Not your usual 'the world in the year to come' text, more a mystical contemplation of the future unknown. Czas jest umowny - 'time is something consensually agreed upon'. We commonly determine that our year - the point at which our planet starts its lap around the sun - begins around nine days after the Winter Solstice in the Northern Hemisphere, which as an astronomical turning point, would be more logical. We agree that the year starts on the first day of January, a month named after Janus, the two-faced Roman god of beginnings and transitions. Janus looks forwards and backward simultaneously; and so it is at this time of year that we tend to look back over the past 12 months and seek to ascertain what will happen over the next year.
As I wrote yesterday, I've been keeping a daily record of exercise and diet over the past eight years. Today, I copy-pasted the 2021 spreadsheet into the next series of columns, re-dated them and deleted last year's data, week by week, month by month, ready for this year's numbers to be entered. And as I did so, I felt I was peering into a framework, a scaffolding, for the future. Tuesday 22 February 2022; Wednesday 18 May; Monday 14 November 2022. What would each of these days bring? Will we reach Saturday 31 December without Mankind encountering any new woes? The Netflix film Don't Look Up seems to be on the button when it comes to summing up the zeitgeist of early 2022...
I have mentioned my father's seemingly irrational phobia (maybe too strong a word) for the number 22. We spoke on 21 May 2017; he told me of his deep anxiety connected with the following day. "The number 22 is a bad number," he said. And so it came to pass that on 22 May 2017, a 22 year-old Islamic fundamentalist suicide bomber at the Manchester Arena killed himself and 22 people. Did my father have a sense of foreboding, of precognition - of was it merely a case of superstition? Can the 22nd of February, 2022, pass without something awful occurring? [Twenty-two is an unusual number to have a fear of. So many people have an irrational fear of the number 13 that this has a name - triskaidekaphobia - and the number is routinely avoided by hoteliers and cruise-ship operators.]
I have posited that few people are gifted with genuine psychic powers, such as telepathy, psychokinesis, clairvoyance or indeed precognition. Such powers are almost impossible to pin down by way of scientific experiment - I believe that this is because these powers do not wish to be pinned down. Some people have strong powers, many more have weaker powers - too weak to even recognise. Most, however, have none at all or się nigdy nad tym nie zastanawiali - they have never considered or contemplated such a possibility, having grown up immersed in a rational materialist worldview that roundly rejects psychic phenomena as mere magical thinking - effect without cause.
I have to be very careful about the words I choose here. I will be trying to describe a phenomenon that I have alluded to on this blog several times, a phenomenon I've noticed since primary school. Namely my observation that misfortunes befall me unexpectedly. I feel that to a some extent I can ward off misfortunes happening by consciously precluding them. Complacency almost draws such incidents upon one - it didn't happen yesterday, so it won't happen today. Bayesian inference.
A car crash. Losing your wallet and its contents. Or your phone. A flood, fire or burglary in your home while you're out. An angry altercation with family member, neighbour or workmate. Terrorism. War. We constantly teeter on the edge of chaos, and from time to time we slip - chaos, misfortune, happens. Is it purely random - or can we guard ourselves against it?
I have to be careful so as not to appear boastful. "Nothing bad ever happens to me because I have these amazing powers" - pride comes before the fall. The hubris that so often meets James the Red Engine. Instant karma, just turn the page.
We can certainly take prevention seriously (mask-wearing and vaccination at a time of pandemic!), but beside practical risk assessment and mitigation practices, there's also a metaphysical aspect, I believe.
When contemplating luck, one should separate ego from consciousness. "I want to win millions on the lottery and have a big car and show off" - guess what - you won't. Wealth and power are attributes of the ego; it would indeed spoil some vast, eternal plan if you were to become a rich man suddenly. But actively wishing for things such as peace, health, comfort, fulfilment - and consciously discounting their opposites - I believe is eminently achievable. In this lifetime.
And so, at the beginning of this year, let me wish all my readers contentment of the consciousness.
This time last year:
communication/This is the gift you must not lose
This time two years ago:
Wealth and inequality - an introduction
This time three years ago:
Gratitude for a peaceful 2018
This time four years ago:
Fighting laziness - a perennial resolution
This time five years ago:
A Year of Round Anniversaries
This time six years ago:
Walking on frozen water
This time seven years ago:
Fireworks herald 2015 in Jeziorki
This time eight years ago
Jeziorki welcomes 2014
This time nine years ago:
LOT's second Dreamliner over Jeziorki
This time 11 years ago:
New Year's coal train
This time 13 years ago:
Welcome to 2009!
This time 14 years ago:
Happy 2008!
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