My husband never met a science fiction movie he wasn’t willing to give the benefit of the doubt. Consequently I’ve seen all the Star Trek movies. I’m a bit of a Trekkie myself, and remember as a pre-teen watching reruns of the original series on my parents’ old black and white TV. Tribbles, the Gorn and Amok Time were part of my personal pop culture, and Mr. Spock was always my favorite.
Since some of the later movies were definite stinkers, I wasn’t holding my breath about the new J.J. Abrams incarnation. The previews made it look like they’d turned it into Starship Troopers, but on taking it in at our local megaplex I found the new Star Trek to be a smart, witty take on the ST mythology that offers plenty for dyed-in-the-wool Trekkies while creating a cracklingly fresh alternative.
As a Spock fan I was not disappointed. Vulcans have always had a monkish vibe (those robes—hello?) and I detected some very Zen-like themes in the storyline of the pointy-eared one. Here are my top three Lessons from Spock as gleaned from the new Star Trek:
We are now heading out of the neutral zone, or in other words, SPOILER ALERT.
- Fear and Anger are your friends, so let’s sit down and get comfortable, shall we? Spock had the right idea with the Kobayashi Maru test. Who would you rather have as your Captain—someone who has never felt fear, or someone who is so intimately acquainted with it that it is No Big Deal? And when Spock tells his father he has anger that he cannot control towards the ones who killed his mother, what does Dad say? “Then do not try.” Vulcans have a bad rep for not having feelings, but their real philosophy is that you can’t control your feelings, but you can keep them from controlling you.
- We are all homeless. When the Vulcan home planet implodes, Spock gets a visceral reminder of what is actually true for all of us, all the time. I recently heard an astronaut describing in an interview how he manages launch-pad jitters by focusing on only the next 10 seconds. But when you think about it, that’s all any of us really has. If we’re lucky. Our only real home is the present moment. Anything on top of that is gravy.
- You’ve created your reality, now lie in it. Can you imagine Future Spock saying this: “Oh if only I left the launch pad a little sooner with the red matter, none of this would have happened. How could I be so stupid? I should have known those Romulans would find a way to blame me! Why did I even bother trying to help them?” No, neither can I. He’s flung back in time away from everything familiar, his home planet is now an Intergalactic Dispose-All and what does he say about the life he left behind? “That is not my destiny.” Talk about grace under pressure. The Dalai Lama himself couldn’t do any better.
I’ll be interested to see how the character evolves in the new timeline, but for now I’ll just say Live Long and Prosper, Spock. Live Long and Prosper.
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