The Illusion of Knowing: A Meditation on Truth and the Human Condition

1. The Premise – The Illusion of Knowing

What is truth? It is this: we are alive and it is beautiful, and we are meant to live in wonder. Instead, we bind ourselves to pain, hate, political ideologies, and religion for the sake of being right, unable to sit in the stillness of the unknown. Our egos dragging us forward into manufactured truth. Not because we seek truth but because we crave acceptance. We force knowing out of fear of not knowing. For in not knowing, we reveal our ignorance, a sharpened arrow of shame piercing our hearts. 

To know that is the mystery. Very few people have known, and when they do, we deify them. We form religions around their memory and teachings as we stumble against their splendor one faltering step at a time. In our struggle to understand their teachings, we ask ourselves, What is the truth? Is there a God? Which religion is right? How, when, and even why were we created? Or maybe there is no God—maybe God is dead and we are nothing more than a scattering of molecules fused by chance, floating through a dark, desperate universe. Still, we stand bickering, fiercely arguing our truths, our knowing faces red with passion as we scream, “I. Am. Right.”

We cling to our ideologies, even in the face of death, declaring that our belief is the only way worth following; each of us standing firm on our own foundation of truth. A foundation inherited through generations. Another uncovered through intense searching. More often than not, one born of desperation—the clumsy grasping for anything that might ease our suffering—clutched tightly against our chest, for fear that letting go means being lost within the torrent once again. 

And so we’re left to ask: if everyone believes they’re right, what is truth?

2. The Observation – The Smallness of Our Frame

We stand knowing, muttering the mantra “Knowledge is power,” thinking ourselves magnificent in the accumulation of our understanding, envisioning ourselves sophisticated and enlightened, staring out the window of the proverbial Ivory Tower. We observe the endless universe, the intricacies of our bodies, the depths of the atomic world, and we think ourselves wise. We spout our truths in the form of practiced, regurgitated answers, and in the following adulation, hold ourselves to the utmost esteem, forgetting how little we know. We speak of the vastness of space, yet our minds cannot fathom its endlessness. We count each heartbeat, but we do not understand how the heart beats. The atomic world lies at our fingertips, yet we forget that we are an impossible amalgamation of subatomic particles coalesced into human form. Our knowledge, minuscule but praised, as if we were the creator, and in our reverie, we declare ourselves divine, clinging to power while forgetting that the air within our lungs holds more mystery than the sum of our learning.  

With this bravado, we saunter forth; our lives vortices of motion, enamored with none other than ourselves. We adorn ourselves with crowns and cry, “Behold! Look upon my works,” never stopping to consider that soon we too will be ground back into dust. Our names will fall away, one whisper at a time, until time no longer remembers us. In this final rest, our truths no longer matter, and what we fought for is slowly lost to history. 

3. The Struggle – Why It Matters

Despite all our achievements, the longing within our breasts pulls us—tugging, wrenching at our hearts, screaming that we haven’t done enough, we’ll never be enough until we do more. More. More! As such, our disoriented minds scramble for meaning. We fight. We strive. We struggle. Why? Because it matters! It’s instinctual. The longing to be accepted, adored, praised for what we’ve done because it means we’re worth something. Instead of realizing our worth from within, we seek it without. In our upward ascent, we relish the accolades, only to find the summit lonelier than expected—as we stand alone in a room of a thousand people. Anxiety and rage tear at our insides—the pain of all our hurts, perceived or real, wars within our minds. Unable to cope, we brush it aside, then stuff it into the dark recesses to let it fester as we paint on a smile that never reaches our eyes. 

We search for meaning in our families and friends, through deep conversations, careers, money, and all our stuff. One moment, it hits us square in the chest—we’re alive! In the next, it’s gone, leaving us hollow and bewildered. We seek it. Grasp for it. Cling to it when we think we’ve found it, but it wanes, then waxes cold. Nihilism creeps in. Soon, meaning is meaningless, and we mourn our naivete. Resentment builds, and we point fingers, casting stones of blame. We soak in the meaninglessness, wondering, “Where is the peace?” Our hearts harden as the bleak, terror-filled thoughts haunt us: “We are nothing,” “There’s no point to any of this.” We languish in our despair until one day, we watch the sun rise. In that one glorious moment, we sense the thread of meaning stirring within our being. We feel purpose. As the light pierces the clouds and shines upon our face, we remember the childlike sense of wonder. We release. Let go of all we’re holding onto. For a fleeting moment, peace reigns supreme. 

Hours later, we find ourselves stuck in the mire of self-righteous posturing, once again spouting our truths—our knowing—and meaning quietly slips away. We fall back into nihilism. A child smiles at us, and, instantly, meaning and purpose return anew. An inevitable and eternal gridlock—light and dark, dark and light. The never-ending struggle. Yin and Yang. The Ouroboros. The cross and the resurrection. 

4. The Revelation – Holding Both Truths

Life is death. Death is life. The moment we’re born, we begin to die, and when we die, we are reborn into cosmic unity. Our minds strain to embrace these certainties. We strive to hold onto meaning but slip into meaninglessness—yet in our despair, we find meaning. Our lives are real, but also a simulation. We are conscious, but we are also unconscious. God is dead until he’s not. We perceive only the minutest details of our waking lives, and from this we posit our truth. We call this Yin and that Yang, blind to the Tao that holds them both. We strive for righteousness within the narrow confines of our thinking, while simultaneously harbouring evil, forgetting that the same consciousness warmly embraces both. 

Even the Apostle Paul wrestled with this paradox when he wrote:

We define truth out of personal experience. Derived from our narrow lens of perception, and yet we still stake a claim that our truth is the truth! But how quickly do our truths change? They shapeshift in response to new information and experiences. What once was absolute is now speculative, with truth shifting, merging, and flowing into something new with every subsequent generation. And yet, we claim to know! And this is our error—the stumbling block of humanity. In our hubris, we declare our knowing. This is why the Bible quietly teaches:

We pride ourselves on our certainty and congratulate one another on mental, moral, and spiritual superiority. We esteem charlatans for the audacity to stand before the many and proclaim their truths with conviction, all the while missing the real truth. The only truth. The simplest, humblest truth of all:

We. Don’t. Know.

Ah…but we do catch glimpses—a flash between the blink of an eye, a momentary remembering of something long forgotten. For most, that knowing is ephemeral—a taste of what is, what was, and what will be. The wisest place to stand is knowing that you don’t know—for that is the only way to truly know. 

5. The Resolution – The Sacred Ordinary

What is truth? It’s the humility to live in the not knowing without fear. To accept the shame-filled volley of arrows that come with ignorance. To find comfort in three simple words: “I don’t know.” Truth is found in the stillness of a cluttered life. It whispers to you in the mundane. Instead of attempting to solve life through logic, facts, and reasoning, you release control and allow yourself to experience the wonder. We take pride in our intellectual adult minds, but forget the teachings of Jesus when he said:

We look at truth, religion, spirituality, and moralism as armor to bear. We pack it on as if it’s the protection we need from an otherwise dangerous life. However, these were never meant to be treated as armor. No. They were meant to strip us of the armor we forged through our experiences. To dissolve our egos, reminding us that even though we look, think, and act like adults, we’re all little children pretending to be grown. Learned. Wise. Returning to truth is embracing the childlike wonder of the world around us, allowing ourselves to stand in awe of every single moment.

Truth isn’t out “there,” it isn’t the next big discovery. It’s the relinquishing of control and allowing yourself to just be. Life was never meant to be solved, only experienced in wonder. 

Until next time,

Josiah

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