Chapter 3: MIRANDA DECIDES TO CHANGE

In the morning, after breakfast, Miranda sits in her armchair, holding a page in her hand. This is what Linda, the philosophical facilitator, had asked them to do this week – to reflect every morning on a text by the French philosopher Henri Bergson (See the text on AGORA’s “Topics” page, July 2015).

David tried to object. “But Linda, every morning? I am a working man!”

“We are all busy, David,” Linda replied, “but five-ten minutes every morning is all we need. Some people do mediation every morning, others watch the news, or run around the block, so why not start the day with a few minutes of philosophical reflection?”

“And during the rest of the day?” Miranda asked.

“Reflect on this text whenever you find a moment to think – in the car, at lunch, in the elevator. If we want philosophy to make a difference to our lives, we must show commitment and continuity – even if it’s just for a minute here and a minute there.”

And so, this morning, before going to work, Miranda takes a few minutes to read a paragraph from Bergson. It is the second day of the exercise, and she reads the second paragraph:

“Not all our ideas, however, are incorporated in this way in the flow of our consciousness. Many ideas float on the surface, like dead leaves on the water of a pond…”

She re-reads these words several times. One phrase in particular strikes her: “Like dead leaves on the water of a pond.” A thought appears in her mind: “The water of my pond is full of life, but it is hidden in the depth. My dead leaves are dead but visible.”

But she is in a hurry. She chooses this phrase as her ‘mantra’ for the day (“to help us remember the text,” as Linda had said), and then rushes to work.

At work, Miranda’s mind is busy as usual: noises, voices, instructions, requests, actions… In mid-morning she finds a quiet moment to reflect on her mantra. “Like dead leaves on the surface of the water,” she whispers.

The words make her feel uncomfortable, she is not sure why. A sentence formulates itself in her mind: “Some things in me are alive, and some things in me are dead leaves.”

At lunchtime, she eats her sandwich silently. Her co-workers chat noisily around the table. Suddenly she hears somebody shouting: “Hey, where’s the water? Give me the water!”

Miranda stops eating. “Where is my water?” she repeats the words. A strange thought speaks in her mind: “Where is my water, my depth, my fullness? Do I even know it?” She finds the question hard to answer. She feels disturbed.

Later, in the afternoon, a “bubble” of insight appears in her mind: “Most of the time, my mind is dead leaves: automatic thoughts, trivial images, ideas that are no longer alive.”

A few minutes later, a second insight strikes her. “I am dead. Eight hours a day, in this room, I am dead.”

A wave of anxiety rises within her. Bergson’s text has given her words to express what she had been feeling vaguely for a long time.

Later, in the evening, she sits again in her armchair with Bergson’s page in her hand. She is tired, and she has only a few minutes to spare.

“Do I want to continue living like this,” Miranda asks herself, “day after day, empty and brain-dead, for ten or twenty more years? No, definitely not! I must change something. But change what? And how?”

She sighs and stands up. Philosophy, she reflects, is making her confused and anxious. But, she admits, it’s also making her realize new things.