I Want to Speak to the Manager!

I don’t always disagree with Schuon, but when I do, Dupree asks me what I’ve been smoking and if he can buy some pot from me.  

I exaggerate. Let’s just say Dupree has never paid retail for pot.

But I do hesitate to disagree with Schuon, since he seems to have a source he doesn’t tell us about. A kind of Intrinsic Authority, if you will. Of course, every cult leader comes off as an unquestioned authority, and sends out a vibe to vertical cronies such as myself to Back off man, I’m a Shaykh, or Einstein of Consciousness, or 11th Degree Peltmaster.

That Schuon was a cult leader is neither here nor there. Rather, the question always and everywhere comes down to what is true, for there are good cults and bad cults. 

Jesus was a cult leader too, and indeed, every big-box religion starts out as a cult with a single person at the center, from Abraham to Moses and everyone in between, e.g.,  Gautama Buddha, Lao Tse, Mohammad, Martin Luther, Phineas Quimby, Clarence 13X, The Báb, Sai Baba, Bob Dobbs, et al.

I just now remembered a book I read back in the day, that day being in the late 1990s, called The Book of Enlightened Masters. The title is only quasi-ironic; as I recall, the author goes back and forth between a gentle skepticism and a freewheeling, indulgent benefit-of-the-doubt, vertical libertarianism.

And why not? Just because we don’t know, it doesn’t mean someone else might not know, especially when that someone speaks with such charismatic authority!

This may sound a bit odd, but I often extend this indulgent attitude to myself. How to explain it… 

Hold on a sec -- did this insolent Gagdad person just call me a cult leader? Ouch!

As to my own Intrinsic Authority, it’s like this: when I (The B'ob) really want to drill down into a primordial subject, -- which is most of the time -- I just begin writing about it, and at some point it’s like what I imagine it must be like for a lead guitarist, say, Derek Trucks, who is my favorite, since he combines so many influences. 

Suddenly the solo begins taking off, as if it has a mind of its own. Did I do that? Yes, but with the cooperation of some x-factor that wasn’t me at all. Come to think of it, pretty much every songwriter I’ve ever admired describes something similar. Is it grandiosity? Or humility? Or megalomodesty, AKA the Ultimate Humblebrag?

Matter of fact, just last night I was reading a book about The Beach Boys. Before trying to write a song (in this case with Randy Bachman), Carl Wilson would light a candle, put his hands together, and say, “Oh Great Spirit of Music, we are together as two souls and we ask for your guidance that we make good music together.” 

Say what you want, it often worked, for example, with the great song Feel Flows, which, as Dupree can tell you, “with its jazzy solos and mystical aura,” is "great stoner music.”

Anyway, more often than not, I don’t know what I think about something until I write about it. But that’s only half of it, because once it’s written, I have to either agree or disagree with it. Yes, but based on what? By virtue of whose authority? Who died and left you in charge, Bob? 

This whole question of “authority” is a big one, and I probably haven’t discussed it enough. Out of 4,000+ posts, probably fewer than five have been on this subject. I WANT TO SPEAK TO THE MANAGER!

There is no manager. No one's in charge. Obviously, because the post got away from me. Encasing, all-embracing wreath of repose engulfs all the senses, imposing, unclosing thoughts that compose... or tried to compose, anyway. Next time I'll light a candle to the Great Spirit of Blogging.

Musical consolation. Best I can do: