Manifestation and Freedom

Edited from “1/2/24 – Manifestation and Freedom”

Eckhart Tolle describes an aphorism taken from the teachings of Jesus to describe a religious form of manifestation: “If you pray for something, believe that you have already been given it. Then, it will be yours.” Tolle highlights the distinction between believing that you will receive it and having already received it. This, he says, is the sentence that one must fully understand in order to manifest and that all other learning is superfluous to that tenet.

What Tolle is describing is a Christian-flavoured exercise in the uniting concept of the Existentialist philosophers: “Existence Precedes Essence” or, more familiarly, that humans are first born, and then afterward they must define what they are. Sartre called this ungrounded, unbound nature of consciousness “Freedom” – not in the sense that a person can freely walk into the sky, but that there exists no authority over the individual whatsoever. This means, in Sartrean existentialism, that no labels are performative.

“Performative” as a description of a label in this case means that it requires a person to perform some action in order for the label to have been correctly applied. An example of a label that may or may not be performative depending on the observer’s beliefs would be that of a sports fan. Is someone a fan of the Packers simply because they say they are? Or do they need to watch Packers games, and then they are a fan? Maybe they only need to know who the Packers are or the name of the quarterback? Does a Packers fan need to be able to point to Green Bay on a map of Wisconsin? These are all potential conditions if we were to say that being a Packers fan is a performative label: you are not something simply because you say you are.

It is easy to see from here how this concept of performative requirements, and the disagreement between philosophies, is one key concept fueling the contemporary culture war. Is someone a woman simply because they say they are? Are they a woman if they have no Y chromosome but work as a lumberjack and bear no children? Are you truly a man if you can’t change a tire? Are you a Christian if you bless same-sex marriages? Are you a singer even if you can’t carry a tune?

On the political spectrum, liberal and libertarian schools most strongly hold to this ideal of pure, perfect individual freedom – some more and some less – and lean away from requiring performance out of identity. Cultural right and left tend to place different value on the necessity of clarity in the meaning of words. Consider the equivalent intention behind the two phrases “All people are welcome here, this is a safe space” and “I don’t care what you do as long as you’re not bothering me”. You may have read them with two different accents, and one with more disdain than the other, but the intentions are the same in spite of the additional political connotation (and baggage) that comes with either form of expression.

Both left and right libertarian schools deny the authority of any system, group, or individual over any other individual. From here we get different flavours of what is essentially an endorsement of “the power of positive thinking” – since no one can tell you what you are, then you alone are in charge. Thus, “I am the master of my fate” “believe and achieve” “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” “visualize and act” “my oppressors are mere social constructs” “what’s mine is mine”.

For the spiritual, manifestation is the exercise of this freedom, after endorsing the concept that no labels are performative. In the same way that nobody can tell you that you aren’t a Packer fan if that’s what you say you are, then too nobody can tell you that you aren’t a singer. Your ability, your practices, your achievements do not matter. Nobody can be singing all the damn time. Between stints of singing, so long as you identify to yourself that you are, you are still a singer.

This develops into some interesting and strange situations, most of which serve to highlight the absurdity of labels generally and the limits of human language. These can be found in the ‘zingers’ of socially conservative pundits, or knowing self-criticism of the particularly ironic post-label youth. “I am actually a lesbian trapped in a man’s body!” “Words have no meanings to me!” “I identify as being able to lift a car!” and the most-original “I identify as an attack helicopter.” While nonsense and identity walk hand-in-hand in a world without an ultimate authority, these are misrepresenting the conflict between labels and performance. The weight of a vehicle is a fact, the chromosomal count of an individual is a fact. The definition of a man, the definition of a lesbian, the definition of a Packer fan – these are not facts. If you believe that the dictionary is the authority on the definition of things, then I congratulate you on living in a world where the constitution and rule of law are perfect by virtue of having been written. Continue to consider everything I write here as the unyielding truth of God.

In the same way that someone can believe that they are kind-hearted, helpful, and loved by others, they cannot be prevented from believing so by anything – even if their friends say to their face that they are not loved. When Tolle describes praying and then believing that you already received it, this is what he means. You are kind-hearted because you want to be kind-hearted. And being kind is the same thing as telling yourself “I am kind”. There is no performative requirement. So it is with being brave, being a good student, being reliable, being trustworthy, being a man.

Facts don’t care about your feelings, but there exist very, very few facts. The freedom of the individual necessitates the rejection of the authority of the state, the authority of God, the authority of the other, the authority of language. The “untenable human spirit” held aloft by so-called humans is also unbound and undefinable. One may assert that there exists such a thing as what is “right” or what is “good” – but understand that doing so places a bound, and for it, you are not free.