metonymy4u

I recently watched Bill Murray’s movie “Groundhog Day” again on netflix for the first time in what, almost 20 years now since it was released? (I had to look it up…). In this movie a man is doomed to live out his life over and over again on the same day. At first he believes he has discovered heaven on earth. He can apparently do anything he wants, anything at all, and not suffer the consequences because the very next morning the clock is literally reset and all is forgiven and forgotten. But then, alas, he realizes that life with no uncertainty is actually a living hell. He even tries unsuccessfully to commit suicide over and over again, but like some tortured, irredeemable Christ-Gandalf-Comedian figure, reincarnates every morning at 6:00 AM to start all over again. So he is forced to innovate. To start to learn things about the small Pennsylvania town he is trapped in so as to manipulate his reality into something just barely tolerable. He robs an armored car. He takes piano lessons. He tries to cheat death and save an old man. He takes up ice sculpting. He contrives to learn everything he can about his love interest Rita, played by Andy MacDowell, so as to lure her into satisfying his carnal cravings. However a curious thing happens on the way to the bedroom. Life actually gets interesting again. Of course his contrivances to land unsuspecting Rita in the sack backfire, leading to more and more contrivances and correspondingly more and more interest in Rita as a person. It is an interesting modern parable, isn’t it? I mean, alongside the scheming, contriving, cynical, wanton and cavalier Phil is also the dedicated, unyielding, stubborn and creative Phil who wins the day (of course) and in the end gets the girl. What a fabulous redescription of our modern Faustian dilemma! Think about it as an allegory: alongside our driven, contrived, draconian, comfort and perfection mad society perhaps we also have the makings of a culture of curiosity, commitment and honoring which can someday break out of this endless repeating cycle of pain and suffering – what the Buddhists call samsara –and help us to discover the healing power of authentic connection.