Presented to the Gulf Coast Unitarian – Universalist Fellowship sometime in 2002
For my presentation this month I’ve once again chosen to draw upon the wisdom of Kahlil Gibran in his masterpiece, “The Prophet.”
I’d like to talk about his insights concerning “reason and passion.”
Again, this month, I’ll read his words and then we’ll explore what I, and then you, see in them.
Kahlil Gibran writes, concerning Reason and Passion:
“Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason and your judgment wage war against your passion and your appetite.
Would that I could be the peacemaker in your soul, that I might turn the discord and the rivalry of your elements into oneness and melody.
But how shall I, unless you yourselves be also the peacemakers, nay, the lovers of all your elements?
Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul.
If either your sails or your rudder be broken, you can but toss and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.
For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.
Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of passion, that it may sing;
And let it direct your passion with reason, that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes.
I would have you consider your judgement and your appetite even as you would two loved guests in your house.
Surely you would not honour one guest above the other; for he who is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.
Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and meadows – then let your heart say in silence, “God rests in reason.”
And when the storm comes and the mighty wind shakes the forest, and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky, - then let your heart say in awe, “God moves in passion.”
And since you are a breath in God’s sphere, and a leaf in god’s forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.
In pondering the concepts of reason and passion, and discussing them with the friend from whom I obtained my first glimpse of Kahlil Gibran’s work, I’ve realized that, over the years I’ve had my own misconception of the two phenomena; but I’ll address that in due course.
First I’d like to state that years ago, when I began thinking about passion versus reason I considered “passion,” that is, “feelings,” to be less than intellect. In fact, I was quite contemptuous of “passion and feelings.”
They were unreliable as guides for human action, I said. ANIMALS employed passion, I believed, since they are not able to think. Humans CAN think, so that’s how we should guide our lives.
I think this notion came from the teachings of Ayn Rand, who believed that the mind was the human being’s sole survival tool.
I’ve since come to believe that this is not entirely accurate.
In any case, to begin explaining my thoughts about passion and reason, I will relate to you an experience which I had back in 1995 when I was still in my career in the nuclear industry. Many of you may heard me relate this story a couple months ago in response to a sermon by Rev. Ord, so I’ll be brief.
I’d been working at the nuclear plant for 11 years. During that time the utility that hired me was bought out by Entergy Corp.
Immediately, rumors began to be circulated concerning layoffs, the plant closing, and other serious issues concerning my employment. Like everyone else, I worried, constantly, about losing my job.
I felt pressure all the time. Although I still laughed and joked with my friends and co-workers, in the back of my mind I was still worried. We all were.
Then one day I was walking down the hall at work and a thought popped into my head; “I can leave here, and the world won’t end.”
It was an epiphany! I like using that word. Almost makes me sound like a preacher.
As that realization dawned on me, a warm glow began to expand inside my chest. Even now I recall that I had a vision of a ball of light, a small sun, if you will, growing within my breast.
It was wonderful! And I KNEW, at that instant, not only that I was leaving that job, and soon, but that no matter what happened, I would be OK in the end.
It’s been almost 6 years since that day, and although my life is still not moving forward, that is, the way I’d like it to, I am still convinced, and have complete faith in myself, that I WILL be OK in the end.
And I’ve NEVER wished that I hadn’t left my career. I still have no regrets about that decision.
In looking back on that experience some time after it happened, it occurred to me that I had made the INTELLECTUAL decision to leave the nuclear industry some 5 years earlier.
I theorized, then, that I hadn’t left at that point because my “heart” wasn’t ready yet. It was only after I “felt” that glow in my heart that things became “right” for me to make the change.
Confirming this thought were a couple of experiences that happened to me in which I relied entirely upon my intellect and expressly IGNORED my feelings.
In both instances, I got hurt financially. In one instance, I was hurt very badly.
So, from these experiences I learned that when one acts in life, one must pay attention NOT ONLY to one’s intellect, but also to one’s “heart.”
And as a result of that insight, it recently occurred to me that BOTH our “feelings” and our intellect are equally important survival tools. Not just the intellect, as Ayn Rand believed.
However, being a feeling, “passion” is, to me, one of our instinctive survival tools. It is possessed by animals, as well as humans, so I had to figure that our intellect was simply the more highly evolved survival tool.
But, although the mind is the most highly evolved survival tool, it is still not the ONLY tool. And for this reason we must pay attention to all our other survival tools as well.
I believe some great thinker once stated “Follow your heart.” To me, our “heart” is that feeling we get right here, when we’re deciding upon a course of action.
Now, I’d like for you to imagine a seed from a small plant. It has all of its adult plant’s genetic structure contained within it. This structure composes the plant’s survival tools.
The seed will not germinate unless ALL of its survival tools are in agreement to a certain extent.
The temperature must be within certain limits, soil pH must be within the proper range, there must be adequate moisture and nutrients in the soil. There must be adequate sunlight.
Before this seed makes the decision to come forth, ALL of it’s survival senses must be satisfied, within a certain range.
I think this is the case with humans. When we’re faced with an important decision, we employ many tools. Our intellect, our memories of past experiences, our knowledge of people, our knowledge of ourselves, our philosophy of life…..all kinds of things.
Note, too, that everything I just mentioned as being one of our survival tools exists in our minds. Even our passions are a result of thoughts and impressions in our minds.
And, just as Gibran pointed out, I think that when one acts solely upon passion, he is likely to err, just as when one acts upon intellect alone.
What I believe, now, and it was the friend who leant me Gibran’s book who brought this to my attention, is that the “heart” doesn’t act as one of these tools. The heart doesn’t think. Thus, all those actions which might be necessary to alleviate a certain situation MUST come from our minds.
What the heart does, I think, is decide when all of our survival senses are in harmony.
When we’ve done our homework, explored every possibility for action in a given situation; when there is no longer any doubt as to what we should do, our hearts will let us know.
It may be something simple like the absence of negative “feelings” in our hearts. Or it may be a warm glow, like I felt many years ago.
When we feel that “glow” as I felt, we can be certain that we are making the correct decision.
When we DON’T feel “right” in our hearts, we definitely should question our direction.
Obviously, life sometimes requires that we make a decision before we’ve had time to consider all the options. Even in that case, however, we can act with confidence simply because, understanding the special circumstances, we know that we’re doing the absolute best that we can in that situation.
Now, once we’ve become certain in our course of action, our “hearts” should provide us with all good feelings, and these feelings should translate into a passion for our actions.
Once we’ve employed our reason to determine a course of action, we may give our passion free reign in spurring us on to success. If we let our passions get the best of us prior to thinking things through, however, we risk our own ruin.
I was reading an article the other day in which the author was describing an individual he’d met. He described how his acquaintance would gesture passionately with his hands while talking.
The author observed, “When someone believes in something with their soul, their body talks too.”
I think that observation describes the proper relationship between passion and reason.
When a person is convinced of his correctness, throughout his entire being, his entire being becomes part of his actions. It is this which imparts passion to our actions.
So now, let’s consider Kahlil Gibran’s thoughts again:
“Your soul is oftentimes a battlefield, upon which your reason and your judgment wage war against your passion and your appetite.”
I see this as the tendency for our emotions to divert us prematurely from our thinking, causing us to take action which may be wrong, since it is not backed by adequate consideration.
“Would that I could be the peacemaker in your soul, that I might turn the discord and the rivalry of your elements into oneness and melody.
But how shall I, unless you yourselves be also the peacemakers, nay, the lovers of all your elements?”
Here I think he’s urging us to be aware of ourselves, and the natural conflict within us between reason and passion.
“Your reason and your passion are the rudder and the sails of your seafaring soul.
If either your sails or your rudder be broken, you can but toss and drift, or else be held at a standstill in mid-seas.
For reason, ruling alone, is a force confining; and passion, unattended, is a flame that burns to its own destruction.”
That’s the most significant point for me. For a long time, as I said earlier, I operated strictly in accordance with my intellect. I tried to suppress ALL feelings as dangerously unreliable. This leads to a very sterile existence; not to mention some bad decisions.
By the same token, if we live entirely by our passions, we will be taken in by every sob story that comes along. We’ll immerse ourselves in every noble cause, with little or no regard for the consequences to our lives and relationships.
“Therefore let your soul exalt your reason to the height of passion, that it may sing;
And let it direct your passion with reason, that your passion may live through its own daily resurrection, and like the phoenix rise above its own ashes.”
Here I believe he is saying that the intellect MUST drive the passion. Once our heart lets us know we’re on the right path, we should give our passion free reign. Our passions will be resurrected each time we come to a new intellectual conclusion. This is preferred to living one’s life entirely in passion.
“I would have you consider your judgement and your appetite even as you would two loved guests in your house.
Surely you would not honour one guest above the other; for he who is more mindful of one loses the love and the faith of both.”
That should be self-explanatory.
“Among the hills, when you sit in the cool shade of the white poplars, sharing the peace and serenity of distant fields and meadows – then let your heart say in silence, “God rests in reason.”
And when the storm comes and the mighty wind shakes the forest, and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky, - then let your heart say in awe, “God moves in passion.”
And since you are a breath in God’s sphere, and a leaf in god’s forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.”
Again, to summarize, we should rely upon our intellect, not just our reasoning, but our memories, experiences, our personalities, our self-knowledge; all those things, in making a decision for action.
But once that decision is made, our hearts will take over and provide us with the passion for action which will ensure our success.
Just as the plant I mentioned relies upon many different inputs before its seed can sprout, so too must we allow all of our survival tools to be in harmony.
To do otherwise would be to risk hurting ourselves, as well as others.