Monday Musing: Patience

‘Never pray for patience.’  

Did you ever receive this advice?  I remember hearing it as a child—and when I asked ‘Why not?’  I was told something like, ‘because all that will happen are situations guaranteed to make you impatient.’

Being a sensible child, can you guess the one thing I never prayed for?  Absolutely right: Patience.  If that was all it took to keep life sailing smoothly, why invite disaster?  Life was already full of things to feel impatient about.  Long car drives.  Waiting at all the places that we drove to.  Waiting for the adults to stop talking.  Waiting to go home.  Waiting for dinner.  Waiting for dessert.  Waiting for summer vacation.  Waiting for Christmas.  Waiting for birthdays.  Waiting to grow old enough so that I could stop waiting.

I hate to break the news to any young readers, but I still haven’t been able to stop waiting.  I just wait for different things now and since I am an adult, I’m not allowed to jump up and down and whine about them.  Bummer.  I could use a good bit of whining. 

Couldn’t we all?  Life just seems to get harder and harder and our only recourse is our least favorite advice: be patient.  Patient?  Patient?!  How much more patient do I need to be?  Will that really solve my problems, being patient?  No.  But I suspect it’ll make everyone’s lives around me a lot easier.  But is that the only reason we should be patient: because it is a social construct?

When you were a kid, what was the best part of Christmas?  The presents?  The food/candy?  (seeing relatives is more of an adult joy, but we’ll give it an honorable mention).  I’ll admit that for me it was always the presents.  I was one greedy little child and I loved being given things.  At some point however, I realized that presents weren’t living up to my expectations anymore.  Not that they still weren’t wonderful—they just weren’t as wonderful as I always wanted them to be.  There was no perfect present that could keep me interested and happy to match the amount of time that I spent anticipating the presents I received.  It dawned on me that I was enjoying the idea of Christmas far more than the reality of it. 

Perhaps this should have ruined Christmas for me.  But for some strange reason I think I started enjoying Christmas even more.  Christmas and my Birthday, to the sometimes amusement and sometimes over-patient bemusement of my parents.  Because now that I knew the real fun was in anticipation, I made sure to milk as much anticipation as possible.  I would start counting down months in advance of my birthday, getting a thrill of glee each time I said the words:

‘Dad, Dad, guess what?’

‘What?’  (imagine a world weary exasperated sigh)

‘It’s 89 days till my birthday!’

‘Oh, wow, is it?’

Seriously, best Dad ever.  He plays along with me every year. :)

Hold on a minute, though.  We were talking about patience: is anticipation really the same thing?  Could you have one without the other?  You can anticipate something with impatience, as well as with patience, so maybe not.  But I think that anticipation is far more fun if you’re at least a little patient.  Impatience ruins the fun of it, because you can’t enjoy the moment when you’re impatient.  You’re always looking ahead, looking for the big thing coming up; and you miss what’s right there in front of you.  Whereas if you are (at least mostly) patiently anticipating something, you never lose sight of the excitement that will be, while still maintaining enjoyment of the now. 

I believe it is a grand thing to enjoy ‘what will be’ before it happens, because no matter what happens after, you just spent so much time being happy about it that even if the moment doesn’t live up to expectations you had all that time enjoying it already. 

One day of a good Birthday still equals only one day.

Three months of anticipating that Birthday equals three months of happiness.

Mmm, good math.

But this idea of waiting for the good things in life seems to have faded out of style along with poodle skirts and mullets.  We are the instantaneous generation.  We have our computers and our iphones (or droids/blackberries/etc) at our fingertips constantly: we are never out of touch with the rest of the world.  Have a question?  Just consult the internet, you’ll find the answer in less than five minutes.  There’s no more waiting, isn’t that great?  I don’t know.

I don’t mean to sound down on modern technology.  I love my computer.  I love the internet.  Cell phones are great.  Having all the knowledge you could ever want at your fingertips can be thrilling.  All the things we can think!

But—

But.

What is it doing to us?  What are the consequences?  Do we care?

I do.  Call me old fashioned, but if I’m taking the time to be with a friend, I don’t want them to be ignoring me in favor of their cell phone, no matter how many texts they’re getting or posts on their facebook wall.  We’re never truly ‘with’ people anymore, because we’re carrying around the entire world with us wherever we go. 

Everything is getting faster.  (people keep saying that, I know, I know).  We don’t even take the time to speak full words anymore: why do that when you can say everything with a couple letters?  Lol.  Rofl.  Asap.  Brb.  G2g.  We don’t even have the patience to think anymore.  Thinking takes too much time; the world is moving too fast for us to think about it.  Have to keep up!

We have lost the art of waiting.  We have lost the ability to be patient when nothing is happening.  In some ways it’s not our fault—not anyone’s fault.  Our world moves so fast we never have the time to be impatient with the dead space because there’s so little of it.  But when there is that five second gap—hoowee.  The long and short is that we panic.  We don’t know what to do with silence, because the only thing that’s there other than silence…is us.  And if we’ve never had the time to get to know ourselves and be comfortable with who we are…man, that is one awkward silence.  Even worse than an office party.

The reason I object to our fastfastfast culture is that it takes away our ability to be.  Be what?  Be ourselves mostly.  People complain and complain about how shallow our culture is—newsflash, a culture is defined by its people, and we are shallow people.  We’ve never been taught how to be anything else.  We’ve never had the time to be anything else. 

But we could.  We really could be so much better than we are.  But it all starts with waiting, with patience, with anticipation.  With time.  And above all, a little bit of silence.

Monday Musings: Love

What is love?  How do you define it?  I dare you to try: it’s ridiculously hard.  Before you read any further, just sit for a moment and imagine that you’re trying to explain love to someone who’s never heard of it or experienced it. 

And when I said try, I meant right now.

What did you come up with?

Mine went something like,

‘Well, love is an emotion, you just feel it inside and you know you love someone.’

: That’s it?  You just feel it?  How do you know you’re really feeling love and not something else?

‘Ah, good question, umm, well, love feels different from other emotions, although technically you can feel all sorts of emotion when you love someone, and it all jumbles together.’

: Wait, so it’s not just one emotion?  It’s a big jumble?  That sounds really confusing and messy.

‘Sort of.  But it’s really nice too.’

: So love is a positive emotion.

‘Oh.  Umm, sometimes.’

: Sometimes?

‘It can be kinda hard and painful too.  Especially when you love someone and they don’t love you back, or when you want something good for them but they want what’s bad and you can’t help them, or when someone’s hurting physically or emotionally you feel bad too and want to fix what’s wrong.’

: Ugh.  And people do this to themselves on purpose?

‘Not really, it just sort of happens.  You care about someone, so you love them.’

: So love is caring about someone.

‘Yeah, that’s it.’

: But can’t you care about someone without loving them?

‘Um, sort of?  There’re different degrees of love.’

: What?  I thought love was just love.  End of story.  One thing only. 

‘Nope.  You can love different people in different ways, and vice versa.  And people don’t all express love the same ways.’

: How many ways are there?

‘A lot?  Umm, some people are physically affectionate and like hugging etc.  Other people buy gifts.  Some people want to spend time doing things, and other people like spending time even when they’re not doing anything.  Some people share ideas and talk a lot about what they want and what they feel.  Other people think words take up too much space.’

: If people have that many ways of showing that they love someone, how on earth can you tell if someone actually loves you, or if they’re just buying you a birthday present or saying hello?

‘Oh.’

: There is a way to tell, right?

‘Sort of.’

: You’re making all this up, there’s no way this can actually be true.

‘No no, I swear, this is all true.  This is what love is.’

: Fine, go on.

‘Umm, how to tell if someone loves you…well, they’ll do something or they’ll spend time with you, or sometimes they’ll just tell you straight out, or maybe they’ll do all of that—‘

: You really have no idea, do you?

‘It’s just really hard to explain from the outside.  It’s really confusing—‘

: I thought you said it was simple.

‘It is!  It’s love!’

: You’re not making any sense at all.

‘Oh, bother.’

That’s where I ended up.  Ridiculous, isn’t it?  How is it this hard to explain something we feel inside ourselves that has been talked about and written about and expressed in songs and poetry and words words words all throughout human history?  Yet if asked to personally explain, we give the blank stare or the deer in the headlights look. 

Part of our problem is that we only have one word for love so it has to cover a lot of ground and mean a whole lot of different things to different people.  The Greeks were more sensible about it—or just wordier—because they had four words for love. 

Storge: The love you feel for a family member, and not necessarily a close one.  A tolerating sort of love, like putting up with family members on vacation and not complaining about them because they’re family and you love them.  In that loose sort of way.

Philia: You love baseball.  You love movies.  You love chocolate.  You also love your family, your friends, and the time you spend together.  An affectionate love.

Eros: The kind of love movies are about.  Its passion and fire and obsession—but, surprisingly, it can also be non-sexual love, a sort of inspiring passion that leads to further appreciation of truth, beauty, and other ideals. 

Agape: What we mean when we say ‘I love you.’  It is a deep love, often referred to as unconditional or sacrificial love.  The true ideal of love.

Interesting division of love, right?  But what does that last one mean?  It sounds so vague—unconditional love, sacrificial love, the ideal of love.  I mean, that’s great and all, but I keep feeling like I’m hearing a whooshing noise as it sweeps over my head.

Why is it so difficult to explain what agape love is?  Well, if the large vague words aren’t working, maybe smaller ones will help.  Let’s try to break it down:

From the inside you know you love someone when you want the best things to happen to them: ie, you care about what happens to them. 

So you have to care about someone in order to really love them.

You also know you love someone when you care about them more than you care about yourself, because you’re willing to put what you need on hold in order to help them out. 

So love is self-sacrificing.

But sometimes you know that for someone to mature or become a better person they’re going to have to endure something painful to get them there.  And it’s awful and horrible and we don’t want them to be in pain, but we care more about their entire life than just that brief moment.

So in loving someone, you’re sometimes loving the person they could become, and not the person they are right now.

But love isn’t just about loving other people.  Loving yourself is necessary too.  If you love someone else but they treat you badly, they don’t truly love you.  So the love you bear for yourself has to be at least equal to the love you feel for someone else, otherwise you’re the person who needs saving/looking after/love. 

Love requires balance.

Okay, that was helpful, but all that seems to only be addressing part of the meaning of love.  You can feel an emotion inside you all you want—but what’s to say it’s really love, or just something else? 

Try this on for size:

Love without actions is not love; it is only the feeling of love without any of the depth.

But actions without love are not love either; they are only make-believe and pretend.

If you feel something for someone and you call it love, but every time they need something or you see a way you can help them but don’t do it, you don’t truly love them, because actions are naturally born out of love.  When you truly love someone, you want to help them, so you do, even when it’s an inconvenience to yourself.  This is love.

But going through the motions of love without feeling anything is equally as false.  Just because everything you do is correct doesn’t make what you do love: the action alone is not enough.  This is not love.

These two ideas are a good quick test if we’re really wondering if our love for someone is truly love, or just lust or fellow-feeling.  If we’re obsessed with someone and love them but know nothing about them and have no urge to actually get to know them and what they need out of life; it’s not love.  On the other hand, if we are continually helping someone out but feel nothing other than boredom or a sort of distant caring; that’s not really love either.  At least—not the strong sort of lasting love.  As we know, there are all kinds of love.

Interestingly enough, this is rather reminding me of the old debate about God: Faith or works?  God says, (in a loose way) ‘Have faith in me and that alone will save you.’  But he also says ‘Faith without works is nothing.’  Which is right?  Throughout history people have argued it both ways.  But I believe the answer lies in our definition of love. 

If we truly love God we’ll be driven to action because our actions are born out of our love for him, just as we help those whom we love here on earth.  When God told us the things he wants us to do, he was giving us a way to express the inexpressible: how we can show that we love him.  We can’t give God chocolate or flowers.  We can’t give him a hug or cook him dinner when he’s tired.  But he knows that, so he told us the things we can do to express our love for him. 

We can spend time with him.

We can trust him with our thoughts and secret emotions.

We can help the people he cares about.

And according to our own abilities and ways we express love, we do our best to show God we love him.  Because there is no question in my mind that God love us and has already shown it in so many ways we can’t even begin to count. 

But for a lark, let’s try to count the obvious ones.

He made the universe, and it is pretty and able to sustain our lives.

He made us and gave us life and limbs and thoughts and emotions.

No matter how frustrating we are as offspring he hasn’t killed us all yet/rejected us.

He gave us free will.  (a whole ‘nother huge topic to tackle another day)

He made chocolate.

Personally I think the last one is enough to qualify as love.  :)  But the other ones are nice too.

So have I done it?  Have I described love? 

Probably not.  It’s really too big a topic for me to understand enough to write about.  But I hope that maybe some of these thoughts will help you figure out what Love is to you.

Monday Musing: Truth

Today, we do something differently.  Instead of the standard Monday Musing that is written in a prose form, this topic felt like it should be expressed in poetry.  It’s not complete, and I’m sure I’ll work on it some more, but it’s a topic I firmly believe in and it’s a question I wish I could ask everyone. 

Do you know what the truth sounds like?

It requires soul-price

The sacrifice of uncertainty to gain the surety of loss.

How else to pay the cost when now you know—

Bedrock bottom heartbeat of the earth itself

Surrounded by black black black

Only allowed to look at stars—

You know it now

You know your truth and their truth and all truth

And it sounds like

Bells resounding at dawn and

Summer breeze in a hammock and

Light

--oh, the Light sings triumph and height

Far height in this tower against the dark

Blaze and burn and forfeit all else to the Light

--oh, the Light.

I can’t even breathe when the light calls

And is it majesty or fear bursting in my chest?

Every time.

I choose the light every time

The summer breeze and the bells

I choose them every time

And wish I could have been a tree instead

Arched and always breathing in

No choice required, no price

Just the light, the light, the dark, the day, the night, the sun, the stars, the heat, the cold,

The length and breadth of days numbered—even so numbered

And given unto death and all its endings.

Trees have no need for choosing.

What is there to choose when all you are is

Truth rampant on a field of black

Arched and always breathing in?

I cannot choose to be a tree

I was made for other things—as are we all.

Traveling on lonely paths made urgent by desperation for the next intersection,

where maybe—

Mabye—we can grab someone and make them walk our path behind us.

That which is unobserved doesn’t truly exist.

Science said that and made us all afraid that when we close our eyes

—between the heartbeats—this truth would find us.

Grieve—all of you!

Grieve because this lie has broken us.

It has stolen our paths and forced the abomination of truth.

Grieve, because we have no one to blame but ourselves.

We have been pulled from our purpose and pulled others from theirs

We have become lost in the intersection of all paths

Trapped in the mockery of The Lie.

It laughs.  We were made to choose one thing only—the simplest choice.

This abundance is poison and we follow other’s paths just so we are not alone.

It laughs.

What perfect revenge.

What brilliant marring.

What an impossible future.

We were made for choice?  How now?  Do we still want to choose?

I do as I always do.

There are bells calling me home

A summer breeze in a hammock

And under it all the silent song showing me only one path

One choice.

And I must bear the burden of knowing that I chose it

My price

Because I saw all the other paths—

Knew where they would take me—

Wanted them to take me,

And I wish—

But the truth is rising in me

It is so loud, so loud

It shakes my bones, twists my lungs and I explode into

Truth.  I am only Truth

One moment.  

All that’s given is one moment to hear

The soul-resonance

The building calm

The one note hum.

Only one moment to console yourself on the lonely path

Walking beside trees that have no need of choosing.

But this is the Lie too.

We are not alone on our lonely paths. 

We are surrounded on all sides by seekers and dreamers

Hopers and doubters, lovers and haters—

Each of us with our own truth to follow,

Our only path to fulfill what we were made to be

The truth that leads us to where all the parallel paths end in the Light

--oh, the Light. 

Monday Musings: What Did You Say?

Children are to be seen and not heard.  If you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.  Silence is the chef’s best compliment.

We have a lot of quotes about not saying things, and usually they’re pretty positive.  (aside from the one about children).  There are many quotes in multiple languages about how not speaking is always preferable to speaking too much; how one will appear wise if they don’t say anything; and how talking too much always leads to bad places.

Correspondingly, we have far fewer sayings about how we should all talk more.  There seems to be a general consensus that talking leads to mistakes; and that’s pretty accurate.  You can never unsay what you just said.  There is no rewind or backspace button to life.  Once something is said it’s out there in the world and nothing can ever take it back.  This fear makes people say less than they mean a lot of the time because you can’t regret what you don’t say. 

Which is a completely false statement, by the way. 

There is this strange competition between communication and silence.  While it seems far easier to regret what is said, it is just as easy to regret something that was never said.  So as with most things in life, it requires a balance.  When do we speak, and when do we remain silent?

There are many good reasons not to say things, especially in a friendship.  Part of being a good friend is knowing what not to say around your friend.  Good friends know where all the hurting spots are, and while they might poke fun around some of them, they know better than to stick a knife right in one and twist it around. 

That’s one reason I tread very carefully around new people, because everyone has bad spots, and I’d rather not hurt anyone, even accidentally.  But trying not to step in a new person’s bad spots is rather like trying to find your way through a marsh blindfolded.  Sooner or later you are going to fall flat on your face in a scum puddle.  Guaranteed. 

But there are other reasons to remain silent about things.  Sometimes it’s important to remain silent so as not to hurt someone or embarrass yourself.  I’m talking about the ‘as long as I don’t say it, it isn’t true’ phenomenon.  We’ve all experienced it, on one side or the other.  Say that person A likes person B, but person B doesn’t like person A, and knows that A really likes them.  Depending on who they are, A might realize that B doesn’t like them, but they just can’t help how they feel.  Now B has two choices.  Either they bring it up in an awkward and painful conversation, or they allow an unspoken pact to occur: whatever A and B think they know about the other, nothing is true unless it is spoken of.  So A can keep their pride and self-esteem and B doesn’t have to break their heart and the situation can subside as gracefully as possible. 

Admittedly, this is sometimes just a ruse where B doesn’t have the chutzpah to let A down and pretends that the unspoken pact is there, but we’re not talking about that right now.  The A and B situation isn’t just about liking someone.  It can occur with friends and coworkers who are willing to pretend that something embarrassing didn’t happen, or sometimes even that it did.  Because what the unspoken pact is really about is saving a bit of face, or pride or self esteem, and that’s not a bad thing all the time.  Denial of reality is a bad thing, true, and a good friend shouldn’t take part in that.  But there are so many little situations in life that are easier to endure when everyone is willing to pretend they don’t exist.  (Like the Matrix sequels.  It’s a pity they never made any).

On the other hand, sometimes it is utterly vital to speak about what you feel because if it never gets said, everyone can just keep pretending it doesn’t exist.  Or correspondingly feel insecure in their position because they don’t know where they stand.  Imagine what it would be like if no one said how they really felt.  You’d never know if anyone truly loved you and you’d be stuck in a cold cage all alone all the time because you could never be sure if the people you were with cared about you at all or thought you had any worth.

(and no, life is not all about seeking self-worth from other people’s opinions, but in reality, we are social creatures who do need the affirmation of our peers, and life can be almost unlivable if we don’t get it)

Which brings me to the perhaps random but in fact very connected topic of marriage.  Marriage vows, to be precise.

A lot of people are against marriage.  They say it’s unnecessary, outdated, ridiculous, and barbaric.  As if standing up in front of a bunch of people is going to make a relationship any more valid than it was before.

But what is getting married, really?  Nowadays you mention a marriage and if you live in America and many European countries, white dresses are going to spring to mind, along with churches and lots of guests and a huge wedding cake and a lot of gifts.  But if you pare all that down to the essentials, you get vows spoken in front of witnesses and a senior member of a religion.  And if you pare that down even further you get two people making promises to each other in front of people who are important to them and who will hopefully help them keep those promises.

Because things aren’t true until they’re said aloud, and a marriage ceremony is all about making sure that certain things are said before two people commit to each other.  Most of us can recite at least half the standard wedding vows we see on tv and in movies, but what if we were to take those vows out of the context of a wedding and put them in the mouths of two people who are trying to hold a relationship together long term.

A: I love you.

B: I love you too.

A: I want to stay with you forever.

B: It won’t be easy.

A: Are you kidding?  I’ll probably hate you sometimes.

B: I’ll probably throw things at you.

A: I might get fat and unattractive.

B: I could too.  I don’t really like exercising.

A: Bo-ring. 

B: So true.  But you said that one reason you loved me was because I’m beautiful.

A: I do. 

B: So what’ll happen when I get old and I’m less beautiful?

A: It won’t matter.

B: How can you be sure?

A: Because I love you—not just the way you look—although that’s a plus, I admit.

B: Hot stuff.

A: Smokin’.  But it’s true that when we get old, we’ll get wrinkles.

B: We’ll sag in currently attractive places.

A: We’ll smell funny.

B: We’ll lose our teeth.

A: But you’ll still be you.  And I’ll still be me.  Well, me without teeth.

B: Ha.  But you’ll still be smokin’.

A: So will you.  Life’s a long time though, and there’s a lot of bad things that could happen on the way.  One of us could get really sick.  I’m talking terminal but lingering illness sort of sick.  I’d understand if you wouldn’t want to stick around if that—

B: What, am I supposed to be some fair weather friend?  Someone who only sticks around when times are good?  If you really want me forever, that’s what you gonna get.  Forever.

A: What if I get rich and snobby?

B: If we get rich I bet I’ll be snobbier than you.

A: The economy is really bad.  My company is making cuts.  I could lose my job in a heartbeat. 

B: So could I.

A: I might not be able to support you.

B: I’ll support you.  And if I can’t, we’ll get jobs working at McDonald’s together.

A: Together.

B: Forever.  No matter what it takes.

A: No matter how hard it’s going to be.

B: No matter how we change as the years go by.

A: No matter the terrible mistakes we’ll make sometimes.

B: We’ll work it out.

A: We’ll never give up on each other.

B: I love you.

A: I love you too.

And if you think that a talk like this in a serious relationship isn’t necessary?  You’re on dangerous ground that’s going to give out under your feet and then you’ll be lying on your back breathless wondering what just happened. 

Because some things need to be said aloud.  They need to be acknowledged and understood because if something isn’t said, how are we supposed to know if it’s real?

Monday Musing: Biological Imperative

It is one of the great strangenesses of humanity that we both crave what is new and different—yet at the same time refuse to acknowledge change because we’re very comfortable as we are, thank you.

Where’s the switch?  How can we exist in such a state of controversy?

To that end, I give you the Biological Imperative.  (clap clap clap clap)

I take you back now to the dawn of time.  Whether we just crawled out of a slime pit or God just placed two people in a Garden, or we were created from trees (by the way, Norse mythology has the coolest Armageddon ever.  Ragnarok Rules!—now I want a t-shirt), you can choose.  (It matters not what your views are on Macro-evolution, but micro-evolution is a documented fact.  Feel free to look up the difference).

So there are all these people running around on Earth and in order to survive they’ve got to have two things (technically three, but we’ll get to that): food and shelter.  Shelter will probably occur near a large deposit of foodstuffs, and it is easier to determine what makes a good shelter.  Does it keep out the elements?  Check.  Does it in some way protect me from creatures and other people?  Check.  Is it in a place that is unstable or will kill me?  Hopefully not Check.  So you see, shelter’s not so hard, and even to people of lower ‘intelligence’ like our ancestors possibly were, it wasn’t hard to figure out.

But food—there’s the problem.  How did they know what was good to eat?  Some people posit that by watching animals you can figure out what’s good to eat.  Not always true, as it turns out, since some animals can eat everything, and we can’t.  So what it really comes down to is trial and error.  And most errors ended in touching eulogies.  Possibly. 

This is where the Biological Imperative starts to come in.  I ask you this: if curiosity is a trait that is bred into your DNA, how long do you think it will take for all the curious people to die off because they don’t know how not to shove everything in their mouths?  It’s quite possible that some people back then were so curious they’d put our best minds to shame.  Although their curiosity likely put them to death because of their lack of common sense.  So if all the curious people are dying off, they’re likely dying off young, and therefore have no time to procreate and pass their fatal trait onto the next generation.

(and this kind of comes around to that third necessary thing for survival: members of the opposite sex.  Because in order so you all don’t die off before you find what’s good to eat, you’ve got to have progeny to keep going after you’re dead.  But the basic man/woman ratio isn’t usually that hard to keep going, so this is only sort of ‘necessary’)

And it would probably only take a few generations for the curiosity DNA to get severely pruned back in a family tree.  But the legacy of this harsh weeding out is that we are genetically predisposed to be wary of new things.  It was the thing you didn’t know that would most likely kill you.  New plant?  It’ll probably kill you.  New animal?  It’ll definitely kill you.  New person you haven’t met?  He’ll steal your food, rape your wife, and also kill you.  Only the cautious survived.

So it wasn’t the curious ones who were breeding, it was all the cautious ones who hung back and let their stupid brother try that berry first.  So now we’ve got two traits that are essential for survival: caution, and the ability to manipulate the actions of others.  This doesn’t mean that curiosity was wiped out, by any means.  Every invention we have is proof of that.  But these two traits are responsible for why every single one of us on this Earth will choose to travel the road they already know to get to that place—or why someone will only eat the same food they ate growing up—or why they’ll never listen to a different form of music—or even why so many people never travel or move away from their home town.  The human animal is most comfortable amongst that which is known—that which is safe. 

But we’re thousands of years away from the time when what was different could kill you.  Why aren’t we any different?

Well we are.  Sort of.

Curiosity is no longer a shunned trait.  We revel in our inventors (when they’re not in middle school.  They’re such geeks) we create new works of fiction by the hundreds, we change our fashions weekly, we are all about the new experiences. 

But what about the hikers who go into the woods completely unprepared because ‘they’ll be all right.’  Or the ones who provoke an animal because they don’t know any better.  Or hey look, there’s a cave.  Lets see what’s inside.  There are plenty of ways for our natural curiosity and lack of common sense to kill us, even now. 

All this is to say, there is nothing wrong with our biological imperative to be afraid of what is new and different.  That’s the little thing keeping us alive sometimes.  But there’s also nothing wrong in overriding it and telling it to be quiet when we want to do something we haven’t ever.  We’re human, which means both that we’re large bundles of chemical interpretations of instincts, but also that we have intelligent minds that can overrule what our bodies tell us.  We are the dichotomy of fear and curiosity, the juxtaposition between the new and the different.  We are curious cowards and reluctant explorers.  We are the uncomfortable middle.  We are human.  No more no less.

Also, I'd like to wish Richard Dean Anderson a Happy Birthday!  We love you MacGyver!

Monday Musing: All Art is a Lie Told to Show the Truth

             Most people find it hard to understand why fantasy is my favorite genre.  ‘It’s too unbelievable,’ they say.  ‘It’s so formulaic.  It’ll never help you later in life.’ 

I have to both agree and disagree with these statements.  Fantasy is a very formulaic genre, but really, what genre isn’t?  Mine just has more fantastical trimmings—which does prove them right when they say it’s unbelievable.  But what I refuse to agree with is when they say reading fantasy will never help me in the real world. 

            Fantasy shows you something worth striving for, something to dream about.  No, I will never practice any form of magic: that isn’t possible or real.  But when I am reading I am more than just myself, more than my boring collection of memories.  This is why most people would label reading as escapism.  They do have a point, because sometimes it is fun to just forget about reality and go slay dragons and save the world. 

But here’s the clincher.  When you read you become the hero and their actions become yours.  By becoming a hero so often while reading a book, you start to believe that you have those qualities inside you.  When you pretend something often enough it has a chance to become real, and soon your pretended qualities of bravery, courage, honor, and assuredness might work their way into your ‘real’ personality.  

            So why are readers of fantasy derided?  Why are we told that our genre is unbelievable and worthless, that real life stories are far more worthy and—above all—realistic and better able to inspire?  A reader of biographies will always be superior to a reader of fantasy.  A watcher of documentaries will always be superior to the watcher of action movies.  And yet—just what is it they’re feeling superior about?

I will give you an example: there was a book recently published called ‘Three Cups of Tea.’  You might be aware that there is now a controversy surrounding the author of this book and the book itself.  It is being said that he lied about his experiences and lied about donating all the money he received to actually building schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan.  The book and the man and his mission are now derided as fakes—people feel betrayed for trusting in him and now they’re doing their best to tear him down.

This is fascinating, is it not?  Here was a ‘true story,’ that turned out to be not so true.  But what of its original effect?  When the book came out people were inspired.  They wanted to donate to building schools for girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan.  They wanted to do it because of the story of a man who lived through hardships and came out the stronger; the story of a man who battled injustice and anonymity to make a difference in the world.  They wanted to become better people because a story showed them how they could.

But then the story was revealed to be only partially true.  What does this mean?  Does it mean that a fake story has just as much ability to inspire as a true one?  That lies can equally motivate someone to good deeds as truth?  That the impact of fiction—if it is believed in—has the same impact as non-fiction that is believed in?

Because at that point it all comes down to the power of belief, not the veracity of the story.  So I ask again: just what is it that other people find to feel so superior about when their ‘true stories’ are revealed to be just as accurate as our ‘false stories?’

            I do not mean to say that all people are this way.  I do not mean to vilify readers of biographies and watchers of documentaries.  What I wish to do is expose a prejudice that very much exists and shouldn’t.  When it comes to personal tastes and enjoyments there is no ‘better than,’ there is only ‘instead of.’  You like reading 20^th century poetry because it inspires you?  Good for you.  You prefer James Joyce to Robert Jordan?  Fine with me.  I would far rather read Piers Anthony than Charles Dickens (sorry Dickens, I know you’re a classic, but I can’t stand you).  Some people love Shakespeare.  Others love Tom Clancy.  What does it all mean?

            It means that as members of the human race, we don’t feel good about ourselves unless we’re better than someone else. 

Wait, isn’t that the description of a bully?  Someone who belittles or hurts someone else in order to feel a sense of self-worth? 

Then I don’t think it inaccurate to say that we are a race of bullies, a race of people who are so insecure about what we like—about what we think we should like—that we feel the need to make everyone around us just like us because it feels safer and we feel a sense of validity about who we are as people.

            What is your favorite genre?  Is it Historical, Drama, Fantasy, Biography, Classics, Mystery, etc?  Or do you not like to read at all but prefer to watch the news and follow politics?  Or do you hate politics but watch indie/art house movies?  Or do you think that a movie isn’t good unless it has explosions and gore in it? 

Keeping all this in mind, I would like to tell you something important:

It doesn’t matter.

I will repeat: It doesn’t matter.

Life is not about being ‘better than.’  Personal tastes are not an indication of self-worth.  We are all different, and yet we are all still the same.  We are all afraid of many things, we are cowardly, we are weak, and we are selfish.  But when we hear and read of others who have transcended their mundane qualities, we are driven to emulate them.  We want to be like them, and their lives show us how.  We all wish to be inspired, but we all search for inspiration in different places.  It is never bad to believe in honor, courage, and causes that are worth living and dying for—no matter how we hear about them.  Just because something doesn’t exist doesn’t mean we can’t learn from it, and just because something may or may not be true does not mean we can’t believe in it. 

I would like to include a quote from Secondhand Lions, a truly great movie.  For those of you who haven’t seen it, this scene is very important.  Throughout the movie a young boy has been told fantastic stories of his great uncles’ adventures.  He loves the stories but he has been lied to all his life and he needs to know if the stories are true or not—whether or not he should believe in them.  Uncle Hub tells him this:

‘Sometimes the things that may or may not be true are the things a man needs to believe in the most. That people are basically good; that honor, courage, and virtue mean everything; that power and money, money and power mean nothing; that good always triumphs over evil; and I want you to remember this, that love... true love never dies. You remember that, boy. You remember that. Doesn't matter if it's true or not. You see, a man should believe in those things, because those are the things worth believing in.’

I will admit that this used to be a hard concept for me to grasp when I was younger.  True was true—how could something not true be true?  How could lies be true? 

Now my older self can counter that by saying: because sometimes it isn’t the words that are important, but the message behind them and how it makes you feel.  There are so many lies in this world, but what truly matters isn’t whether or not you believe in them, but how they make you act. 

How are you going to act?

Monday Musings: Opinions, or What is Wrong with our Political System.

One of the great misconceptions of our time is that opinions are bad things.  Our culture has gone through so many radical changes that we now fear being different and opinionated in our politically correct culture.  We are raised on statements like: ‘what’s true for you may not be true for someone else,’ or, ‘there is no one right way.’

And if a politician dares to state a firm opinion: he'll lose votes!  The all powerful vote will be lost!  So he must lie lie and lie some more because if he actually told you what he actually believed and how he was actually going to act during office, we'd never ever let him in.  (and yes, I've been using the generic 'he.'  I know we've got women politicians, but it gets tiring to write he/she each time I need a pronoun)

So for politicians (and for many of the rest of us) what it all eventually comes down to is, ‘whatever you say or do will offend someone somewhere sometime, so say as little as possible in the quietest way.’  To this end we have become a nation of opinionated people professing to not have opinions.  We may not be able to hear ourselves think over the cacophony of voices screaming for our attention, but don't worry: our politicians only believe exactly what the largest number of us believe.  Ha. 

This is sheer nonsense.  This is the double talk of our modern age.  Everyone has opinions about life.  Everyone.  It is impossible not to have an opinion.  So when people start saying that they have no opinions about anything, I start looking for the lie.  Or the power cord to the automated politician robot. 

To live means to be able to make knowledgeable choices about the world around you, to choose between one thing and another, knowing the consequences.  So if someone isn't choosing, they're really not alive.  Hence the power cord.

 What we need to do is to stop being ashamed of opinions.  Everyone has them, and to pretend that you don’t is a lie.  Now that doesn’t mean that bludgeoning someone over the head with your opinion is a good idea: as with all things subtlety is needed.  But at least opinions are straightforward, plainly stating what they are. 

And that is what our culture needs most, a little certainty among the chaos.  We're tired of lies, of half-truths, of politicians that only say what they need to get into office.  We're so tired of having our opinions ignored as unimportant: except at voting time.  What we want is someone to actually represent us, to be opinionated on our behalf because we are an opinionated people, and it's time that was understood.

Monday Musings: The Inherent Narcissism of Blogging and the Struggle to Not Appear Like a Self-Obsessed Moron

Last movie watched: Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol

Currently reading: Maskerade by Terry Pratchett

Currently listening to: Tyr: Land

Hello.  This is my first blog post.  I’m a bit nervous.  What?  Oh, nice to meet you too.  So, you probably noticed those three little lines right above.  Yeah, I’ll be doing that a lot, kinda like a conversation starter.  You know, favorite kitchen utensil, earliest memory, etc.  Because there’s no better way to get to know someone than to learn they’re obsessed with meat cleavers.   (wire whisks!)

This brings me to a problem though: The Inherent Narcissism of Blogging and the Struggle to Not Appear Like a Self-Obsessed Moron.   See, it’s all about me.  My blog.  My thoughts.  My likes.  My dislikes.  Other blogs might have a statement or a real point.  Be it political or informative, humor or advice, craft or DIY.  What have I got?  Not sure yet.  But whatever I blog about, it’s really all going to come back to me.   That doesn’t really sit well.  I don’t want to be a self-obsessed moron.  Are all bloggers self-obsessed morons? 

It’s strange, but that thought never occurred to me before I started writing this.  Of course blogs are all about the person who writes them.  That’s the point, isn’t it?  I am now the portal through which you experience information.  So along with whatever wisdom I impart, you get me along with it.  So no matter what I say or what type of blog I write, it all ends up being about me and how I think.

Any time I start thinking like that though, alarm bells go off and my sensible brain yanks me back for a chat.

--That’s not a good way to be thinking.

What?

--That it’s all about you.  You shouldn’t think like that.

Why not?

--Because it’s not all about you.  And you know what happens to people who think like that.

‘sigh.’  Yeah…they get arrogant and annoying and presumptuous and I hate people like that.

--Good.  So don’t be one.

Fine, fine…

But once my sensible brain has finished giving me a stern talking to, I get all depressed because I was only one thought away from becoming my worst nightmare and I’ve got to keep slapping down my own thoughts so they don’t do anything stupid.  Repeat after me, ‘I will not be a self-obsessed moron.  I do not like self-obsessed morons.  It is not all about me.  Even though I’m writing a blog that’s all about me—‘

--Stop it—bad llama.

But what if it’s not all about me?

What about the other side of the equation?  And by that I mean all of you.

What if the point isn’t that I’m blogging to make you listen to me because I’m a narcissist who thinks I deserve it, but because I want to share something with you, to give you something that you might enjoy to make life just that much better.  Kind of like a hug.

Now, I’m not talking about the awkward ‘goodbye, person I’ve just met who’s a good friend of my friend and therefore deserves more than a handshake,’ or the limp return hug to the hug-a-saurous co-worker.  I’m talking about the real thing, the real hug you give your bestest friend in the world whom you haven’t seen in months--

~You know, you just used ‘bestest’ and ‘whom’ in the same sentence.

So what?

~’Bestest’ isn’t a word.  And no one uses ‘whom’ anymore.  It’s falling out of use.

And your point?

~You can’t use a nonsense word and an esoteric one at the same time. 

Who says?

~The English language.  And every grammar textbook ever.

I hate grammar.  And bestest is so a word.  Go away.

Ps. Your last sentence was a fragment.

~Argh!

—I’m talking about a serious hug, the type of hug where you pour so much of yourself into it that the person you’re hugging knows how much you love them, because you just wrapped them in love and tried to smother them with it.  Because in a real hug, both people are doing that, and the funny thing is no matter how much of yourself you’re putting into a hug, as long as the other person is doing the same, you always get more back than you put in. 

            Let’s do fake math on it.  Say, I put in a 5, and you put in a 5, but somehow we both end up with 7’s.  No lie.  But I think Shakespeare said it best:

‘My bounty is as boundless as the sea,
My love as deep; the more I give to thee,
The more I have, for both are infinite.’ –Romeo and Juliet Act 2 Scene 2

            Impossible you say?  Then you’ve never really been hugged, and I wish I could make it my personal mission to show you what it really feels like.  *big giant bear-hug*  (because those are the bestest hugs ever)

            Getting back to my original metaphor of Blogging being like a hug: if I pour all I can of myself into writing it, and you pour all that you can into reading, it’s not about narcissism any more or it being all about me.  It’s all about us.  It’s about the hug.  It’s about not feeling alone anymore or un-liked or unappreciated or unknown.  It’s knowing that there are people like you out there to whom you can entrust everything because you know they’ll do the same for you.  It’s safety and friendship and overall it should be fun.  Because life could use more fun.  And what’s not fun about hugs?