I’ve read the book “Blue Like Jazz” probably a little under a dozen times. Each time I see the same thing… Miller parroting thoughts of my own that I have experienced repeatedly. Here is one piece that describes me, as I see me precisely:
“When we were done, I started wondering if we had accomplished anything. I started wondering whether we could actually change the world. I mean, of course we could- we could change our buying habits, elect socially conscious representatives and that sort of thing, but I honestly don’t believe we will be solving the greater human conflict with our efforts. The problem is not a certain type of legislation or even a certain politician; the problem is the same as it has always been.
I am the problem.
I think every conscious person, every person who is awake to the functioning principals within his reality, has a moment where he stops blaming the problems in the world on group think, on humanity and authority, and starts to face himself. I hate this more than anything. This is the hardest principle within Christian spirituality for me to deal with. The problem is not out there; the problem is the needy beast of a thing that lives in my chest.”
“More than my questions about the efficacy of social action were my questions about my own motives. Do I want social justice for the oppressed, or do I just want to be known as a socially active person? I spend 95 % of my time thinking about myself anyway. I don’t have to watch the evening news to see that the world is bad, I only have to look at myself. I am not browbeating myself here; I am only saying that true change, true life-giving, God-honoring change would have to start with the individual. I was the very problem I had been protesting. I wanted to make a sign that read “I AM THE PROBLEM!”
That night, after Tony and I had talked, I rode my motorcycle up to Mt.Tabor, this dormant volcano just east of the Hawthorn District. There is a place near the top where you can sit and look at the city at night, smoldering like coals and ashes beneath the evergreens, laid out like jewels under the moon. It is really something beautiful. I went there to try to get my head around this idea, this idea that the problem in the universe lives within me. I can’t think of anything more progressive than the embrace of this fundamental idea.”
The truth is I could type the entire book up but I’d rather give you the opportunity to seek it out and read it yourself. I guarantee he’s just saying what so many of us are already thinking and to see ones thoughts on paper does tend to make them come to life in a new way. Anyway… read it if you get a chance!