[MD] Quality, Value, Love as Meaning

[Hamilton Priday]

Happy New Year to All!

Yes, 'the Ham' is still alive and monitoring the wisdom of moqtalk.

As an octogenarian, I am naturally interested in learning what may be the 
next phase of my "awareness" -- if any.  This has led me to read two books 
during the past year:  Dinesh D'Souza's 'Life After Death" (c 2009) and Eben 
Alexander's 'Proof of Heaven: A Neurosurgeon's Journey into the Afterlife' 
(c 2012).

While both opuses are fascinating treatments of near-death experiences from 
an objective (SOM) perspective, and D'Souza does an admirable job of 
demonstrating the moral benefits of belief in an "afterlife" as opposed to 
atheism, Dr. Alexander provides us with first-hand experience (his own) 
which from any perspective is more credible evidence in support of 
transcendent consciousness.  Considering that the author is a practicing 
neurosurgeon with no prior religious indoctrination, what he has to say 
would appear to add even more to his credibility.

Thousands of people have reported near-death experiences (NDE) which 
scientists typically explain as "empty fantasies produced by brains under 
extreme stress."   What makes Dr. Alexander's experience exceptional is that 
his brain was shot down completely ("flatlined") for seven days as he lay in 
a coma.  He was diagnosed with a rare form of spinal meningitis from which 
the recovery rate is less than 30%.  Yet, he defied the odds and managed to 
make a complete recovery within a few weeks' time.

I'll get to the subject heading in a moment, but those of you who share my 
interest may find the author's conclusions enlightening.  Here are some 
notable excerpts:

    "There are two ways to be fooled.  One is to believe what isn't true;
     the other is to refuse to believe what is true."
                                                           -- Soren 
Kierkegaard

    "To understand how the brain might actually block out access to 
knowledge of the higher worlds,
     we need to accept--at least hypothetically and for the moment--that the 
brain itself doesn't produce
     consciousness.  That it is, instead, a kind of reducing valve or 
filter, shifting the larger, nonphysical
     consciousness that we possess in the nonphysical world down into a more 
limited capacity for the
     duration of our mortal lives.

    "In all this writing, one word seemed to come up again and again.  REAL.
     What I'd experienced was more real than the house I was writing in, 
more real than the logs
     burning in the fireplace.  Yet there was no room for that reality in 
the medically trained
     scientific worldview that I'd spent years acquiring.

    "The unconditional love and acceptance that I experienced on my journey 
is the single most
     important discovery I have ever made, or will ever make, and as hard as 
I know it's going to be
     to unpack the other lessons I learned while there, I also know in my 
heart that sharing this
     very basic message--one so simple that most children readily accept 
it--is the most important
     task I have.

    "Love is, without doubt, the basis of everything.  Not some abstract, 
hard-to-fathom kind of love,
     but the day-to-day kind that everyone knows--the kind of love we feel 
when we look at our spouse
     and our children, or even our animals.  In its purest and most powerful 
form, this love is not
     jealous or selfish, but UNCONDITIONAL.  This is the reality of 
realities, the incomprehensibly
     glorious truth of truths that exists or ever will exist, and no 
remotely accurate understanding of
     who and what we are can be achieved by anybody who does not know it, 
and embody it in all
     their actions."
                                                                --Eben 
Alexander, MD: Proof of Heaven

Could this Love be the Quality (DQ) of which Mr. Pirsig speaks?
It most certainly gives meaning to the Value of my Essentialism.

Just another thought offered for contemplation in the new year.

Wishing you a safe and fulfilling 2013,
--Ham