.  Or not. Because I would guess that there is not one amongst us big enough to break that system of exploitation and profiteering and perhaps Marx is not so far off the mark. That has to do with the developmental level of our modern world in general and we will speak to that issue in another essay.

     The way we make the most money is by exploiting the most fundamental drives of human beings: people crave safety ( like all animals) so we sell huge armies and nuclear missiles and helmets and knee-pads  and so on ad nauseum; we crave shelter hence the real estate industry and home construction and multi-billionaire moguls like Donald Trump and so on…; we crave good health so we sell hospitals and doctors and insurance and lots of drugs although I have my doubts about how healthy that has made us; we have a nutritional  craving for sugar, animal fat and salt hence Whataburger, Wendy’s and numberless others of their ilk. One of our most basic and fundamental cravings is for motion; from cradle to grave we yearn to move and so tricycles and jumbo jets, pogo-sticks, hot-rods, wheel-chairs, skateboards, space ships and submarines -- we’ll buy it all. 

     But there is yet another yearning, a craving which is fed and fed and never gets enough and still many cannot speak its name. Its name is Ego. It is that which makes me me and certainly not you. Without ego I would be just another nameless face, a nobody in a nothing world. But now is not the time to count the ways in which we exploit and capitalize on our universal craving for ego - just turn on the TV or look at a magazine if you would like just a few examples of this lucrative practice. If it is true, and it certainly seems to be, that there is a sucker born every minute, the question would be “Why?” And the answer is that when we begin the process of self evaluation, shortly after our first venture into the realm of  self consciousness in our adolescent years, we almost always come up short, especially in comparison with the wondrous sorts of humanity (big, beautiful, brave and all around super-duper) which are forever being paraded before us lowly sorts. And, if you have got religion, the basic premise is usually that God is Great and you are a sinful idiot without a clue. If a jar of make-up or a new suit can do anything to fix that situation, we’ll go for it every time. And, if you are selling escape from this constant position of quiet and fruitless humiliation, why just give me a ticket -- the circus, maybe, where we can see people who are weirder and even worse off than ourselves; or a movie about the Lone Ranger and we can pretend that we are as cool and complete as he is; or, how about a simple six-pack of beer and maybe a couple of joints then we won’t really give a hoot about who’s great and who’s not. 

      So, we feed the ego with countless products, then, when the ego becomes distressed, we sell methodologies for hacking the ego and getting lost in the primal haze of subjective immersion: that would include a guided trip to the top of Mt. Everest, a big load of alcohol, movies, movies and more movies, and so on down the escapist ladder. We buy approval and when we can’t afford it any longer, we pay for an escape route from the constant judgment that follows the modern human every minute of every day -- mostly because it is us constantly critiquing our very own selves. In order to reach a balanced state, we must, once again, divide up the overcoming of the ego into the Good and, to be politically correct, the ‘not so developmentally appropriate’ (formerly known as ’Bad’): Poetry, wilderness communion and adventure, bicycle riding and so on,(don’t forget Death Café) -Good Hacking; Shooting up dope, reckless driving, rape and pillage and so on - not so Good -- oh, go ahead and call it Bad.  Once again, it is the Golden Mean which Aristotle advocated for so long ago that we must aim for. But, before we take aim, we must make it known to people at large and to adolescent people specifically, what this crazy balancing act is all about and how it is possible to get from here to there if we really want to

*****

     My ego is craving to keep on rambling, but my larger, more compassionate self says it is time to end this rant. We have dug us a big hole and now it is time to look around and see what we can see. I would like to follow up with more investigation into the troubles of youth as it relates to the uninformed development of self consciousness and why we as a society fail to address this monumental episode which affects  everyone’s life. And, as this is a Death Café exercise, I would like to follow up on how and whether this omission is linked to our societal denial of issues relating to death and dying. Death and dying are certainly a very real and tragic part of too many children’s lives and the best we can tell them is “just don’t drink and drive -- if you manage to live through your youth you can grow up to be a moron without a clue, just like everyone else.” We need to learn to balance the effect of self-consciousness, to develop a meaningful methodology for children to transition, (once called ‘rites of passage’ ) to adulthood and to offer the coming of age child a place of respect in a true and loving community … and so on.

     Let us begin the work.

                      Thank you for your time and consideration,  Chuck Kniffen