4
leads to a conversation about the your need for sleep, rather than the thing other than the source of our hap-

issue
writing and social activism that have
other way around? Can you accept that piness, people ruin this happiness. That
occupied her time in the years since
human contact and freedom from fear is social ignorance, collective ignorance.
Fluxion Aldous’s death.
are essential to your health? And can you Fundamentally it’s ignorance of self.

accept that to have those things, other
Nick street: Much of your work has
people must have them too? What is it not to be ignorant of one’s self?
vision to do with cultivating primary human
It’s the wish to answer the first impulse:
relationships—particularly between
so our behavior--our actions as What do I want? What do I want?
adults and children. That might seem
individuals--creates the world we see
navï e to some people at a tim children.
around us. unhappy people make an Americans seem pretty attuned to their
That might seem naïve to some people
unhappy world? wants. How do you mean?
at a time when war and other kinds of
If you’re talking about individual suffering We desire more things than we need,
social violence seem like more pressing
or the bigger kinds of suffer more food than we need, because we
problems.
ing you mentioned, it’s always what we replace the things we really want—rela-
Laura Huxley: Actually I think the primary
bring on ourselves. We should always tionship and connection—with unwhole-
human relationship is the relationship
bring the line of questioning back to some substitutes when our deep human
with one’s self.
ourselves. How do we respond to suf- needs go unmet.
fering? The choice of how to respond is
What does that mean for you? How does
always ours. What do you see as the consequences
that play out in your work?
of these unmet needs?
My work! If my eyes were better I could
That sounds kind of bleak in a way—like Fear and rage. They are there all the time.
write more, do more. But to answer your
the world is the way it is because it’s the The fear that is now in this country is in-
question: Individuals live in an ecology
world we deserve. credible. It’s really like a contagious germ.
of relationships—to each other, with
I think the greatest difficulty in life is for
the earth. Maintaining the health of
people to realize that we already have That’s a marvelous metaphor: Fear as
that ecology starts with each person’s
everything we need to be happy. That’s a contagious disease. How do you
relationship to himself. Do you under-
not bleak. That’s a pretty hopeful view, inoculate yourself against that contagion?
stand how to eat healthily—to care for
I think! And the only thing that makes Well the answer is always vivid aware-
your body as well as this planet? Can you
us unhappy is our ignorance of the fact ness. Is this my fear, or is it Mr. Bush’s
adjust your waking life to accommodate
that we have everything we need to be fear? I don’t drive anymore, but in
happy. By acting as if the world is some- driving you can learn some tremendous
This page and the following 6 pages:
116
Views of Laura and Aldus Huxley's home and gardens in the Hollywood Hills