The Lord of the Flies + Who Gets to Tell Us What is True?

The Lord of the Flies scared the shit out of me.

It was terrible, and relatable.

I experienced elementary school as a terrifying and unruly place. The bullying and harassment on school grounds was an awful experience... and I still don't trust any of those kids to this day. I’m looking at you Darlene and Kim. The Lord of the Flies seemed wholly plausible, and a perfectly reasonable assessment of modern society. It disturbed me for years.

When our peace is disturbed, Byron Katie asks us if what we believe is true.

“Is it true? Can we absolutely know that it is true? ”

— Byron Katie

A lot of the stuff we get upset over isn't true and we can't ever know for sure that it's true. Our believing it is true is what disturbs our peace, so to regain peace, we fall back on what we know for sure is true.

The real story inspiration for The Lord of the Flies.

What is true?

The true story that inspired The Lord of the Flies is much more beautiful than the nightmare we've been given. Instead of a group of humans devolving into murderous monsters, the real shipwrecked boys survived for 18 months until they were rescued.

They worked together to feed and shelter themselves. They worked together to forage and grow food, find water, keep the rescue fire lit 24/7 and nursed one of the boys’ broken leg so well that it healed as if he had been in a hospital.

The real boys came together for mutual love and benefit and continued to support each other until they were rescued. Their return to home and family was the miracle of a good green Earth and bountiful loving Universe.

The true story is quite the opposite of the Lord of the Flies that we got.

Who decides what is real?

William Golding was a depressed, angry, alcoholic school teacher.

By all accounts he had monstrous tendencies. By his own admission he was an attempted rapist who set his students to fight one another; a scene in Lord of the Flies that was inspired by real life. Golding was a dark and brooding character who served up a portrait of himself that got turned into a false mirror we accepted for the world.

Artists don't offer an absolute mirror to society; we offer up a portrait of ourselves and society can choose to see ourselves reflected in that mirror, or not. Maybe it's easier to believe we will turn on each other in times of strife rather than support and care for one another.

William Golding, 1983 = giving the darkest version of living.

Maybe William Golding thought that he would turn on others and he saw all of humanity in that light.

Who gets to decide which stories get told?

The same is true for all children growing up where parents and adult authorities are the gods in our lives. They are our gods for a short time, and what we learn from them is true, until we decide that it's not.

We reject in ourselves what isn’t accepted by those who are supposed to love us.

As children we reject aspects of ourselves that were criticized by adults - especially our parents. We reject aspects of ourselves that made our parents angry, uncomfortable or distant. We rejected aspects of ourselves to stay safe, to stay loved and welcomed and valuable and worthy in the eyes of our parents. We rejected any aspect of ourselves that made us unacceptable to our parent-gods.

We need love and safety, and as children we willingly cut off parts of ourselves to be loved and accepted.

Children are the centre of their own universe - they are the cause of everything wonderful AND horrific that happens to them and others. On one hand, this is beautiful and valuable wisdom; children know instinctively that the whole of the Universe is for them. It's also flawed because they are too young to have the boundaries or experience necessary to discern the difference between truth and the wounded reactions of unhealed adults.

The Fall

There is a psychological period in a child’s development that is thought of as the 'fall' from innocence. It occurs between 7-12 years of age and coincides with the replacement of ‘baby’ teeth by permanent ‘adult’ teeth. This development marks the transition of a child from innocent, unquestioning belief in what they are told by authorities, to the realization that our parents are in fact human, wounded and fallible.

At this time, our parents stop being seen as gods and the unquestioned authorities of our life.

I remember this as a moment of huge disappointment in my childhood. I used to eavesdrop on my parents after I was supposed to be in bed. I would sit under their giant record player by the kitchen door and listen to them talk. No one ever found me, even if one of them got up to use the bathroom, I was never discovered.

This is the Clairtone my folks had when I was a kid. Great hiding spot.

But it also meant that I heard a lot of things that weren't intended for my ears. Mostly it was petty talk about other people; judgements, criticisms and mean, small gossip about other adults in their lives.

Up until then, I had believed that adults were truth and goodness. Any cruelty or harm I experienced at their hands, I believed was my own fault for being young and dumb. I had believed that the cruelty I saw and experienced at the hands of other children would disappear when we grew up and learned how to be better human beings. I thought harm happened because we were dumb kids, and we would grow up and learn to not harm one another anymore.

So sweet and so wrong.

The Fallout

The results of this "fall" are both frightening and exhilarating.

We choose our life. We choose what we believe our life is, and what it means, and who we are.

We choose our lives, and ourselves, and we can be anything we want.

I mean it - anything - all of it is our choice.

Nothing that we were told or made to believe about ourselves or the world is cut in stone. Everything can be re-assessed and believed anew under the light of 'what is really true?'.

Don’t forget to ask for it. Ask the Great Mystery. Ask all of the Universe. Ask yourself, your loved ones, your neighbours and friends. Continually ask for what you need. Asking is a requirement to getting.

Remember to give as well. Every one of us is sharing our experience of the world with the world. We teach the world what we believe in every thought, action and word that is given. We have an obligation to share our highest knowing of what the world is with the world, and every being in it. Giving is a requirement of getting.

There is only loving inclusion. Expect to see this in the world and you will.

The body is a wisdom tool

Being in touch with our bodies and the signals it is giving us about our states of being - spiritual, mental and emotional is using a wisdom tool designed to help us know ourselves and the world around us.

Gestalt psychology says that the body never lies. Being in touch with our body and it's messages to us is a way to the truth about ourselves and our situations in the world.

Click here for the full slideshow.

What is bothering you? What is disrupting your peace?

Disrupted peace is a pebble in the shoe of our being and needs to be addressed. It may be a signal that we are believing something about ourselves or the world that isn't true. We may be believing a view of ourselves and world that was given to us by someone who should not have the position of truth-teller in our lives.

That role belongs to us.

The Cailleach Ken Library has several tools to help us ferret out whatever is disrupting our peace. It can help us connect to the natural world and make use of their wisdom to help us work through the events and situations in our lives that that are the echo of original misunderstandings of what is true.

The world is a Beloved Presence to us and we are to Them in return.

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