We begin in the middle, in the space between you and me, and the sign living there is the means of meaning. When we build relationships or construct guidance systems, we do not begin with ‘fundamentals’ as if we were building with stone. The material of which meaning is made is alive, is life itself, the water of life. Living beings do not have foundations. Instead, they make default assumptions – apply principles which are acted on as if true, unless and until the consequences of acting call them into question. Often it is the failure of the default, or rather an unexpected consequence of applying it, which causes us to become conscious of it for the first time. This opens up new space for the emergence of other possibilities.
And the answers? Sometimes the answers just come in the mail. And one day you get that letter you’ve been waiting for forever. And everything it says is true. And then in the last line it says: Burn this.
— Laurie Anderson, ‘Same Time Tomorrow’
All created things have the nature of destruction. This is the last statement of the Transcendent Lord.
— Shakyamuni Buddha (Thurman 1995, 93)