Self-Difference - 12.22.09

Student Comment: From watching this movie on fractals, the recurring theme that hits me is this idea of self-similarity. It really interests me, and I’d like to know more about it.

“It’s true that in every moment you are similar to the way you were in the last moment. But you are also different. And this is the key point. If you are in fact different from every past moment, and you’re going to be different in the next moment, then you are not who you are now. You are in fact the difference itself. . . . The human essence is not form but the difference between one form and the next. Between one iteration and the next. And because you are difference, difference has no form. And that difference cannot be predicted. It is freedom. . . . And that’s why it’s possible—in any moment—to become enlightened. . . . just by realizing that what you are is difference itself. . . . Therefore you can change your life, utterly, at any moment; you have that freedom. It’s only our fear—of using that freedom—that keeps us stuck. Recorded on the evening of Tuesday, December 22, 2009.