The beetle, the box and the light you carry
Jun 26, 2025
"If the doors of perception were cleansed every thing would appear to man as it is, Infinite."
- William Blake
I found a golden beetle on the lavender in my window box this morning. It was so beautiful I decided to take a photo of it. That way, I could share it with somebody else and maybe they would say, “nice beetle.” Or something like that.
It put me in mind of Wittgenstein’s thought experiment, “beetle in a box”. He invited us to imagine that every one of us is carrying a box. We all call whatever’s inside the box a “beetle”, but nobody is permitted to open another person’s box and look inside. Although we might the same word beetle, for all we know, what's inside your box may be nothing like what's inside mine.
We might all be talking about something very different, while using the same language.
It reminded me of something Joseph Benner wrote in The Impersonal Life, that inside the box, there’s not a beetle, but a Presence. Not a personality, but an impersonality - a Divine “I” that is eternal. He writes, “You cannot see Me nor can you hear Me with these human ears, yet I speak through you and live as you.”
In other words, in a world where we're constantly being warned about the dangers of Artificial Intelligence, there's a Divine Intelligence that is at the heart of all things. A great Impersonality that we are all simultaneously part of and have never been separated from.
This might sound a bit abstract or hollow, especially if we're grappling with feelings of hurt, disappointment or annoyance, or can't quite believe that somebody else behaved in the way they did. But here's one of the most challenging, and liberating, lessons I've been learning over the past 47 years on this planet:
People rarely do things because of you. They act because of themselves - or more precisely, because of their own conditioning, perspectives, fears and stories.
They are not privy to the rich, complex web of what makes you you. How could they be? And you aren’t able to see inside their mind and see what makes them them. And that’s okay too.
Because beneath the layers of personality and perception, behind all the tangled stories that drive our actions, there’s something we all share.
A Presence. A deep Intelligence. Not personal, but impersonal.
Benner’s “I” isn’t the ego-centric ‘I’ who gets offended, misreads situations or acts out of fear. It’s the Divine “I” - the Divine awareness that lives through us as we stumble through our human journey.
Think of the box again. The box is just a vessel. You are not the box any more than you are your body. You have a body, but you are not a body. Your body is your life-house. Your body is the vessel for your soul. And your soul is part of the vast Divine Intelligence that animates all life.
So next time you find yourself misunderstood, or you can’t quite believe why another person did what they did, remember the beetle. Think of the box.
But most importantly, focus on the light they carry. Because it’s the light we all carry, even if it seems too dark to see what's inside each other’s box.
Maybe our challenge isn’t to control how others behave, or even always to understand it. Perhaps it’s to remember the Light behind it all. Even when we can’t see it. And especially when they can’t.
