Nobody Knows Anything
My mind can’t help but think a lot.
It likes to understand and explain things I experience, see, hear and feel.
But it’s not always satisfied with the answers and explanation it receives.
Every time I struggle to make sense of the world, I remind myself of the only three things I feel certain about:
We know nothing.
Everything is a story. Everything is artificial.
We chose the stories that work best for us and that support our current world view.
“We can know only that we know nothing. And that is the highest degree of human wisdom.”
- Leo Tolstoy
Here are some examples of stories:
Religion (The biggest ‘truth-tellers’ out there)
Solutions for Co-Vid19 (How do we deal with it best? Do masks really work?)
Astrology
Veganism
Homophobia
Racism
Political parties
Capitalism
Definition of success and happiness (having a family and kids, a nice house, a good well-paying job and career)
Eating three meals a day
Men wear short hair, women long hair
Feeling happy is good, feeling sad is bad
We claim to think we know how the world works. But we know so little.
What we try to do is feel more certain in an uncertain world. We try to limit risk and survive. That’s what we do as a living species when looked at through the filter of evolutionary theory: we try to survive.
“I know that I know nothing.”
- Socrates
We speak of right or wrong but who knows what is truly right or wrong?
Talk to ten people from ten different countries, cultures or religions and they will all tell you different stories about what is right or wrong.
If Islam is true, then Buddhism, Hinduism and Christianity are not. If Buddhism is essentially true, then Islam, Christianity and Hinduism are not. And so on.
Most disease is still still considered to be genetic or purely caused by matter, but along comes Epigenetics and mindbody medicine showing clearly that lifestyle, our environment, shock and developmental trauma, suppressed and repressed emotions, as well as chronic stress lead to physical illness. Check out the books When the Body Says No by Gabor Mate or The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van der Kolk.
The mainstream still believes depression is a disease and is thus treated with anti-depressants, but it is becoming more and more clear that it is only a symptom of deeper issues such as trauma, avoiding emotions and loneliness/isolation. See also the book Lost Connections by Johann Hari.
How About Science?
Science keeps being wrong and discovering new ‘rights’.
It seems that for almost every study indicating the truth of one theory, there's another proving the opposite.
At times, science claims to know the limits of what is possible and then it turns out they were wrong:
“Scientists said that flight by machines “heavier than air” was impossible, but nonetheless airplanes flew.”
It’s also important to add that most science is an industry and relies on funding from outside. Hence why there is little research on eg. breathwork. There is no money in the breath. But there is more and more research on psychedelics, because there is money in therapies, psychedelic substances etc.
What we think we see (and taste, hear, touch and smell) isn’t actually real. It sort of is, but what we actually experience is well explained by Michael W. Taft, a neuroscience researcher and science-based meditation instructor:
“No human being has ever experienced the actual world. Your experience of the world comes to you through the signals of a group of peripheral devices, called “senses.” Those signals are then assembled in the brain into some kind of experience. It’s important to remember that this experience is a brain-generated hallucination or fantasy, not the actual outside world. It’s just like a really, really high-resolution virtual reality.”
—Michael W. Taft
The Limits of the Human Mind
As the saying goes: “not everything that matters can be measured, and not everything that can be measured matters.” In other words, science helps us understand many things through the lens of the human mind, which is based on the capacity for the human mind to process information.
Our brains literally cannot understand the universe, any more than a grain of sand can understand a beach.
What we perceive is what the human mind is capable of perceiving. Any meaning we make from it—the stories we tell ourselves—are limited by virtue of the mind’s limitations.
Beyond that, we all carry biases that influence what we choose to believe.
How to Live While Knowing Nothing
The only thing I can do is stay curious and keep my mind open while testing and experimenting for myself to see what works for me and me only.
I don’t claim to know the truth. Even at times, when my words sound like I do, there is no ONE truth.
The one truth doesn’t exist.
Thus, get into the habit of questioning everything. Every belief you carry. Every habit, every story you tell yourself. Every story you are being told or were told growing up. Question your conditioning and programming.
And then figure out for yourself what works.
The result of what works for me is my lifestyle, the level of joy I experience in my life and how I deal with challenges:
I eat a plant-based vegan diet, because I believe in non-violence and I feel great not having animal products circulating in my body
I meditate and journal daily, because it helps me to stay grounded and connected to myself
I mainly buy organic and as natural-as-possible foods and cosmetics, because fuck processed shit and chemicals
I don’t use deodorant, because I just don’t believe we need it
I work 4-6 hours a day, because that’s all I want to do and it’s not good for me to spend more time staring at my laptop screen
I don’t use to do lists, because they stress me out and I believe they are products of a patriarchal system
I work out several times a week, because it makes me feel damn good
I write or create something every day, because it brings me joy and I have the urge to use my second energy center every day
I practice non-violent communication as much as I can, because it helps me deal with conflict
I get my Astro chart read now and again, because I believe in the power of Astrology and the planets and it has proven to be correct with my experiences
I feel emotionally impacted by the full and new moon, because I experience it every month, especially as a human on a menstrual cycle
I like Buddhist and Yogic philosophy, because it has helped me through some tough times and it makes sense to me
I consider myself a minimalist and own little, because it gives me a sense of freedom and peace
I believe in a higher power or the universe, because I like feeling connected in that way
I believe in past lives and reincarnation, because it helps me explain certain things in life and makes me feel connected to past and future generations
I don’t believe in gender based on sexual organs, because I consider gender a social construct and nothing that is static
As you can see, all of these are based on stories and beliefs. You might agree or disagree, which is awesome.
What I won’t argue about is how much my belief system and resulting life fulfills and works for me. And the same goes for you.
If you agree that we know nothing and that there is no absolute one truth, you might also agree that judging others for what they do or say is in most cases arguing with absolute truths.
For example, if I judge someone on the street for their choice of clothes, I suggest that I claim to know that there is a good and a bad way to dress.
I personally find it liberating to accept that we know nothing and that one truth doesn’t exist.
I liberates me from attaching to opinions and beliefs too strongly, it keeps me from having arguments that strip me of valuable life energy and it provides me with more inner peace.
I have to remind myself regularly that I know nothing and I still sometimes catch myself judging others or claiming I know what’s right or wrong. In the end, I’m an imperfect human, like we all are. And I do it all much less than I used to. In the process I’m kinder to others and to myself.
However, the claims “there is no one truth” and “we know nothing” in and of themselves imply that they are true and right. Because maybe there is one truth and we do know more than nothing. So in the end, it’s a conundrum.
Let me rephrase:
Everything is possible and nothing is possible.