Mind Musings
On a daily basis each of us is faced with the good, the bad and the ugly elements of life unless one makes the personal choice to remain blissfully ignorant. I must admit that for a significant period of time I chose the latter. In recent years, however, I have become more informed, more enlightened and more involved. As a result I have become less tolerant and, consequently, less optimistic. I worry over and fixate on way too many things that ultimately I cannot change. Some of those things are superbly summed up in a few of my favorite quotes. Allow me to share…
- Many who believe that they have kind hearts actually only have weak nerves.
- Rules are for those lacking the courage to make their own.
- All really intelligent men recognize that the moment is everything.
- The arc of the universe is great and it always bends toward justice.
- The older we get the higher the bar is raised.
- A “no” uttered with deepest conviction is better that a “yes” uttered merely to please, or worse, to avoid trouble.
- Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be.
- If we stay alert to the possibilities we will all be led through our own mistakes toward our own moments of grace.
- The only difference between a rut and a grave is dimension.
- The minute you settle for less than you deserve, you will get less than that for which you settled.
- People seldom do what they believe in…they do what is convenient and then repent.
- Principles only mean something if you stick with them.
- Behind every great woman is herself.
And last but not least, one that covers all the bases…
- Could’ve, would’ve and should’ve are all laments of the spineless. The strong declare I can, I will and I shall.
See no evil…Hear no evil…Speak no evil
Nietzche once said, “Stare long enough into the dark abyss and the abyss will eventually stare back.” His words lend themselves perfectly to the current human condition. All it takes is one day’s exposure to print and visual media to affirm the fact that mankind has upgraded itself to a first class, one way ticket to hell, fire and damnation. Not only is the darkness staring back…it is laying seige. The seven deadly sins have given birth to profit from tragedy, violence for the benefit of You Tube and organized criminal religion. Free will at its finest has spawned a new and improved evil of the 21st century…a diabolical demon on crack. Not only are the founding fathers turning over in their graves, but they are frantically clawing their way toward the earth’s core to distance themselves from us. Under the guise of evolution we have become less humane, increasingly desensitized and demoralized to catastrophic proportions. Sex, drugs and rock-n-roll have morphed into preversion, biological warfare and a lethal song of suffering and strife. Oh what a tangled web we weave!
I am confident that I do not stand alone in my views on the present day state of the universe. Edmund Brooke declared, “The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing” and Dean Koontz proports a more modern day summation…”The given world dazzles with wonder, poetry and purpose. The man-made world is a perverse realm of ego and envy where power-mad cynics make false idols of themselves and where the meek have no inheritance.” I’d venture to guess that when the long-awaited day of judgement arrives the meek will find themselves blessed to have forfeit inheritance of this now dispoiled and defiled Earth. One can hope that in its stead awaits the prophesied afterlife of light, hope and glorified salvation…one in which we do not blind ourselves to truth or wander catatonically down roads that lead nowhere but to eternal darkness.
And the Oscar Goes to…
I am sure many of you reading this will sympathize to some extent with the fact that I spent most of my Sunday at home recovering from an overdose of fun on both Friday and Saturday nights. My activity of choice on days when the body is worn to the extreme is movie watching. I retreat to my couch with a few choice snacks or some hair of the dog that bit me and break out a favorite horror flick or two for entertainment. On rare occasions I opt for a drama or the cheesy chick flick but didn’t need nor want the sap today. It was Sunday’s cinematic mini-marathon that got me to thinking…life could actually be thought of as a movie in which each of us plays lead role. Allow me to elaborate.
Women would most certainly see themselves as starring in a fantasy romance. Men, on the other hand, would probably envision starring in an action adventure epic. There are those individuals that would be living “la vida loca” of a Broadway musical. The rebels among us would likely choose to be the badass in an exploitation B movie or in some cases the “cable man” in a spicy adult picture. The lives of some mirror experimental student art films that make no sense. Intellectuals tend to live documentaries–serious and educational—while the cognitively challenged undoubtedly mimic screwball comedies. A select few achieve blockbuster status while a disproportionately higher number fail due to funding deficits.
Still not convinced? Consider this…we spend most of our lives marketing in a society where image rules tyrannically. There is makeup, hair, diet, exercise, the charm, the attitude, the pose and the strut…all of it culminating in “the look”. Each of us is a virtual walking billboard advertising ourselves…a preview of the coming attraction. Meanwhile, behind the scenes, production is in disarray—we’re over budget, do poorly in test screenings and gradually become creatively stagnant. We endlessly tinker and touch up, revise, edit and tailor ourselves to please a target audience. Collectively it all constitutes our personal quest for a happy ending.
After a bit of self-examination and reflection I am unable to place my life into one solitary genre. I do know that I am continuously struggling to maintain artistic control; I throw Prima Donna tantrums and on occasion I pout in my personal trailer when I don’t get my way. It’s an inner conflict deeply rooted in what ultimately decides the true significance of our existence…Does one aspire to be a palatable crowd-pleaser catering to the mainstream or something true to self no matter what anyone else wants or says?
The value each of us places on ourselves as human beings
is determined solely by the work we do to become one.
After Awhile
After awhile you begin to learn the subtle difference between holding a hand and chaining a soul…
You learn that love doesn’t mean leaning and togetherness doesn’t equal security… You learn that kisses aren’t contracts and presents aren’t promises…
You learn to accept your defeats with the grace of a woman and not the grief of a child… You learn to build all of your roads on today because tomorrow’s ground is too uncertain and futures have a way of falling down mid-flight…
You learn that even sunshine burns if you get too much… You learn that you really can endure…
You learn that you truly are strong… With each new day…
With even the smallest leap of faith… You learn.
Broken
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men…
couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again.”
As children we hear those lines from the popular nursery rhyme and envision the rotund title character falling from atop the wall, sustaining said physical injuries and ultimately being in such a damaged state that he was in fact beyond repair. The lines are merely a factual account of a sad incident. This summary is one interpretation—it is what one would hear from a child when asked to talk about the story. Children by nature tend to process stories literally. It is much later in life that we learn to “read between the lines”—to see underlying meaning in what is read. With knowledge of literary tools like symbolism or double entendre one can see beyond the literal translation to what is a classic parable of fear, pain and loss on a scale far greater than merely the physical. At the heart of the rhyme is each of us as we live out the days of our existence. The tale parallels how we find ourselves time and time again, regardless of any efforts by the “king’s horses and the king’s men”, confronted with circumstances calling for us to “put (ourselves) together again”. More often than not the human spirit can summon the strength needed to achieve success…an outcome differing greatly from that of the ill-fated Humpty Dumpty. In the average person’s life it is probable that there will be several times when they find themselves void of strength, hope or faith, struggling to find the will to face each day and harboring a spirit, heart, body or soul (and/or any combination thereof) in need of repair. In these moments most people will rise to the challenge and ultimately overcome whatever it was to have rendered them “broken”. If circumstances involve physical injury and pain the repair process (while possibly lengthy in duration or demanding in nature) is often easier than the process faced in times of emotional suffering. Emotional healing is not always achieved through known or conceivable method. Often the damage to the spiritual being can be such that it simply cannot be mended no matter how valiant the effort and strong the will to make it so.
In the span of my 39 years I have known my share of personal trial and tribulation. I’ve challenged and overcome physical injuries ranging from mild to life-threatening. In addition I seem to be on a quest of sorts to determine just how much injury and subsequent rehabilitation my heart and soul will endure before failing to bounce back. So far they have taken a “lickin’ but keep on tickin’.” I would venture to say that I am one of the luckier ones in that my personal tally of suffering and strife is not of record breaking status. Still…I must also acknowledge that as a person who possesses more than my fair share of pedestrian flaws I am assured many more instances before I meet my maker in which my will shall undoubtedly be tested. As one acquires more life experience one thing becomes abundantly clear with respect to this human condition…the only constant is change. More often than not changes that occur and ultimately have a profound and/or irreversible effect tend to come when we least expect them or when we are ill-equipped to deal with them entirely. The inalienable truth of such a cold reality lies in the fact that if one chooses not to deal with the adversities of life…elects not to try to overcome…if one cowers and flees with proverbial tale between legs…eventually one arrives at complete and utter personal defeat leading in turn to the figurative or literal (sometimes both) end to life as one knows it. Many will assert that there are things one must endure in life that serve to make us stronger provided they do not culminate in death. Personally I am more inclined to believe that life is improvisational art performed by each of us for the purpose of entertaining the cosmic powers that be. Quite frankly there are instances when there is neither conceivable purpose nor justifiable reason for what some are forced to face time and time again…even those lucky enough to be both emotionally and physically sound and strong. Most stories that are dramatic or adventurous in nature involve conflict that leads to a circumstantially specific outcome. As we each play lead day after day in this drama we call life there are none blessed with immunity to hardship. Additionally, there are few at best that are lucky enough to be starring in a tailored romantic comedy, Broadway musical or fairy tale. All in all life can only be what each of us chooses to make of it as we live out our days seeking happiness and fulfillment or dying in the process!
Silver Linings
Life is easy…life’s a bitch…life is what you make of it–no matter how each of us may view this existence there is one undeniable truth…life is meant to be lived. No two lives will be the same. There will never be another you…another me. Good things will happen to good people…bad things will happen to good people and much of what happens will be completely outside our control. The most any of us can do is grow, change and affect our reality in accordance with the future we envision. Unfortunately…many people are tempted to give up right when things are about to get interesting. I like to call it the lament of the perfectly imperfect.
Recently I was talking with a close friend and was saddened to hear him say that he was, “starting to believe the Devil is going to beat me…do me in.” It was a comment born of his feelings during a difficult and painful time in his personal life. While I understood completely how one could feel as he did I was a bit surprised that such words had come from someone who had generally been a shining example of inner strength and faith. This was a person possessing enough to go around in the past and many had borrowed on it throughout the years…myself included. Nevertheless I started to ponder exactly what it must take to wear such a soul down. Ultimately the line of thinking made me reflect on why so many of us are incapable of remembering how lucky we are and/or how much worse things could be at times of personal trial and tribulation.
Let’s face it…the only constant in this life is change. This life is just improvisational art for the most part…we make it up as we go along in other words. Sometimes it is easy and sometimes it is extremely difficult. There is immense happiness and there is unspeakable pain, grief, loss, anguish and dismay. The defining moments are in deciding whether to let the bad things in and deal with them when they land on your doorstep or allow them to sit on the stoop while sitting inside afraid to go out one’s own door. I like to think that anything I am confronted with in this life is manageable provided I’ll still be alive when it is over. I am also a firm believer in divine intervention, divine justice and divine inspiration. Put those two together and I tend to ride life’s roller coaster with hands up high and screaming…it will be ok even though right now everything is not ok. If that doesn’t serve to revive some fragment of hope then I remember that no matter the nature of my problems, someone has it far worse and someone has it far better. Problems are rarely insurmountable and cannot define our lives unless we allow them to do so.
If you are at a loss for something to call on in those times when it seems life has dealt you its worst hand, try this on for size and it should help you find some perspective…
The majority of the world lives on less than a dollar a day. How do you feel that majority would view your income? Add up the clothes in your closet or the belongings in your house and ponder what someone with a yearly salary of less than $365 would think upon entering your home.
While I believe we are forever changed in some way and at times made stronger by our life experiences and events, I don’t believe that every single one “happens for a reason”. Sometimes things just happen. Luckily…there is no instrument better than the human soul for stitching silver linings into thunderclouds!
