The Master And Her Emissary

So I'd like to talk today about some ideas that were discussed by Ian McGilchrist in his book The Master and His Emissary.

Really,

Really interesting ideas and McGilchrist is a fascinating man.

I mean he's been a neurologist,

A neuroscientist,

Psychiatrist.

He's also deeply versed in literature,

English literature in particular,

And world history,

World culture.

Profoundly learned man with some really rather radical ideas about the nature of the mind,

The nature of the brain,

And how these interact,

How the different facets of the brain have interacted to produce a deep schism in world culture,

Especially since the industrial revolution,

Urbanization,

The industrial revolution,

And more recently digitalization,

And the impact that the divided brain has on our experiencing of the world and what that has done to the cultures that we live and move in today and our history.

The story is a bit like this.

If you look at any brain,

And this is the bird's brains,

Lizard's brains,

Human brains,

Chimp brains,

Zebra brains,

They're divided,

Left and right hemispheres,

And to understand the division you can think in terms of the way in which we attend to the world,

The different ways in which we can attend to the world.

Now historically since the 1950s when they started actually to split brains for clinical reasons,

You know,

If someone had a clinical condition which meant that it was more beneficial to actually divide the hemispheres than to leave them intact,

Even though that could be quite an effect on the person,

There would be a net gain if they divided the hemispheres in some conditions.

It was thought that the left hemisphere was in charge of reason,

The right hemisphere in charge of emotion,

The left hemisphere was as it were rational,

The right hemisphere artistic,

A whole bunch of pop psychology ideas entered the culture,

And they're all wrong,

They're all wrong.

Both hemispheres are involved in everything,

They're not ultimately divided in that sort of way,

But they are divided and the division gives rise to real differences in the ways in which we experience the world,

The ways in which we can attend to things,

And it's important here,

It's useful here,

To think about perhaps the way in which a bird might peck seed that's fallen amongst gravel.

So in those conditions,

The bird needs a highly focused attention to go out and separate the seed from the gravel,

It needs to be able to do this utilitarian task with some degree of accuracy.

While the bird's doing that,

Its right hemisphere is responsible for keeping an eye out for predators,

For being aware of chicks in the nest that need feeding,

To be aware of a mate that may be approaching and needs accommodating in the picture.

So left hemisphere in this context is about focused,

Job-specific,

Utilitarian doing.

Right hemisphere,

Wider context,

Relational.

So that division continues in humanity.

Our left hemisphere is responsible for the doing part of lives,

Getting stuff done.

It's abstracted,

Its capacity for abstraction is very large,

It's focused,

It's disembodied,

It's able to look into the future,

Remember into the past as it were,

And it's using all of these faculties to get stuff done,

To achieve stuff,

To do stuff.

Right hemisphere,

Interested in meaning,

In context,

In purpose,

In relationship,

It's embodied,

And so on.

So left hemisphere,

Abstracted,

Right hemisphere,

Embodied,

Left hemisphere,

Doing,

Achieving,

Getting stuff done,

Right hemisphere,

Context,

Meaning,

And purpose.

In his book,

McGilchrist tells a parable,

The parable of the master and his emissary.

I generally change genders here because I think it's helpful.

You could think of master here not so much as a kind of overlord,

As a spiritual master or a master crafts person,

Someone who has mastered a task and someone who has wisdom.

So think about the master in that way and let's think about a wise spiritual master who governs a realm and she's wise enough to realize that she needs to keep herself somewhat distant from administration if she's to keep an overview of what is best for her people,

For the people who look into her for guidance.

She's also realizing that the realm is growing too big for her to attend to all the details of it herself.

So she appoints a number of emissaries who might go out and govern on her behalf,

Run things on her behalf.

And one day,

The smartest and most capable of those emissaries,

One whom she nurtured carefully and trained herself,

Gets to think,

You know,

I'm really,

Really good at this governing business.

I'm really,

Really good at this administration.

Boy,

Can I get things done.

I'm really ace at getting stuff done.

You know,

I'm much better at this governing business than the master.

And he starts to use her regalia as his own and in time he comes back to the capital and he captures and imprisons the master and rules in her stead and the domain falls into disrepair and ruin.

Now in this story,

The emissary is the left hemisphere,

Getting stuff done,

Really,

Really good at that administrative stuff,

Really,

Really good at achieving,

Striving,

Making things happen.

Right hemisphere here is the master,

Aware of the wider purpose,

Aware of the wider context,

Concerned with the wider set of relationships,

Able to see more deeply and more wholly into what is happening.

And what's happened in our culture over time,

And in many of our lives over time,

And especially with digitalization,

The left hemisphere,

Getting stuff done,

Abstracted and disembodied,

Has taken over and imprisoned the right hemisphere.

I don't have time to spend,

To hang out with my kids on Saturday afternoon.

I've just got to get those emails done for work.

I don't have time to see my friends this evening.

I must prepare that slide deck for work.

I don't have time to just sit and stare at the trees.

I've got to be doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing.

We're so compelled by the demands and insistences of the left hemisphere.

It's taken over the whole domain of human affairs,

Because it quantifies,

It can say,

These are the metrics,

This is what achievement means,

This is what we've got to do,

Off you go.

And it drives us,

Drives us,

Drives us.

Now,

What's called for here is not,

And by the way,

I'm not saying,

I'm not saying right hemisphere good,

Left hemisphere bad,

Master good,

Emissary bad.

I'm not saying that.

I'm not saying that.

It's really important.

We need both.

We really need both.

And it's,

You know,

The wonderful capacities of our left hemispheres that have enabled us to build civilization,

Enabled us to thrive over time.

It's also produced a few problems in its train.

But let's say that,

You know,

It's just necessary,

You can't do without it.

But the master needs to lead.

That's the point.

The left hemisphere needs to serve the master,

You need to do your doing,

In the service of the things that really matter,

In the service of the wider context of meaning and purpose,

In the service of the wider context of the relationships that matter to you,

In the service of what means most to you in your life,

When the task takes over and becomes an end in itself,

Then we're lost.

And if you look around at human affairs these days,

In so many contexts,

And so many places,

The left hemisphere has really come to predominate.

We're running around like headless chickens doing,

And not really sure why we're doing,

Not knowing why we're doing.

It's all doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Doing,

Achieving,

Getting,

Spending,

Getting,

Making things happen,

Getting,

Innovating,

Finding,

Knewing,

Doing.

And why?

To what end?

For what purpose?

In what context?

All of that is subsidiary.

So what we need to do is to rebalance things,

To find ourselves much more in a position where the right hemisphere is in charge,

And the left hemisphere doing is at the behest of the right hemisphere.

And that's part of what's involved in the kind of spiritual life that I'm advocating here.

A life that is imbued with meaning,

With a wider sense of purpose,

With a sense of context,

With a concern for relatedness and relationship,

With a concern for the beauty and wonder all around it,

And at the same time able to do its doing in that context.