Think462Twice
12-08-2003, 05:57 PM
The concept behind AEnima is simple enough if you put your mind to it. As you all (should) know by now, it is two terms conjoined together: Anima (Jungian psychology; in lamens terms it can be seen as the soul) and Enema (the injection of fluid into the anus for cleansing purposes). Now, what can be derived from this? The album should (I only say this because in my mind IT SHOULD) be seen as A CLEANSING OF THE SOUL, or in other words, self-discovery. Every single song relates to this concept in one way or another.
"Stinkfist" is a song about human civilization/modern society in general. Think about how many people, including yourselves, are in a constant state of restlessness and boredom. Pop-culture, the media, and basically every aspect of human life are constantly changing, but why? Some would argue that it is just evolution, it is the natural way that things "should be" going. To those who take that stand I must ask this question: Why, then, have tribes (The Dogons of Africa, Aborigines of Australia) maintained their culture/way of life for thousands of years without change? Why do we, the people of modern "civilization," destroy everything from the environment to ourselves while those ancient peoples live in harmony with the earth? What took natural evolution billions of years to create, it has taken modern human society a mere ten thousand years to destroy. Our culture reaps everything that it sows. How can anyone in their right mind consider this a natural way to evolve? Plainly put: IT ISN'T; every aspect of modern "civilization" is fundamentally flawed, from the way we treat each other, to the way we kill off thousands of species a day, to the way we pollute and destroy our mother earth. It is only in modern "civilization" that human beings begin to have addictions (of any kind; drugs included), mental disorders, suicides, homicides, war, etc. Sure, there has always been some sort of conflict, that is just the way that life works ("life feeds on life"), but to wage wars in the name of God or money or oil or capitalism or democracy, that is absurd and horrific.
Think about forty or fifty years ago, what types of movies were released? What music did people listen to? How did people dress and act? What was deemed normal and what was seen as "outside the lines?" All of these things and more have changed so much that people don't know what to do with themselves anymore. Human life has become meaningless; how many times have you asked yourselves what you are living for? So, what do people live for? Going to school, graduating college, getting a job only to sit in some cubicle for the next fifty years of your life so that you can get married, buy a house and car, have kids, then retire and move to Florida to die.
What do people desire the most? If you took a pole I guarentee that the results would end up being superficial objects that people neither need nor truly want. But people LIVE FOR these things: expensive cars, nice houses, boats, clothes, their own delusions of beauty and sexual arousal, drugs, toys, guns. What kind of a life are we living?? For the sake of comfort and convenience we have given up truth and meaning. We constantly allow the authorities to run our lives, telling us what to do from day one. And they maintain power and domination by keeping us preoccupied with money and greed and power and wealth. They manipulate us into thinking that we are actually happy when in truth we are all miserable and weak. And these ideas are only scratching the surface of so much more negativity and evil....all you need to do is open your eyes and the illusion will become clear. What illusion you may ask? Duality, compartmentalization, seeing the external world as being separate from us; when in truth we "are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are just an imagination of ourselves." Sound familiar?
"Stinkfist" is about rediscovering meaning and purpose in our lives. It is about saying "FUCK YOU" to everything that we are bred to believe/live for and to begin the process of personal enlightenment/evolution. It is the first step in the process of THE CLEANSING OF THE SOUL. When Maynard sings "constant over-stimulation numbs me" he's talking about the fact that nothing comes as a surprise anymore-think about the images portrayed on the idiot-box and in movies every single day: grotesque pictures of dead bodies, blood, and gore. The most important news every night is a story about houses being set on fire and murder, rape, crime, brutality. What would our great grandparents have thought about the images we see each and every day? The idea behind over-stimulation is that no matter how hard we try, we really feel nothing at all. In this chaotic world, we are lost and hopeless, we push on only to fail. Every year someone starts a new religion or group or sports team, we attempt to identify with SOMETHING above ourselves, and for moments at a time we begin to feel a connection, only to lose it just as quickly. From this endless cycle we have become frustrated, destructive, and violent. We perpetuate our own misery by continuing on this road that leads to nowhere. Once more, the idea is this: WAKE UP PEOPLE, BECAUSE HELL IS VERY VERY REAL-YOU ARE IN IT. Don't think so? What would you call it, then?
What do you think of when you hear the word "hell?" Whatever that might be, it is surely not to be taken literally-as many religious people do. Hell is here, this dimension of earth, this chaotic cycle of birth and death. The concept behind Tool's music is to end this cycle, to wake up from this nightmare and become one with all-because all life is interconnected. You are me and I am you: WE ARE ONE AND THE SAME. Whether or not you believe in Jesus Christ as being the "son of God" is not relevant for our goal, instead think of what his message was, as a person. Basically, and this is very simplistic, LOVE IS THE ROAD TO GOD, it is the path that will take us home. This is because love is the only thing that matters. Think about a world where every person was in-touch with his or her-self. Think about a world where everyone could be completely honest and open. Think about a world where human beings live in harmony with nature. This is true love, not the superficial meaning we have given it. True love is love for yourself, but it is much broader than that: it is love for all life everywhere, from the smallest micro-organism to the birds and bee, elephants and tigers, human beings and aliens. It is love for the earth and plants, trees and rocks, for everything that exists. For everything is you and you are everything. Don't you see?
"Nothing seems to satisfy, I don't want it, I just need it, to feel to breathe to know I'm alive"
Nothing that society gives us has any real meaning, it provides us with nothing more than perpetual ignorance. Maynard is saying that we should search WITHIN OURSELVES for the answers; that it might "hurt a little" at first because we have forgotten how to use our whole-brains (and have lost touch with higher aspects of ourselves), but as we continue to strive forward, the pain will ease up. Then, once that first step is finished "finger deep within the borderline" we can move on to the next step, digging a little further with a "knuckle deep within the borderline" and so on, until we reach the shoulder, at which point we have completed the entire first stage of our cleansing.
The one question that seems to remain with many of you is "how does the other person come into play?"
Do not take anything Tool says literally, instead think of everything as a metaphor....again and again throughout this album what is really being referred to is TWO SIDES OF OURSELVES. The male and female sides (i.e. Tool = male, A Perfect Circle = female); the logical and emotional sides; mathematical and artistic sides. This album is about finding a balance of the two halves of your personality in order to OPEN YOUR THIRD EYE, to become enlightened and/or reborn. You see, instead of letting your ego control you, which is something that everybody-including myself-does, this album is communicating a message about cleansing your soul so that you may (re)discover who you really are and what meaning/purpose your life has. A very important part of this is the destruction/death of the ego, which is talked about in later songs. But, as I just said, it is also about discovering/maintaining a balance: "blend and BALANCE pain and comfort DEEP WITHIN YOU." So, when Maynard sings "turn around and take my hand..I can help you turn tired (boredom = tiresome) moments into pleasure" he is talking about the other half of himself. By joining the two halves we begin to see things under a different light.
The ego, my friends, is the devil. It is not some demon sitting in the middle of our planet waiting with a pitchfork to burn us for eternity, no, it isn't. Think about your ego, which, by definition, is the aspect of our "self" that controls thoughts and behavior, especially when related to external reality. Our ego is what becomes addicted to fast food, alcohol, drugs, etc. Our ego is what threatens our security, it is what drives us to become jealous of each other. Our ego is what blinds us from what is true and meaningful. Yet, despite all of these negative things, the ego is quite tempting when it wants to be. For those of you who have experienced "bad-trips" (i.e. psychedelic nightmares), the ego is what tempts you to be afraid because it's domination/control is being threatened. It is what holds back people who meditate. It is everything that is wrong with human beings...for those of you who are religious, isn't this exactly the way Lucifer/Satan is described in the bible? Furthermore, the bible claims that we are all "born into sin." Well, we are all born with our egos, hence we immediately sin.
"There's no love in fear"
"Stinkfist" is a song about human civilization/modern society in general. Think about how many people, including yourselves, are in a constant state of restlessness and boredom. Pop-culture, the media, and basically every aspect of human life are constantly changing, but why? Some would argue that it is just evolution, it is the natural way that things "should be" going. To those who take that stand I must ask this question: Why, then, have tribes (The Dogons of Africa, Aborigines of Australia) maintained their culture/way of life for thousands of years without change? Why do we, the people of modern "civilization," destroy everything from the environment to ourselves while those ancient peoples live in harmony with the earth? What took natural evolution billions of years to create, it has taken modern human society a mere ten thousand years to destroy. Our culture reaps everything that it sows. How can anyone in their right mind consider this a natural way to evolve? Plainly put: IT ISN'T; every aspect of modern "civilization" is fundamentally flawed, from the way we treat each other, to the way we kill off thousands of species a day, to the way we pollute and destroy our mother earth. It is only in modern "civilization" that human beings begin to have addictions (of any kind; drugs included), mental disorders, suicides, homicides, war, etc. Sure, there has always been some sort of conflict, that is just the way that life works ("life feeds on life"), but to wage wars in the name of God or money or oil or capitalism or democracy, that is absurd and horrific.
Think about forty or fifty years ago, what types of movies were released? What music did people listen to? How did people dress and act? What was deemed normal and what was seen as "outside the lines?" All of these things and more have changed so much that people don't know what to do with themselves anymore. Human life has become meaningless; how many times have you asked yourselves what you are living for? So, what do people live for? Going to school, graduating college, getting a job only to sit in some cubicle for the next fifty years of your life so that you can get married, buy a house and car, have kids, then retire and move to Florida to die.
What do people desire the most? If you took a pole I guarentee that the results would end up being superficial objects that people neither need nor truly want. But people LIVE FOR these things: expensive cars, nice houses, boats, clothes, their own delusions of beauty and sexual arousal, drugs, toys, guns. What kind of a life are we living?? For the sake of comfort and convenience we have given up truth and meaning. We constantly allow the authorities to run our lives, telling us what to do from day one. And they maintain power and domination by keeping us preoccupied with money and greed and power and wealth. They manipulate us into thinking that we are actually happy when in truth we are all miserable and weak. And these ideas are only scratching the surface of so much more negativity and evil....all you need to do is open your eyes and the illusion will become clear. What illusion you may ask? Duality, compartmentalization, seeing the external world as being separate from us; when in truth we "are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively, there is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we are just an imagination of ourselves." Sound familiar?
"Stinkfist" is about rediscovering meaning and purpose in our lives. It is about saying "FUCK YOU" to everything that we are bred to believe/live for and to begin the process of personal enlightenment/evolution. It is the first step in the process of THE CLEANSING OF THE SOUL. When Maynard sings "constant over-stimulation numbs me" he's talking about the fact that nothing comes as a surprise anymore-think about the images portrayed on the idiot-box and in movies every single day: grotesque pictures of dead bodies, blood, and gore. The most important news every night is a story about houses being set on fire and murder, rape, crime, brutality. What would our great grandparents have thought about the images we see each and every day? The idea behind over-stimulation is that no matter how hard we try, we really feel nothing at all. In this chaotic world, we are lost and hopeless, we push on only to fail. Every year someone starts a new religion or group or sports team, we attempt to identify with SOMETHING above ourselves, and for moments at a time we begin to feel a connection, only to lose it just as quickly. From this endless cycle we have become frustrated, destructive, and violent. We perpetuate our own misery by continuing on this road that leads to nowhere. Once more, the idea is this: WAKE UP PEOPLE, BECAUSE HELL IS VERY VERY REAL-YOU ARE IN IT. Don't think so? What would you call it, then?
What do you think of when you hear the word "hell?" Whatever that might be, it is surely not to be taken literally-as many religious people do. Hell is here, this dimension of earth, this chaotic cycle of birth and death. The concept behind Tool's music is to end this cycle, to wake up from this nightmare and become one with all-because all life is interconnected. You are me and I am you: WE ARE ONE AND THE SAME. Whether or not you believe in Jesus Christ as being the "son of God" is not relevant for our goal, instead think of what his message was, as a person. Basically, and this is very simplistic, LOVE IS THE ROAD TO GOD, it is the path that will take us home. This is because love is the only thing that matters. Think about a world where every person was in-touch with his or her-self. Think about a world where everyone could be completely honest and open. Think about a world where human beings live in harmony with nature. This is true love, not the superficial meaning we have given it. True love is love for yourself, but it is much broader than that: it is love for all life everywhere, from the smallest micro-organism to the birds and bee, elephants and tigers, human beings and aliens. It is love for the earth and plants, trees and rocks, for everything that exists. For everything is you and you are everything. Don't you see?
"Nothing seems to satisfy, I don't want it, I just need it, to feel to breathe to know I'm alive"
Nothing that society gives us has any real meaning, it provides us with nothing more than perpetual ignorance. Maynard is saying that we should search WITHIN OURSELVES for the answers; that it might "hurt a little" at first because we have forgotten how to use our whole-brains (and have lost touch with higher aspects of ourselves), but as we continue to strive forward, the pain will ease up. Then, once that first step is finished "finger deep within the borderline" we can move on to the next step, digging a little further with a "knuckle deep within the borderline" and so on, until we reach the shoulder, at which point we have completed the entire first stage of our cleansing.
The one question that seems to remain with many of you is "how does the other person come into play?"
Do not take anything Tool says literally, instead think of everything as a metaphor....again and again throughout this album what is really being referred to is TWO SIDES OF OURSELVES. The male and female sides (i.e. Tool = male, A Perfect Circle = female); the logical and emotional sides; mathematical and artistic sides. This album is about finding a balance of the two halves of your personality in order to OPEN YOUR THIRD EYE, to become enlightened and/or reborn. You see, instead of letting your ego control you, which is something that everybody-including myself-does, this album is communicating a message about cleansing your soul so that you may (re)discover who you really are and what meaning/purpose your life has. A very important part of this is the destruction/death of the ego, which is talked about in later songs. But, as I just said, it is also about discovering/maintaining a balance: "blend and BALANCE pain and comfort DEEP WITHIN YOU." So, when Maynard sings "turn around and take my hand..I can help you turn tired (boredom = tiresome) moments into pleasure" he is talking about the other half of himself. By joining the two halves we begin to see things under a different light.
The ego, my friends, is the devil. It is not some demon sitting in the middle of our planet waiting with a pitchfork to burn us for eternity, no, it isn't. Think about your ego, which, by definition, is the aspect of our "self" that controls thoughts and behavior, especially when related to external reality. Our ego is what becomes addicted to fast food, alcohol, drugs, etc. Our ego is what threatens our security, it is what drives us to become jealous of each other. Our ego is what blinds us from what is true and meaningful. Yet, despite all of these negative things, the ego is quite tempting when it wants to be. For those of you who have experienced "bad-trips" (i.e. psychedelic nightmares), the ego is what tempts you to be afraid because it's domination/control is being threatened. It is what holds back people who meditate. It is everything that is wrong with human beings...for those of you who are religious, isn't this exactly the way Lucifer/Satan is described in the bible? Furthermore, the bible claims that we are all "born into sin." Well, we are all born with our egos, hence we immediately sin.
"There's no love in fear"