Between monkey and monk
walking the rope above the abyss
“the overman shall be the meaning of the earth... Man is a rope, tied between beast and overman—a rope over an abyss” - Nietzsche
I am told by spiritual teachers that everything is perfect as it is, but I have this felt sense that something is deeply wrong. A homeless person lies on the side of the road, and a man in his Ferrari drives past him. We have created a world of abundant resources, and yet there is so much lack. The modern capitalist credo is that “the man in the Ferrari has taken the risk, and so should be rewarded”.
Sure, it’s not on him to solve the inequality. He is not G-d. He’s probably a nice person who cares a lot about the world and its problems, and gives to charity. Maybe his name is Lewis Hamilton. I would love to have dinner with this man. And I would love to experience the thrill of driving in a Ferrari, especially with Lewis Hamilton at the wheel. This is not about bashing Ferraris. There is virtue in beauty, in art, in craft for its own sake. But most people don’t buy Ferraris as an appreciation of engineering.
And who am I to judge? I also have enough. More than enough. I’m writing this from a quiet, comfortable home with savings in my bank account while others sleep on the street. I justify the fact that my savings will have no impact on the system, and so I’m using my voice as a way to maybe start conversations. Maybe someone with far more money and power will read this and be jolted into action. (@Lewis, please let me drive in your Ferrari if you ever read this.) Maybe one day I will be that person. This is a conversation among the relatively comfortable, critiquing systems we benefit from even as we claim to see through them. I’m complicit in the very games I’m describing.
I wonder if this is not the paradox of being in the world; the price we pay for wanting to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden? We wanted to be like G-d, and so our monkey brains are confronted with polarities and problems beyond our perception. All I’m left to do is to scratch my head and ponder, to point fingers and judge and want someone else to make the changes.
The animal has no such problem. When they are hungry, they eat, or hunt. When they’ve been traumatized by the hunt, they shake their bodies to release the chemicals. There is no narrative of good and bad, no elaborate story that confounds the mind with suffering. Everything is what it is. There’s no separation between desire and action, no elaborate performance required to deserve having needs met. The ecosystem works - needs get met in balance. No animal organizes political systems that prevent others from accessing resources.
Looking at our own lives through the animalistic, physical level, we are all seeking the same thing - a state of satisfaction in our bodies, the physiological undercurrent of homeostasis. Most of us will have an intuitive sense of what this feels like in our bodies. If not, visualize the place and time in your mind’s eye when you were most happy and at ease in the world. We’re all looking for safety, belonging, a sense of “deep-okayness” in our bodies.
But the various conditions and belief systems we’ve created to access that felt sense have led to massive inequality, suffering and planetary destruction. A consumer-driven culture creates a market that thrives on consumption; on the luxury end, we might even call it conspicuous consumption. The suicide bomber believes that blowing themselves up and killing and maiming others will give them that bodily state of comfort, belonging, and connection with 70 virgins in the afterlife. The man beats his wife at home because it gives him a feeling of power to compensate for the powerlessness he feels in other areas of his life. We are all playing different games to get this felt sense.
The games are built into our economic system too. Worth is tied to productivity and capability. We operate from a place of competition, resource hoarding and scarcity. Yet we produce enough food to feed 10 billion people, whilst over 700 million still go hungry. The scarcity is a feature of faulty distribution systems.
And accumulated wealth is another area where we’re confronted with a distribution problem. There’s no incentive for the ultra-wealthy to redistribute. To paraphrase Bob Dylan, “and how many yachts must one man have / Before he can hear people cry?”
We can’t go back to pure instinct - would it not be a regression to return to our animalistic nature? But we also haven’t reached the status of the monk who sees through the games entirely, and lives for the benefit of all beings. So we’re stuck between monkey and monk. And when we can’t go back, the only way out is through.
So let me lay out my utopian vision. It is a vision built on the fundamental worthiness of all humans. This is not a call for equal outcomes, and not even a call for equal opportunity. But rather, it’s a call for the equal regard of all, without the lens of status or economic output.
And yes, I hear the objection - in its current form, this vision would lead to stagnation. There would be no motivation to do anything. We’re goal-oriented beings, and it’s in our DNA to achieve and to win the approval of the tribe through our actions in order to move society forward. Communism has failed, so why suggest it again?
But what if the underlying incentives fundamentally shifted? What if we could see life - not just humanity, but all life (sneaking in some more of the utopian vision here) as the hive to our bee, and us all solving for the wellness of the whole? What if we only felt good when everyone felt good? Oh wait… Maybe it’s actually been that way all along, and we’ve just missed the point?
Nature solves for the collective, but Western society is structured around solving for the individual. Self-actualization is a mirage. I believe we should be aiming for societal actualization - where the measure of success isn’t individual achievement, but collective wellbeing. Where we feel satisfied not when we have more than others, but when all have enough, and have the felt sense of wholeness and satisfaction in their beings.
Call me an optimist and an idealist. It would be a first, and it would be a great change.
Future humans, Nietzsche’s “overman,” will hopefully look at our wealth hoarding, our race to Mars while Earth burns, our tying survival to performance, with a disdain and condescension as we look on those who traded slaves. The shift isn’t about individual consciousness rising - it’s about becoming aware enough of the games as a collective that we can start building systems that don’t require them.
It goes without saying that this would not be an overnight change. It will most likely be a phased approach, probably measured in generations rather than years.
But for now, we find ourselves stuck between the beast and the overman, the monkey and the monk. But the awareness itself - seeing the rope we’re walking, feeling the abyss below - that’s the beginning.
Becoming the bee - may this life be the queen of the hive.
Thanks to Anna for the conversation that sparked this; to Nic and George for their thoughtful feedback on the first draft; and to Adam for the wonderful image of the monkey and the monk.
Dario, I so appreciate your writings and sharing your struggles. I don't always read them, and when I do, I don't feel so alone in my challenges.