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The world we live in
10 - Plato's allegory of the cave
Plato was concerned with the importance of education in our lives. If we replace ‘education’ with ‘consciousness’, Plato’s allegory of the cave still applies to our 21st century.
For these folks, the shadows on the wall are reality. One day, someone gets freed and turns around. Suddenly, he sees the fire behind him and the objects making the shadows. What is real is not the shadows on the wall but the fire and the objects behind him.
Eventually, he leaves the cave and sees the real world outside—sunlight, colors, the works. When he goes back to tell the others, nobody believes him. The shadows are all they want to know.
It’s a pretty good metaphor for the way we experience the world. Most of the time, we’re just looking at shadows—limited by our senses, our brains, and what we’ve been taught. Every now and then, someone gets a glimpse of something bigger, but it’s hard to explain to everyone else. That’s what science, philosophy, and art are all about: trying to turn around and see what’s out there.
We share with the monkeys a need for security. An experiment was carried out when transferring monkeys from the downtown zoo and turning them loose in a park. Those animals had been living in a cage all their life. It was decided to make the transition to a free park as smooth as possible. The monkeys were kept in their familiar cage, and the cages were moved to the park. That gave them time to look at their new environment before opening the doors of the cages. The young monkeys were the first to venture outside and explore the park. The old ones went to the door and looked outside but never left their cage.
Inside their cages the old monkeys enjoyed security but it prevented them from enjoying freedom. Our limitations prevent us from enjoying the freedom of the vast world and they also prevent the vast world from hurting us. The longer we remain in our cave, the more difficult it is to face the vast universe.
What’s the cave all about? Plato imagined people who spent their whole lives chained in a cave, only able to look at the wall in front of them. All they ever see are the shadows on the wall. They are the shadows cast by objects behind them, thanks to a fire burning further back.
Let’s get out of our jail. Plato would approve!
That could even be the main purpose of our lives. During the day, we live in the material world. Our sense organs keep us prisoners of what we can see, hear and touch. We must regain our freedom.
We are carried by the flow
and pretend to be the captain of our ship!
Our jail is our body. To escape from our jail is to free ourselves from the limitations of our sense organs. The people watching the shadows on the wall were relying on what their eyes could see. They did not realize that the limits of their sense organs became the limits of their thinking.
Our search for freedom should start inside ourselves. We need a third eye turned inside. This is not easy. As we fail looking inside, we look for compensation and pretend to be the victims of society. We forget that we created our society in our image. It is a mirror reflecting ourselves.
After our death, our bodies get recycled. What is left is the changes in our soul. Our main concern should be the effect that our life has on our soul. We don’t want to discover, after our death, that we wasted most of our time on Earth.
Our main concern should be
the effect that our life has on our soul.
Let us add another chapter to Plato’s allegory:
Plato makes his explorer go back to his cave to help his fellow men. That is very commendable, but let’s try another ending. Let’s assume that our explorer decides to stay outside the cave. You can guess what happens. He meets a woman and falls in love. He becomes conscious of new feelings and a new reality. The woman made him conscious of feeling he could not have imagined. He discovers that his first cave was inside a bigger cave, itself inside another bigger cave. We could say that he was climbing a staircase and every step up widened his horizon.
One day, the woman asked him: “Are you conscious of love or is it love that makes you conscious?” This is not an easy question. It seems that consciousness and love come together. We become conscious of love when we experience it.
Let’s water the little seeds:
Freedom, consciousness, and love were already buried in our explorer, like seeds waiting to be watered. We can see something similar in Nature. Seeds are buried in the ground like he was buried in his cave. If you don’t water the seeds, nothing comes out. As the seeds grow, people get introduced into a new reality. Consciously or not, we keep watering little seeds buried deep inside us. Pushing the envelope of our consciousness is a powerful motivation. Every stress in our life is an opportunity to bring something to the surface that will help us overcome future problems. Watering our little seeds pushes the envelope of our consciousness and our freedom. The criterion of success is a feeling of purpose and happiness. To live a human life is to water some seeds that already exist deep in our soul, such as freedom, consciousness, love. It is by developing them that we become conscious of a new reality.
Let’s add a second chapter to Plato’s cave.
The next step is the ‘platonic’ love. That means a feeling of love that does not need help from another human being. It is detached from the material world. It is the love of the whole universe! This love penetrates the world like heat penetrates objects, without getting attached to them.
What Plato did not tell us is that we have a problem. We water everything: Not only the seeds but also the weeds. Everything can grow in our garden - the good and the bad.
The next step
How can we get out of our cave?
-First, it helps us to realize that our view of the world is limited. We should stay curious, keep asking questions, poking at the walls, and looking for cracks.
-We can learn from each other. If we compare notes, we might get a better idea of what is really going on. That’s why conversations, stories, and sharing ideas matter so much.
-Third, we can try to build better tools for understanding the world. Science, technology, art, and even just good old-fashioned thinking are ways to stretch our minds and see a little further.
And finally, we should make the cave a better place for everyone, while keeping an eye out for the sunlight.
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