“Vigilance means to be alert to what happens inside, so you can catch an old, collective habit pattern.” Eckhart Tolle
“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” Thomas Jefferson
“The battle is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave.” Patrick Henry
“When good people in any country cease their vigilance and struggle, then evil men prevail.” Pearl Buck
In another brilliant Ezra Klein podcast, Ezra interviews Naomi Klein (no relation), a provocative author/critic acclaimed for her books No Logo and The Shock Doctrine. In her most recent book, Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World, she discusses how we are sometimes able to lose track of who we are. We abandon our vigilance and, in so doing, our values. I particularly liked this quote:
“This is the thing about doppelgängers: In literature, they’re always a message, giving you a warning that you have to look at yourself. There’s something about yourself that you’re not seeing if reality starts doubling.”
A doppelganger, of course, is an exact lookalike. These days, with my wild, white uncombed hair, people sometimes confuse me with Larry David or Bernie Sanders. In my younger days, I never thought I would be happy to be compared to people who looked like either of them. Now, I find it kind of funny. And, fortunately, I admire both of them as courageous curmudgeons.
It’s not always easy, though, to look in the mirror and face the reality. What is it we are not seeing about ourselves?
I recently read George Saunders new book, Vigil, and Michael Pallon’s new book, A World Appears: A Journey into Consciousness. Thus, the title for this post. I was wondering why we often lack awareness of our level of moral consciousness, and I wanted to understand how important vigilance is to heightened consciousness.
In an increasingly complex world, the concept of “vigilant consciousness” offers a lens through which to examine our moral awareness and potential for growth. In Vigil, George Saunders illustrates our inclination to disregard the ethical implications of our actions, while the research explored in Michael Pollan’s A World Appears, underscores the profound importance of actively cultivating a heightened state of awareness as Tolle suggests in the opening quote.
True vigilance moves beyond simple attentiveness to encompass a deep, introspective engagement with our ethical landscape and its impact on the world. Saunders’ Vigil serves as a potent, if fictional, case study of humanity’s lack of moral vigilance. The novel centers around Jill “Doll” Blaine, a death doula, who attempts to comfort K.J. Boone, a dying, climate-change-denying oil executive. Boone, a man described as a “real stinker,” embodies a profound absence of self-awareness regarding the destructive consequences of his life’s work. Even on his deathbed, he remains unapologetic, believing his actions were justified because they served his family – and he was “rewarded so handsomely for it.” Saunders masterfully uses the narrative, which features a host of “chatty dead,” to expose Boone’s ego-driven existence and his inability to confront the “painful deaths and the destruction of the environment” his decisions caused.
The story reveals how many of us are “caught up in own obsessions and unable to break free or find peace” – trapped in an egotistical loop.” Saunders demonstrates that true vigilance requires confronting uncomfortable truths, a skill Boone conspicuously lacks.
Sharpening our vigilance allows us to perceive the subtle impacts of our actions and encourages us to take a more humble and attentive stance toward the world, counteracting the kind of self-serving obliviousness displayed by Saunders’ K.J. Boone.
In a post I wrote last year entitled “Unexamined Privilege,” I commented on the “bubble” of a small rural town that is “completely disconnected from the chaos of city life and the messy challenges of dealing with the diversity of urban melting pots.” I argued that this comfortable existence fosters a lack of examination of the “privileges that may be blinding us to the need to take action” in a world facing critical issues like climate change, nuclear war, and social polarization. In Vigil, Boone, a man whose privilege allowed him to remain deliberately unaware of the broader suffering his actions caused, refuses to challenge his comfortable narratives or confront uncomfortable realities. Boone demonstrates the destructive inertia of unchecked ego and a refusal to acknowledge the ripple effects of one’s decisions.
Vigilant consciousness is the active and ongoing process of scrutinizing our internal landscapes and external impacts, ensuring that we are not, like K.J. Boone, allowing our lives to be defined by a comfortable yet morally bankrupt existence. It is only through such an awakened state that we can hope to foster a world built on compassion, connection and care.
Michael Pollan’s latest exploration, A World Appears: A Journey Through Consciousness, marks a significant evolution in his career as a voice at the intersection between nature and human experience. Having previously explored how we eat (The Omnivore’s Dilemma) and how we alter our minds (How to Change Your Mind), Pollan now turns his gaze toward the most fundamental question of all: What does it actually mean to be aware?
Pollan argues that we often take the “movie” of our lives for granted, failing to realize that our brains are constantly constructing a reality rather than merely recording one.
A central theme of the book is the fragility and construction of the Self. Pollan investigates how the ego acts as a gatekeeper, filtering out the vast majority of sensory input to keep us focused on biological goals. By interviewing neuroscientists, philosophers, and meditators, he illustrates that the “Self” isn’t a solid entity located in a specific part of the brain, but rather a persistent narrative. He posits that when this narrative is disrupted—whether through deep meditation, trauma, or awe—a “world appears” that is far more vibrant and interconnected than our standard daily experience.
What makes the book compelling is Pollan’s role as the “everyman” skeptic. He avoids falling into pure mysticism by grounding his journey in biology. He treats consciousness not as a supernatural ghost in the machine, but as a biological miracle that we are only just beginning to map.
Pollan argues, however, that vigilance is not just a biological function of being awake, but an active, ethical responsibility. He posits that because our brains are “prediction machines” constantly hallucinating a version of reality, we must be vigilant in questioning whether our internal map matches the external world. When we place Pollan’s scientific inquiry alongside George Saunders’s 2026 novel, Vigil, we see a haunting dramatization of what happens when that vigilance fails—and ego takes over the controls.
Pollan explains that the brain prefers efficiency over accuracy. It creates a “Self” to act as a narrator, filtering out any data that contradicts our established story. Pollan suggests that consciousness is the “light” by which we see the world, but Saunders shows us that this light can be directed away from things we don’t want to see.
To me, the questions are: Is the ego a shield that deflects moral accountability and/or a filter that detects actual reality before it touches our soul? Is vigilance a spiritual practice to see clearly and/or an opportunity to accept the truth before we die? Is true vigilance the act of letting truth in, even when it threatens the story we have created for ourselves?
These questions brought me back to two metaphors that may provide meaningful “answers”. You can choose which one “works” best for you.
The first is the metaphor of the carriage, horses, reins, driver, and passenger which originates from ancient Eastern philosophy, specifically the Hindu Upanishads dating back thousands of years. It illustrates the human condition: the passenger is the soul, the carriage is the body, the horses are emotions/senses, the driver is the mind, and the reins are intellect.
In the 20th-century, G.I. Gurdjieff popularized a specific, detailed version of this metaphor in which the Carriage (body/moving center), Horse (emotional center), Driver (intellectual center), and Master (essential essence) interact in a variety of ways depending on the dominance of any of the respective centers AND the evolution of the passenger or “Witness.”
The metaphor suggests that most people live with a sleeping passenger, a confused driver, and chaotic horses – meaning the “soul” is not in control of the “body.” The goal of spiritual practice is to wake the passenger and train the system.
The second metaphor is that of a movie projector, the story on the screen, and the light which illuminates the character and setting. It is now a popular analogy for consciousness, psychology, and spirituality. Interpreters of the metaphor posit that the mind (projector) projects thoughts and beliefs (film/story) onto the world (screen), powered by awareness (light).
For me, the story on the screen depicts the roles of each of our physical, emotional, and intellectual centers in the story we create about our lives in the external world. The projector represents the conscious beliefs that influence each of our centers. And the light illuminates the probabilities and possibilities or who we are and who we might become.
I prefer the first metaphor, but I would love to know which one resonates best with you.
I’m hoping that we can look in the mirror and experience an accurate reflection instead of avoiding truth through deflection or protection. For me, that will involve some bitter realities, but then again, it may free me from my narrative prison. I’m also hoping we can brighten the light on our lives so that we can live with more vigilant consciousness. Finally, I’m hoping our Witness can help us find peace in this mess. May it be so.
