The Concept

The concepts of Order and Chaos are fairly abstract, but when taken up close in  experiences with which we’re familiar, they begin to take on an emotional charge.

Chaos, the uncontrollable  and unpredictable, is embodied in words like Fear, Lost, Dark, Exception, Random, Storm, Confused, Calamity and Blind.  But also in Dream and Risk.  It’s what someone expresses when they say they are “walking into the dark”, are involved in a “stormy relationship”, or “forced to take a risk”.

Order has its own parallels:  words like Right, Reason, Status Quo, Light, Control, Calm, Routine, Safe and Persist.  We voice this when we say “someone switched on the light” to denote that we understand something, and “all routine” when things are going to schedule.

It is as if emotively, Chaos engenders fear and avoidance, and Order conjures up safety and stability.

Then there are the Crucible times or circumstances where the status quo cannot be maintained, things come to a head and a transformation occurs.  It may be the adjustment that needs to be made to cope with illness or loss,  the growth from child to adult, or a situation where personal responsibility must be embraced more fully.  Sometimes it is simply a change that just has to be made and the safety of the old and known Order has to be abandoned and the Chaos of Life and Choice unshackled.  

These times often bring their feelings of discomfort or outright fear as the Chaos appears to have so obviously taken hold.  The knowledge that there was an old Order can provide enough faith based on memory and experience to endure the process with some hope.

Then there is Resolution, the calm after the storm, but things are not quite as Black and White as they were.  There is a new Order.

When I looked at it, many of the things we find very beautiful and useful are the result of that process of amalgamation.  What we find beautiful is often “flawed” from the point of view of perfection, but its flaws are what give it it’s individuality.  Dance, Music and the other arts are often seen as beautiful, but involve patterns unintelligible except to a few.  Mathematics and Science are similar, reassuring but any inherent Order incomprehensible to most people unless reduced to a simple level.  Our personal relationships can also fit this pattern.

We also value the idea of the Phoenix - the bird that rises up from its own ashes, because there can be that experience of “good” coming out of “bad”, or the creation of a new “me”.

For me, that was the Beauty that comes from the Dance of Chaos and Order.  The fear engendered by a Chaotic situation is mitigated by the constants which Order provides. Chaos can then be a source of Wonder and Vitality.