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Hi Folks,
Have you fallen in love with someone?
Have you had any heartbreaks?
How about having a butterfly in your stomach during your first date?
Perhaps, the sky tore apart with the final goodbye? Parting ways towards other lonely roads…?
Over the week, I went through "many" of my journal entry. "I surfed along the fragmented waves of words." From my early engineering days to recent ones. From loneliness to elation. From nature to nurture. From being an observer to being observed. Everything. I found repetitive patterns sticking out from those nuanced thoughts. Metaphors.
[[Metaphors]]
[Figure: A door that metaphorically illustrates “metaphors” as door handles of what can know and what we can imagine]
It seems metaphors are scattered all over the place. They are so much ingrained in our language that we don't stop much to have second thoughts about them.
Coming back to the opening questions:
Why does love feel like “falling”?
Why do we feel our hearts have “broken”?
Why do we compare nervousness with a “butterfly”?
Why does “sadness” even relate to raining?
Why is the inanimate object road “lonely”?
Metaphors in poetry
Normally when we think of metaphors, we connect to poetry. Poetry is one of the clearest places to find metaphors. [2]
For instance, a fragment of Marie Howe’s poem Singularity describes the degrading state of coral reefs as a "pain" metaphor.
…the coral reef feels pain. Trashed…
Obviously, the pain in the coral reef represents a sad state of pollution. It puts a perspective of how we humans are corrupting the nature itself. The “pain” part is so humane that it helps us connect to that global problem directly.
Mary Oliver's "When death comes" personifies death as a way of living life.
The poem “In the desert” has the metaphor of “eating the heart” which I find profoundly moving.
Similarly, the poem “Do not Stand at my Grave and Weep” has a poignant metaphor about loss and grief:
Do not stand at my grave and weep
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn rain.
This haiku portraits what it’s like to live in this world with changing time:
On a branch
floating downriver
a cricket, singing.
Metaphors in quotidian lives
I am sure we can find a plethora of poetry and still discover new metaphors. And perhaps, the same metaphor might have different interpretations as per the ever-changing nature of life. (More onto this later!)
However, a large part of our quotidian lives is filled with metaphors (like the question I posed earlier), not only just poetry.
For example, when we say "It's raining cats and dogs out there.", it's not that we are expecting cats and dogs falling off from the sky. It's expressing a very heavy rain outside that we don't want to get completely soaked in; large raindrops are surely painful.
Similarly, when talking about [[Elephant in the room]], it's probably representing a problem that everyone knows but no one wants to acknowledge. Not that there's an actual elephant in the room. (But we can bring in the elephant in the discussion table if we want. Haha. :D)
Additionally, this essay by Tim Urban, [[Taming the mammoth]], brings up “life as a massive beast” metaphor that can (or should be) be controlled by our own thought processes.
Some commonly used metaphors might be:
"Button ourselves into our lives."
"All the world's a stage."
"Life for me ain't crystal stair."
“Time is money.”
“My life is falling apart.”
“My blood is boiling.” (This is an interesting tweet)
“Eat like a horse.”
The art of metaphor
Watching | TED-ed | 5 min
Metaphors are ways of talking one thing but describing something else.
“It’s raining cats and dogs.”
Good metaphors aren't puzzles or ways to convey a hidden meaning. They simply let us feel and know something differently. That is they help us better understand the world, life, emotions, and nature.
Metaphors that aren't good leaves you confused.
There's also a paradox in metaphors. They almost always say things that aren't true, yet they are understandable.
Metaphors might live in verbs, come out as adjectives or simply act as comparisons.
Verb
"I saw no way that the heavens were stitched." - Emily Dickinson
Adjective
"Still waters run deep."
Comparisons
Sweet as honey.
Strong as a tree.
These comparison forms are generally referred to as similes. While similes and metaphors are related, their difference is subtle. Similes tend to make us think. Metaphors let us feel things directly.
Also, metaphors aren't just about human life and emotions either. They can represent any abstract idea.
"The fog comes on a little cat feet. It sits looking over the harbour and city on silent hunches and moves on.”
Metaphors we live by
Watching | Then & Now | 12 min
Again, to emphasize that metaphors aren't just poetry, they are a fundamental part of our conceptual system.
Metaphors help us understand, experience and communicate the world around us. It's more than simply art. We use metaphors to communicate experiences that are difficult to otherwise.
Besides grammatical separation of metaphors (as mentioned earlier as verbs and adjectives), metaphors are also categorized tentatively on how and where we use them.
Structural Metaphors
These determine the structure of thoughts itself.
For instance, the metaphor “An argument is a war” ties us to the "structural" concept that arguments, just like war, are either won or lost. They have weak and strong points that drive the conversation, just as a power disparity drive war towards win/loss.
"She shot my arguments"
"They attacked the arguments"
Orientational Metaphors
These relate to spatial concepts such as positive emotions as “UP” and negative ones as “Down”. These concepts can range from emotions to the orientation of a particular situation.
Happiness as up: "I am feeling high."
Sadness as down: "Her mood sank."
Control as up: "I am on top of the situation."
This has something to do with our natural postures. If we are happy, confident, or satisfied, it is believed that we have a good straight posture. On the contrary, when we feel low, we have low self-esteem and lack confidence; we don't quite look straight ahead.
Ontological Metaphors
These tie abstract ideas to physical objects that help in simplifying things.
For instance, “inflation” is an abstract phenomenon that we treat like any other physical object.
We combat inflation. Or inflation can get out of control.
Container Metaphors
These are Ontological Metaphors in which concepts are represented as having inside-and-outside.
"She is in love."
"He fell into a depression."
Often times, we mix metaphors into different categories. It’s not that one specific entity has to be tied to only one category.
For example, when we think about “love”, we might relate to the following metaphors:
“Love is a journey.”
"Look how far we've come."
"We're at a crossroads."
"We can't turn back now."
"I don't think this relationship is going anywhere."
"This relationship is a dead-end street."
"Our marriage is on the rocks."
"This relationship is foundering."
Although many metaphors are fundamental to our language and understanding, they are culturally conditioned.
For instance, when we talk about labor, different cultures have different interpretations. For some, labor might mean hard-working, while for some it might mean represent poverty. These might also stem from comparing labor with time.
"Labor is a resource and time. A resource is by no means universal. They emerge naturally in our culture because of the way we view work, our passion for quantification, and our obsession with purposeful ends.”
The art of changing metaphors
Watching | TEDx | 19 min
While we use metaphors to distill ideas, their usages vary depending on contexts. That is to say, our interpretation of an event can vary based on how we treat them metaphorically. [3]
For instance, when someone says “I am battling cancer”, we know that the cancer is a life-and-death situation. If they lose, they will die. So, they have to “battle it”.
Now, if we rephrase the same situation with something like “I am dancing with cancer”, we understand that someone is trying to live in the moment despite having cancer, without “giving in” to all the negative emotions.
This attitude actually treats metaphors as objects that go into frames (our mind).
"We become what we think about." - Earl Nightingale
If we can identify the metaphors framing our thoughts, we can change them to change the way we approach our lives (world).
Another example might be while talking about (romantic) love.
(Yes, why not?)
We mostly associate “love” to " falling in” because when we are in love, we get attached too deeply to the other person. This attachment is so tight that if things don't work (heartbreak), we find it very hard to move on.
Again this is an Orientational Metaphor that represents great sadness in life. We can't “move on” easily.
Now if this was treated something as " flowing in love", the outcome changes drastically. We treat love as any other event in life, without overthinking. As a result, we gather courage (with optimism) to move on.
It might hurt us. But it’s okay to let go. We’ll flow again. :)
Reframing a situation with different metaphor changes our perspective about the situation.
This particular video has actually impacted my view of metaphor entirely. The way the author framed the whole essence of “changing-metaphors” has made me think real hard. It’s equally inspiring to watch.
In all, metaphors are simply masks, not the essence of things itself. Our goal is to make useful masks, not the bad ones that create confusion.
Metaphors we believe by
Reading | Aaron Lewis | 21 min
In this particular essay, the author metaphorizes today's technology-driven world into different types of “God”.
"God" is a metaphor that allows us to talk about events that we can't comprehend. In the past, that belief gave rise to religion that directed societies to have coherent behaviour; to form structures, rules, and laws. But as human civilization progressed with the scientific understanding of the world, technology has become the very embodiment of “God” itself. [4]
The same “God” metaphor is applied to modern times to oversimplify the uncontrollable complex systems we're embedded in. These complex systems have enabled the world to be unified, to share knowledge and culture, and thus influence groups at different levels of abstraction. [0]
Let's face it, we humans are pretty bad at reasoning about complex systems. So, abstracting these systems into a single entity X helps us not overthink much about the complex mechanics under the hood.
For instance, instead of saying “global temperature of earth is rising, polar caps are melting…and such… because of factors a, b, c, d, e, f…”, we abstract them into Climate Change. This helps a lot while talking about the effect of increasing global temperature.
Some of the metaphorical “God” in this essay I really liked are:
Human Colossus
It is a god of “collective intelligence” that helps us imagine all humans as a single super-organism stemming from globalization. In doing so we have enabled the sharing of knowledge, exploitation of resources, and directing the world in a coherent way.
Moloch
It is the god of coordination failure. It's actually a demonic metaphor that's preventing humans to solve important global problems like Climate Change and the likes.
Uruk Machine
(Click on the link. It points to a good read.)
It is the god of heartless market forces that represents what happens when irreversible market forces collide with pre-industrial social systems. That is, these market forces exploit the chaos and messiness of our society. They have authoritarian impulses and are mostly driven forward to events that should add value to the economy.
Yggdrasil
It is the god of spooky entanglement. That is, unlike the Human Colossus that sees the world as a single bubble, Ygdrasil sees every event like branches in a tree; one small change can create a ripple effect. (See: Butterfly Effect).
We’re cells in the Human Colossus. We’re caught in the fiery clutches of Moloch. We’re invisible to the Uruk Machine. We’re surrendering our data to The Stack. We’re tangled in Yggdrasil’s roots. We’re uploading ourselves to the Singularity. We’re hosts to increasingly parasitic Egregore.
There’s a tight feedback loop between the gods we believe in and the societies we create, which is why we must take seriously the metaphors we believe by.
Overall, this essay is thought-provoking. Highly recommended to read.
The tails coming apart as a metaphor for life
Reading | Scott Alexander | 10 min
This is directly related to “Why the tails come apart” which is a very thought-provoking statistical phenomenon.
The trend seems to be that even when two factors are correlated, their tails diverge: the fastest servers are good tennis players, but not the very best (and the very best players serve fast, but not the very fastest); the very richest tend to be smart, but not the very smartest (and vice versa). Why?
The very best ones you identify as best ones [1] are unlikely to be actually the very best.
This has something to do with the distribution itself. Since the real data doesn't have correlation=1, the distribution is more like an ellipse rather than a regression line. Thus, there is some bulging in the distribution around the extreme points.
For instance, in basketball, let's say performance, in general, correlates with height. The greater the height, the better is the performance. In an ideal scenario, the person that is performing the best should have the maximum height in the given group. However, that's not the case. It happens so because of that ellipse-like distribution. The person that performs the best doesn't (necessarily) have the maximum height in the sample.
Another explanation might be related to trade-offs. If you are too focused on improving one factor, chances are other factors that will be neglected.
In this particular write-up, Scott presents [[Happiness]] as an example to “Why the tails come apart” idea. He also talks about the categorization of happiness; how the intuition for "being happy" might change towards the extreme points of the ellipse. So, the tails are the actual metaphors to life itself. (At least that’s my understanding after reading it once).
So, what are my thoughts on metaphors?
Obviously, our beliefs (and understanding) of the world are affected by metaphors we "live by" and "believe by". It ranges from nuanced emotions like love, anger, work, time, money to a wider spectrum of our [[Belief Templates]], and the functioning of society, organization, nation, and such.
Some of the metaphors I (kind of) "live by" in my own insignificant world are:
I am a dot in a dot
This helps me put a better perspective that my life is both insignificant and significant simultaneously. “Insignificant” because till now I haven't directly impacted the direction of the world. "Significant" because I can impact a small dot in my vicinity. Again “You Will Never Do Anything Remarkable” narrative plays out.
This is water
I find the “water” metaphor from DFW profoundly moving. For me, it represents the value of awareness and “beliefs” I have towards the world. It’s about “noticing” the world I guess.
“Your mind is an excellent servant, but a terrible master.”
Life as a lonely train ride
Life is a lonely ride on a lonely train heading towards a lonely station. It stops nevertheless.
I took this one directly from Bijay (who has always inspired me) as it hits close to home. (Also check his iteration of ToN for metaphors.)
I am a rock in the river.
This stems from different levels of struggles in life. If you leave a rock in the middle of a swift river for ages, its structure will be shaped by how the water hits it. Life's like that I guess…
My mind is fragmented.
It's not that I have my brain broken in pieces. It's about my fascinations with almost everything. Again, the "master of none, jack of all" narrative is here.
Where the river flows
Life is metaphorized as a river. Just flowing. Another variation is, being a glacier long before even becoming a river.
The cook and the chef, Engines vs Power-ups, and the likes.
These are metaphors for learning. These might relate to the “My mind is fragmented” metaphor too.
I guess this can go on and is likely to be more philosophical if I think really hard about many metaphors. And it's possible that this can change based on how “life streams itself” for me. In my journal entries, I find most metaphors tracing to nature. Perhaps, nature inspires us more than we can think of…
Life might not be a river, it can be a whirlpool. It can also be a mountain. It might not be a dot but a bubble expanding/contracting....you get the idea...
Similarly, I used to think romantic “love” was something I couldn’t possibly touch. Things changed from “love is meaningless” to “love helps us peek into some meanings of life” to “flowing in love is fine” to “love breaks heart”. And again, I find myself "yearning” to “climb on top of a mountain of romanticism” and just sit there with someone, sky-watching. I let these thoughts “drift” here and there for now. Perhaps, these thoughts will stick around like my shadow.
Nevertheless, metaphors are inspiring. They drive our lives without us noticing them. They are like handles of doors of what we can know and what we can imagine.
#Watching
The art of foreshadowing metaphors
Nepali Flicks Exposition | 18 min
Here, the author analyzes the nuanced aspects of a Nepali movie Fitkiri. The movie seems to have this subtle metaphor of masks, either through literal masks on a character's face or reflected in the character's persona itself.
I enjoyed this video essay thoroughly. I hadn't really found any Nepali youtube channel for good video essays. But this one is good. I am subscribed.
Rap cover songs don’t exist
Adam Neely | 17 min
We often see covers of classic music, rock/metal music, and poetry. But, why don't rappers ever cover other rappers?
One reason might be because of the emotions that each rap song carries — all the beats, tempo, words, and style uniquely represent a rapper’s style that cannot be covered that easily.
What is postmodernism
12 min
This video was produced for the exhibition Postmodernism: Style & Subversion 1970 – 1990, which ran at the V&A South Kensington from 24 September 2011 to 15 January 2012.
I’ve been trying to learn about postmodernism. And in the process, I found this video really fascinating. I guess learning about postmodernism is like studying Quantum Mechanics. Haha.
One fascinating example I found is fractured sculptures.
Johannes Gutenberg and the Printing Press
14 min
I found this video while re-reading an essay on Neuralink by Tim Urban.
It seems Johannes Gutenberg didn't actually invent the printing press. Chinese had already done that a bunch of centuries earlier. Gutenberg simply made the production cheaper by mass-printing.
Or, more accurately, when Gutenberg was born, humanity had already figured out the first 95% of how to invent the printing press, and Gutenberg, with that knowledge as his starting point, invented the last 5%.
He would make stamps and arrange the letters exactly like the original page. This would allow printing that page in bulk. And he would rearrange the letters for the next page and continue.
The Human Foot Is a Design Disaster
Cheddar | 6 min
The article Why Do we even have does had made me re-visit this video.
It turns out our feet might still evolve (if evolution takes its course). It hasn't yet stabilized if we compare them with bi-pedal animals like flight-less birds. Our feet were originally meant for climbing trees and grasping. So, it's modified ape hands. Haha.
#Fascinating
Website: readruler
This helps you to organize your pocket list.
This has helped me to organize my to-read articles/essays based on reading time. Also, it can generate a list of articles for you to read within some specified period (say 30 minutes). I am using it often these days.
Futuro House
These 20th Century prefabricated homes are often referred to as "UFO Houses". They were intended to be used as mountain cabins, not as permanent settlements. Since these cabins used plastic, and due to the price hike in oils, it impacted the manufacture of the houses. Now, there are around 50 Futuro houses.
#Fragments
Video: To understand rain
One of “those” videos I get back to once in a while; helps me calm down. The way rain drives our lives is inspiring, which depends on what metaphors we connect to.
One thing guaranteed with rain is that the rain will always end. So, find solace in the rain.
Video: Letter to myself
Ramuna's renditions always hit close to home. I have always found this type of letter comforting. Probably, it's human nature to find comfort in familiarity. Last night (as I write this), I was hit my strong anxiety. So, to ward off that, I wrote Dear Nish. :)
Music: Robbie Basho - "Kowaka De'amour" (1971)
It feels good to listen to Basho after many months. You might want to listen to the album “Twilight Peaks”.
Music: Blowing in the wind
Not sure why I find myself frequently ending up to this specific Dylan song. Probably, the metaphor of "The answer is Blowin' in the wind" hits hard.
#Ending-Thoughts
I found this tweet very thought-provoking:
“Everything feels unprecedented when you haven't engaged with history.”
That's it. I hope something stuck out to you from this write-up. Or perhaps some sections “poked you”? What's your favorite metaphor? Has any metaphor changed your perspective towards life? Do let me know.
Paradoxically yours,
Nish
PS: I tried spoken poetry for my poem I Think I'm Dead to get out of usual life rut. It might as well be metaphor for solitude itself. I let that be… :)
PPS: I am currently watching “Analogy as the core of cognition” from Douglas Hofstadter. Probably, I need to revise certain concepts from GEB too.
Also, if you find this newsletter helpful or someone who might find it helpful, do share. Might motivate I guess.
Footnotes
[0] - Groups can be small organizations, cults, societies, nations, digital nomads. Anything that represents [[Memetic Buckets]] driven by common goals. (see cultural genes known as memes)
[1] - The best one means a certain set of skills (factors) that usually make the outcome (performance) better.
Basketball players with greater height perform better.
Serving faster in table tennis provides the upper hand.
Being intelligent makes you rich.
[2] - Let's not dive into what makes a poem, poem. But almost every form of poetry can be metaphorical, whether or not it was intended to be in the first place. Like any other thing, that's open to interpretation. But one common "road" we can walk on is that the metaphors in such proses help us better understand the world around us.
[3] - Emotions are into play while interpreting any events. I guess I have mentioned that previously too.
[4] - I am not going into that debate of “creationism” vs “evolution”. For me “God” is also a constructed abstraction irrelevant to scientific/religious backgrounds. Just replace “God” with “incomprehensibility” and it might make equal “sense”.