Stoic Wakefulness in the Pandemic
Tag: Wake up and look at what is truly great.
Bismillah ir Rahman ir Rahim
If we take a trip across space, time, and philosophies in search of approaches towards mindfulness, we can easily find some interesting gems. This discussion is a curiosity based attempt to apply the ideas developed across continents over the centuries to the current pandemic and a global state of lockdown. It basically feels like a menu at a high end restaurant, but instead of irresistible food, you get philosophical flavors on the bread of reality.
Let’s order “Watchfulness” of the stoics today. Mindfulness is generally associated with Buddhism. Stoicism, with a Greek origin, believes in transformation via understanding the world. Which actually sounds magical and possible in equal proportions. The key concept of watchfulness involves observing nature and its course. A famous quote by Chrysippus says that, “Men should live in accordance with the experience of what happens by nature”.
They also believe that ideas and life should be the same. In other words, philosophy would be nonsense if it is not practiced. How can this benefit us, especially as we are living a scenario that would have been hard to imaging a few months ago. A very fast moving world has come to a stand still, and fear has replaced a zombie-like carefree attitude towards reality.
If there actually is a method to this madness, it certainly has more than one dimensions. The impact on our daily lives, and the worldview or the role of reality in our world view seem to have taken hits due to the pandemic. I am not an expert stoic but, with a surface level knowledge and one more ingredient, I have an ugly idea. Social media talks of something that can be a disturbing example of the point I am trying to make. The cruelty that human beings have been orchestrating against other living beings on a massive scale. I am not talking only about a specific part of the world. Where the exotic animals being kept in conditions that would not even suit garbage disposal, let alone something that is alive, and can feel pain. This is a point regarding living conditions of animals consumed globally on a daily basis.
Science may reveal inaccuracies in this train of thought. Religious authorities may have the right to correct it. I apologize for the discussion being this dark. The pain is real, not in watching how animals die, but the pain in how they live.
Human beings treat everything they encounter as a resource to be exploited for their gain. The idea is not to negate the use. The abuse is what nature would retaliate against. I advise you to not look up the living conditions for animals that we consume, if the images won’t let you be at peace for a long time. I don’t know what is more sad. The fact that we did those things, or that we expected nature to never respond.
Everything that exists is not for us to grab. Coronavirus provides us with a perfect opportunity to be watchful of how nature has the power to fight back, and restore balance, with something as small as a 100 nanometeres.
If a stoic is reading this, I congratulate you on the sheer power of your school of thought. However, if we pay close attention to the nature of nature itself, an ask a simple question. What does nature need to pull this off?
Two basic ingredients come to mind. Knowledge and Power. Nature needs to know things, and have the power to do something about them. In Islamic though, those are the two most basic attributes of God. Aleem and Qadeer, All knowing and all powerful.
Watching the nature then becomes ‘Knowing God’, the term for that is ‘Marifat’, knowing, or ‘Marifat e Elahi’, knowing God. Don’t you believe that philosophy is nonsense if it is not practiced. Thoughts and ideas should be the same? Not only does Islam puts emphasis on ‘Ilm’ with ‘Amal’, knowledge with practice, it even goes on to say that ‘Shukr’, gratefulness, increases the bounties of God, or what you might recognize as nature.
How about discussing a very different matter of life and death? water. Has nature not provided enough of it? Do we just have too many people, and we are running out of sustenance? Is nature too powerless to provide enough water for all humans to drink?
Basic human needs account for about 8% of the water consumed. The idea of “Day 0”, a day with zero water, isn’t caused by nature being inadequate. It is mainly caused by worthlessness in human treatment of this priceless resource.
Cape Town was the first major city to declare a “Day 0” in 2017. People would have to face water rations, walk to the source of water and form queues, just for the basic needs. I urge you to pause reading and lookup what happened. Islam talks of limiting water consumption, even for taking a ghusl, bath, or wudu, ablution, that is the mandatory washing of specific parts of the body before prayers. Negating the overuse, or wastage, of water very strictly.
People started using water responsibly in Cape Town. Day 0 was pushed forward by a month. And then further, and further away. One might say that South Africans just got lucky, but I want you to tell me what do you think happened, if I tell you, it rained unexpectedly.
Being grateful with words is not the most superior form of it, according to the Islamic literature. Using what God has given you, in a way that God wants would cause an increase in whatever is in question. Watchfulness is great. Gratefulness is probably even greater.
Let’s hope we can all watch nature properly, and learn to put everything in its right place.
Wasi A. Rizvi
9 June 2020
This Piece was originally started as a writing assignment, for the course “De-Mystifying Mindfulness” by “Universiteit Leiden” on “Coursera”.
