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Pollux and Castor sailed far, to a distant island beyond the boundaries of maps, in
search of Phineus, the seer. Upon arriving, exhausted but exultant, they
immediately sought an audience with the famed prophet. Pollux, carefully trying
to disguise his identity as son of Zeus ⎯ whose fit of jealousy had caused the
blindness of Phineus ⎯ was the first to speak:
Greetings, wise seer. My brother Castor and I are on a quest for the ultimate
Truth. But we know not which course to pursue. Bewildered as we are by the
myriad myths of man, we humbly plea for your guidance.
Phineus looked over the two brothers with compassion. He knew the
inevitability of what was to follow. After a long sigh, he replied:
There are only two authentic paths to truth, young seekers. Man has no
shortage of myths at his disposal. If his true motivation is to find peace, he must
search for the myth that resonates with his heart and make it his life and reality.
This, the path of the heart, is authentic to man's deepest being.
He paused, knowing full well what he was about to do to the son of his nemesis:
The other path is one in which many seekers before you have found their
demise. It is the path of the absolute: The rejection of every myth in the quest for
a truth as pure and untarnished by the touch of man's mind as a buried jewel in
the bowels of the Earth. This path requires the rigorous cleansing of raw
experience from the narratives constantly woven and projected by mind. Behold,
for he who finds and polishes this jewel will know the absolute truth!
Castor ⎯ whose mother, like Pollux's, was Leda, but whose father was the mortal
king Tyndareus ⎯ interjected:
How do we know which path to choose, great seer?
Phineus:
Listen to your deepest, most uncritical, most sincere motivation, young
seeker! What does your heart truly seek? Peace...?
And then, turning slightly to glance at Pollux, he continued:
...or the absolute truth? Listen to your heart and, above all, be honest to
yourself. This is the most personal of all quests. In its pursuit, you cannot cheat
anyone but yourself.
Pollux and Castor, confused but resigned, thanked Phineus and returned to their
ship. The darkness of the night had already descended upon them.
On the deck of their ship, bathed by the light of many stars ⎯ Gemini particularly
conspicuous above their heads ⎯ Castor shared his thoughts with his brother:
I must be honest to my most sincere motivations, brother. Truthfully, what I
seek is peace. The confusion and doubts of life corrode my very soul. If I can find
safe haven in a myth whose validity my heart can accept, there my quest will end.
Pollux:
I respect the sincerity of your choice, brother. But truthfully, no myth can
sooth my heart. I must know what is, not the narratives woven by my own mind,
or the minds of lesser men.
The brothers then parted ways, each pursuing the path dictated by his heart.
Having scoured the known world for the many myths and traditions of man,
Castor failed to find the peace he so deeply craved. He did find a handful of myths
that resonated with his heart. But how could he surrender to a myth while
knowing that it was just a narrative? How could his heart be soothed by
something his intellect knew not to be the absolute truth?
Castor, diligent as he was, could observe his own mind in the very process of
weaving narratives whose true motivation was to sooth his pain and disquiet.
The narratives were inventions. Castor knew that he was consciously trying to
cheat himself; and that such attempt was ultimately futile. A man cannot be both
trickster and audience at the same time. The trick has no power upon those who
know how it is done.
Having spent years in seclusion in some of the most isolated islands of the
Adriatic, carefully observing the dynamics of his own mind, Pollux sought
diligently to separate the jewel of immediate experience from the pollution of
narratives. He saw through the many subtle layers of narrative-making: stories
built on top of stories, all ultimately resting on unexamined assumptions. He
realised that removing the narratives was like peeling an onion: there was
always another, more subtle layer underneath.
In his quest, he tried to find the most basic, raw factors of reality: He had a body;
that seemed free of narratives. His bodily sensations in the present moment
seemed as close to an apprehension of the raw truth as he could get. The past
and the future were just stories. Extrapolating this line of thinking, he concluded
that only a newborn baby could experience the absolute truth, before any
narratives had raised their ugly heads. As a grown man, such a state was not
available to Pollux, but it suggested to him that an absolute truth did exist; his
ultimate goal was there, just tantalizingly out of his reach.
Yet, upon further reflection, Pollux began to question his own conclusions. The
possibility of narrative-free apprehension in a newborn was itself a narrative; a
story constructed by his mind, since he could not experience the state of being a
newborn in the present moment. Could there really be such a thing as raw
perception without narratives? Was the mind of a newborn truly narrative-free,
or was it simply in the process of weaving its first narratives as it perceived the
world for the first time? Was perception fundamentally concurrent with
narrative-making? Could anything ⎯ anything at all ⎯ be perceived without
being couched in a narrative, chaotic and inconsistent as it might at first be?
Pollux realised that he was forever locked into the narrative-making processes of
his mind, which constructed the very reality of his search for the absolute truth.
His search was itself a narrative. Whatever there could be outside of that
narrative was fundamentally inaccessible to him and, as such, as good as unreal.
After many years, the brothers met again on the deck of their trusted ship. As it
floated gently on calm night seas, under the light of the new moon, Castor
offered:
Brother, I have failed in my chosen path. The soothing power of myth needs
permission from the intellect to be accepted as the truth. Without such
permission, it is sterile. Knowing, as I do, that narratives are not the absolute
truth, my intellect cannot give my heart permission to bask under the light of its
chosen myth. I cannot find peace. For this reason, wise brother, I shall follow
your example and pursue your path towards the absolute!
To which Pollux, in horror, replied:
Seek not through my path, brother! It is a hall of mirrors. Nothing absolute
will you find there; only reflections of yourself, layered in exquisitely subtle
veneers. The intellect is an unstoppable narrative-making machine of
unfathomable power. It constructs all of our reality, like a cocoon which we
inhabit. In my search for the intellectual ideal of an 'absolute,' I have only found
my own limits.
The brothers sighed longly, as they starred at the moon. They remained in
silence for a long time, until Castor offered in resignation:
The intellect... that is the common thread of our failures, brother. My intellect
won't give me permission to surrender to my heart's chosen myth. Your intellect
weaves an impenetrable wall of narratives that insulates you from the absolute,
if there is any...
Pollux did not reply. He knew his brother was right, but he knew also that they
were their intellects. What else could they be? Their quest was doomed to failure
from its very beginning. He had nothing left in him anymore; he was defeated.
That night, they fell asleep on the deck of their ship, under the moon's light.
Pollux dreamed of Phineus. In the dream, Phineus sat by a rich banquet table,
indulging his appetite and laughing hysterically at Pollux's dilemma. Phineus had
taken revenge on Zeus simply by telling the truth when requested to do so. What
an ironic twist of fate, Pollux thought, as he descended into a domain of restless
hopelessness. Orpheus had deserted him...
Castor, in turn, dreamed that he was swimming naked in the sea, under the
moonlight. He swam effortlessly, drifting along as if one with the waves. He could
feel the water caressing his skin. There were no thoughts in his mind... only the
sea, the moon, and the fresh air, as if they were aspects of himself. In his dream,
he found peace.�