First of all, in order to attain the perfect life, we must qualify what we mean by perfect. Perfection might seem at best elusive, at worst impossible in a world where everything we make is ultimately destined for the recycling bin. Even the most carefully crafted objects are prone to break down, and with them go our nerves. Yet there are moments when we glimpse perfection. In fact, perfection is all around us. Look at a brilliant landscape, or a grand tree, or a humble woodland animal. Go smaller and consider how chemicals behave, single atoms, or light cells, always with perfect outcomes? And a new-born, human, flora or fauna, never fails to excite cries of “perfect!”. All these things and millions of others provide clues to the meaning of perfection and prove that it is possible.
When we gaze out at our environment, we see countless examples of lives lived perfectly, from the tiniest cell to the largest mountain ranges (my definition of life includes everything natural). So, what is it about a tree that makes it perfect, or the endless travails of an ant, or the magic of a spider’s web, or the majesty of snow-capped hills? And why is it that, while a million daffodils can achieve perfection in their brief but gloriously golden lives, men and women struggle to achieve it every day?
A scientist who spends their days in the lab will know the joy of working with chemicals that never fail. Mix one chemical with another and a predictable response will occur. Perhaps even the scientist working with these chemicals might take this fact for granted, that chemicals can be relied upon to behave in a certain manner, no matter what. A space physicist building the next rocket to the moon will be aware that, as long as certain fundamental laws are obeyed, they will succeed. If they fail it is down to human error, not a failure of the physical laws. Mathematical equations always lead to the same conclusions. It is a great consolation to humankind to know that the thing we call science is constant, always operating in accord with pre-established laws. This knowledge has led to the incalculable improvements in medicine and communication and agriculture and travel we see around us every day.
But while our scientific endeavours are based on perfect laws, the results are often less than perfect; the manufacture of devices is frequently flawed; the same can be said of medicines and medical procedures; the same with new agricultural techniques; and so on. So, if we rely solely on science to perfect our lives, we will be waiting a long time. And what do we find in other spheres of endeavour? Perhaps philosophy has the answer or religion or art? Does culture have the ability to make us perfect, in and of itself? Perhaps for a while. But philosophy can lead to nihilism. Religion to bigotry. Art and culture to degeneracy. All these things are traps if we ignore one thing, something which is at the same time the simplest aspect of our lives and also the most complex: the basic code of life.
I call the basic code that which writes and governs all the laws which produce everything that we see and experience in the natural world. It is in us as much as it is in a rodent or a weed, or a mountain, or the planet as a whole. It is found right inside us – in our bodies, in our organs, in our genomes – and all around us. The air we breathe, the sunlight we see, the weather we feel. The reason why all animals seem to lead a perfect life perfectly lived is because they are instinctively attuned to the code. This leads me to wonder why, if a lion left undisturbed in its natural environment, is capable of a perfect life perfectly lived, why not men and women?
The answer lies in a faculty that is present in humans but not present in other animals nor indeed in any element belonging to nature; the faculty of rebellion. While every other thing blessed with life silently obeys its intrinsic code, humans have been busy for thousands of years learning how to rebel against it. Humankind alone has the ability to strike out and counter the code which governed its creation in the belief that it could improve its lot by doing so. No chimpanzee ever got up in the morning and decided he needed wheels. No giraffe ever thought their life could be improved by striking up a fire. No elephant decided of its own accord that by applying paint to a cave wall she could produce something both significant and inspiring. Men and women did all these things and more, but while for the most part these developments benefitted our species, they also brought with them another concept absent from the rest of nature, the concept of failure.
Failure is not “things not working out the way you want them”; failure is feeling bad about “things not working out the way you want them”. It’s an emotion like any other and one that needs to managed. And with age and with experience, this feeling stacks up, like a tottering tower ready to collapse at any moment. When people say “forget the past” they mean “forget the failures of the past.”
This would not be a problem in itself except for the fact that we now live in a culture which demands perfection in every respect and at all levels. The higher we set our goals the more likely we are to fail, and the more we succeed the higher we set our goals. It’s a vice-clamp of expectation. The effect of failure influences everything we do. If we use philosophy, art or religion as antidotes to failure then we misuse and abuse those things. The answer is not to stop achieving, stop creating, stop having new ideas, but the opposite. We can achieve more and better if we learn to manage failure.
The key to escaping the vicious cycle of achievement and failure is to understand that failure is not something to be abhorred but embraced; failure is an important part of experimentation. The person who fails the most is the person who has done the most. That being the case it ought to be encouraged. But have we now arrived at a juncture in our social evolution which is so demanding of success and so abhorrent of failure, not only in our manufacture of new devices, but in the way we behave toward each other and even in the way we present ourselves to the world, that we have made it impossible for any member of the human species to find contentment?
What, then, is a blessed state of perfection? A lion that has just feasted on a zebra knows; a camel filling up with water at an oasis in the desert understands; a tree that grows to a degree of impossible complexity that is endlessly beautiful feels it. Perfection is obedience to the code of life. As a species we have forgotten this. And if we pay homage to science first, above the homage due to the code of life on which science is predicated, if we let financial considerations take priority over the whispers of the natural code, then we come unstuck. Three centuries of enlightenment have led us to forget one important thing: that we are already perfect, we are born perfect, and we do not need science to make us any more so.
To achieve a perfect life perfectly lived, then, we must first remember and honour the origin of our existence, and do it every day, be it in the name of God, Gnosis or Gaia. The name we give it is optional. Living by its laws isn’t.
Isn’t this what Matthew meant when he said, “You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (5.48). This is perfection not as never failing, but as being part of an eternal plan that will inevitably succeed no matter what.
