“space is neither empty nor a negative, but is a set of relations that must be managed.”
In relation to where we reside on the temporal axis, we are quickly reaching a point where history is becoming unavailable, while the future is rapidly disappearing. This is the age of simultaneity. Upon observing the fatal intersection of time and space, we must be careful to differentiate between sacred and profane spaces.
When we consider the issues that surround the space occupied by our populations, proximity emerges as an element that must be considered and managed. The mismanagement of proximity between fellow beings leads to great anxiety. Due to this mismanagement of space, we are no longer able to enjoy time. Furthermore, there is a temptation to employ an anemic agreeableness in order to smooth over the tension of anxiety that emerges in such proximity zones and spaces which consist of broken relations with others. This leads to a singularity where the past becomes unavailable, while the future once envisioned begins to disappear. In the essay Heaven Emerges I posit:
“With each space being its own casting within which one must fit, there is a constant demand for one to abbreviate and repress what is most natural and true about their personhood in order to live and work in society. This, in part, leads to the sickness of agreeableness which prevents proper engineering of spirit.”
“proximity without relationship induces unending anxiety.”
In our effort to desanctify all spaces, time begins to collapse and disappear. The goal of post-modernists seems to be the rasterization of space as homogenous while exorcising the world of all hidden sacredness. The attrition of life happens over time in space. Although the oppositions of; sky and earth, sacred and profane, fixed and convertible spaces still exist, our experiment in rasterization continues to flatten all space as we attempt to erect paradise. The erection of this paradise is always a virtual image event that prevents us from making proper distinctions between authentic and fabricated reality. It is important for us to remember that space is neither empty nor a negative, but is a set of relations that must be managed. In the age of anxiety, all spaces become eligible to become sites of temporary leisure. The solution for these dysfunctional set of relations is the extinguishing of all diversity. This pathology, largely driven by ressentiment, seeks to change all which lies outside of the organism with no consideration of what lies within. Society has forgotten that between the heavens lies the Self. One can not change the world if one can not change the self.
We are surrounded by utopias — or so-called perfect sites which can never be significant places. The perfect presentation of these unreal spaces fills us with an uncanny dread concerning the attrition of our lives. These places are therefore like mirrors, for they are placeless places that are indicators of our existence which lacks being. The utopia of these mirror-like places is where we wrestle with our visible shadows and the vestiges of a shattered family unit. Again, proximity without relationship induces unending anxiety.
In contrast to these utopias, there are places which often have a specific function within society, while still being unreal spaces, despite their connection to the whole of society. These heterotopias also juxtapose several, often incompatible, spaces in one place. These "nowheres" are also "elsewheres" that serve a specific function within a society, while simultaneously being apart from society. Imagine a garden within a forest, or a theater. In the case of the garden we see a private space within a public space. In the case of the theater, a public space becomes a place of privacy. Heterotopias are also places where we spend a specific type of time, which should not be conflated with a specific amount of time, although the latter is often the case. In the case of a cemetery, bodies rest for an indefinite amount of time in a garden where they appear, remain, yet simultaneously disappear all at once. Additionally, museums and libraries have become heterotopias of indefinite time. They have become archival places of all times and ages.
Heterotopias are structured so that entry and exit makes them both accessible and inaccessible under specific conditions and within certain parameters. They are both sanctified and penetrable, are not the same as public places, and usually require permission to enter or exit due to the fact they are not freely accessible. The entrance into these places is by definition an exclusion of other people, places, things, and sometimes require a suspension of previously held beliefs or modes of behavior. Heteretopias can be physical or mental spaces that act as other spaces alongside existing spaces and more often than not, are spaces where norms of behavior are suspended sometimes resulting in epoché — id est environments which demand a suspension of judgment that allows for the apprehension of reality and truth free from worry and anxiety. Slices of time can either be accumulative or transitory within heterotopias. In these elsewheres, there is an eternal contest to present the self as the authentic self. There is a great challenge for mankind to exist, and co-exist with others, in these elsewheres that lie between the heavens.
“The attrition of life happens over time in space.”