That’s kind of an odd title... seems to be a little bit of an oxymoron and maybe even untrue. Because how can one be moving and yet...not moving. It is difficult to think of stillness without fixity or even an on going moment where there are ever perpetual possibilities but no linear line of movement. There is no getting closer to the object yet there is no retracting from it either. Could this be a land where routine rules and monotonous living flourish? Or could that "monotonous" living be the very thing we long for??
I should first, before I go on, give a more glamorous definition of the word monotonous. First off, I don't mean it in a condescending way (as it usually co notates) rather a constant recurrence of a beautiful or good thing. Such as the sun rising, or the blooming flowers found during May time. It is my intention to use it in the setting of a type of Elysium (see Virgil). Because who would say to the sun, "stop rising every morning, it rather irritates my eyes. Could you find a new hobby?". So it is in the timeless moment of complete and utter joy, the ever ensuing encore of beauty in reality.
T.S. Elliot seemed to have the most insight into the realm of timelessness. He calls it the eternal present, or the still point of the turning world. Where motion is evident but time is not. There seems to be this longing or desire inside of us for the timeless. And still there is a constant frustration that eats away at us, a slow deterration caused by the inability to satisfy the insatiable desire for the eternal moment. Our attempts are futile because we go about it the wrong way by trying to step into the "alongside" as if our life were some kind of movie. A terrible lie that has crept into our culture is that we can satisfy our eternal desire by not taking part in our lives, by living yet not living. We are indoctrinated into this easy slumber (especially among the youth); where it is taught that materialism is reality, however, reality is elusive so don't bother your head over it to much. Inevitably however, there follows the crude awakening from that peaceful ignorance that had once so wonderfully enveloped us. Immediately after awakening we attempt to go back through various roads, whether it be living vicariously through another or simply going into an unstable state of denial.
To describe such a moment, would for me, be to describe beauty. Its not gonna happen!! :~) However, just because our linguistics fall short do not make the moment less real. Once again, another false notion! Our language does not describe, completely, reality. It has done a wonderful job at hinting to something out side of its walls, but never has it broken through. Often I become short sighted in this area, and fall back on the fact that, if I can't explain it, it must not have happened. When really this is doing injustice so some many different aspects of life, it’s a wonder why there is no law against such an egotistical ideology.
Lewis talks about these sorts of experiences he had during his childhood. He called them, stabs of joy, that stabbed him when it was least expected but immediately went away as soon as he began to cognitively think about the experience at the moment. There was no linear sequence by which he could relay such feelings, nor was it something that happened often. T.S. Eliot describes the same situation in his book "The Four Quartets":
“Dry the pool, dry concrete, brown edged,
And the pool was filled with water out of sunlight,
And the lotos rose, quietly, quietly,
The surface glittered out of heart of light,
And they were behind us, reflected in the pool.
Then a cloud passed, and the pool was empty.
Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children,
Hidden excitedly, containing laughter.
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind
Cannot bear very much reality.”
And so it is. We cannot, while temporarily living in this sinful body, endure much reality. We cannot endure it because we cannot contain it cognitively, which would make sense why the moment leaves as soon as we become aware of what is happening. Lewis called it Joy; Eliot called it reality, but whatever name it would prefer to go by, we could not contain it still.
"We had the experience but missed the meaning,
And approach to the meaning restores the experience
In a different form, beyond any meaning
We can assign to happiness." ~T.S. Eliot, The Dry Salvages
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Thank you for your eloquent description; it brought a sort of clarity to what has been a great marvel to me; how can the paradox exist? As you said, I also fall back into thinking that somehow, if I can’t define it, it must not be “real” (leaving room for extremely materialistic tendencies). I found your description of language unique: “it has done a wonderful job at hinting to something out side of its walls, but never has it broken through”. Where today’s relativist would say that language is a barrier that we are unable to escape, you have painted language as having its own cage, one that it cannot escape but that we are not bound to; after examining the matter, I think you’re right. I like what Jerry Root said, that you can’t define the infinite; to give something definition (emphasis on “finite”) you must make it small enough to wrap words around.
Also, the way you portrayed, let us call it Elysium, with a “glamorous” definition of monotonous, gave a new angle for me as well. Indeed, the sunrise does not lessen its glory though it occurs every morning. “The timeless moment of complete and utter joy, the ever ensuing encore of beauty in reality”, like a deep breath in of a delightful fragrance, these words “echo thus in my mind”.
And yet, as you said, I am extremely frustrated that I can’t find resolve now; all my attempts are as “chasing after the wind”. It is vanity, for all is fleeting. Can it be captured here do you think? Can a moment be “made eternity”? Can even a “Grey Goose” offer freedom from time? It seems that what I fear of change is not the motion, but the dying. In Elysium perhaps, where death is behind us, and not all motion leads to death, perhaps there, we will know.
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