Monday, July 12, 2004

Sometimes you can work as hard as you can, do everything you know to do, push beyond your own limits, and it still doesn't work out.

Sometimes it doesn't depend on you.

People say that if what you want doesn't come to pass, it probably wasn't meant for you. They also say that any trouble you have, any heartbreak, sorrow, or pain, is intended to teach you about yourself, or humility, or god.

And maybe these people are right.

But I think that sometimes, things just happen and perhaps there is no point at all. In fact, I think it must be so. If there is a grand design, some of that design is negative space, even more -depends on negative space! Without the random, the quantum, the inexplicable, things would get pretty dull.

And what does that mean? It means suffering. But it also means incredible happiness. One thing that is constant is that life is filled with all sorts of sadness: losing friends and family, making poor decisions, creaking joints that warn of age sneaking up behind you, tragedy and devastation and children starving on tv.

Then there is the ennui of living in a computer, in front of a cathode or plasma or lcd screen; seeing glimpses of a beautiful day outside a distant window as we drop off a file at someone else's cubicle; the dull stupidity of too much drink; the slow heavy awkwardness of too much food; the groggy headache of too much sleep, or the sandy scratchy feeling of too little.

This is life as a human being for many people in the Industrialized World.

It can be even worse for the rest of Humanity. And the rest makes up the vast majority. It is "out there" that details the reality of human experience.

And so we come to it. What is the point? If things are so dark and grey and life is a bag of illness and pain why do we do it?

The answer is found in the earth, the air, in flame and in water. It is the moments we live for. Those pure, crystal moments when we see above our own lives. We see beyond. When we see a new baby with new eyes, when we feel an exquisite moment of true and pure love. When we look out on the world around us and for even the briefest second are filled with a wonder and awe of a living planet, these are the things that remind us. They remind us of all the happy ways in which we are alive!

Suddenly, creaking joints are a pleasure because it means we are walking! Losing someone special allows us to truly value their memory and if we let it, opens us up in ways that teach us to honour our connection with the ones we still have in our lives. Making a mistake becomes learning a better way to do things.

There is no magic cure for our problems. There is only magic. And when we see that, then we see the wind.

And when we see the wind, we are on our way.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Sometimes life hurts but it's life's way so what could we do?You are right Aaron we should wait and see the wind....