I've always marveled at the way that life has exacted its humor upon us in the form of ironies. It has always been a dichotomy between what is and isn't there. For example, there are those who have been gifted with incredible talents but have not been given an opportunity to explore and make use of them to their fullest potential. There also are those who are well off in life but have no appreciation of their predisposition, and at times even have contempt over their "boring" privileged lives. While there are those who would walk for 3 hours over land and water just to go to school, there also are those who choose to cut class because they see studying as a pointless endeavor. Countries like the Philippines that is surrounded by bodies of water have citizens who don't have access to clean drinking water. There is an endless list that we can make which would probably take us forever to write down but for the purposes of our conversation today let us just focus on the fact that we are confronted with a plethora of ironies.
It makes one question whether we are by nature discontented with our existence. Is it logic that dictates us to search for things that aren't there because it is pointless to look for things that are already there? What is the significance of asking a question that has already been answered or one that you already know the answer to? Is life meant to be an ambiguous search for congruence between daily events? Or is life a mere collection of random events that we spend our energy on trying to synchronize into a single coherent and consistent entity. Just asking these questions made me realize that our natural state is not of discontent, rather, it is one of inquisition.
There is an innate desire in each of us to acquire an understanding of things that we experience and an intense drive to search for the things that we do not possess or experience things that we have not yet encountered. If our nature is to inquire, then it must follow that we are entitled to want things that we do not have. However, with wanting, disappointment and discontent are constant companions. They cause us to bear feelings of longing, disappointment, or discontent when we are unable to acquire that which we have pursued. Are we then trapped in a vicious cycle of seeking and failing? Yes there are times when we are able to achieve the results we seek but that opens more doors to things that we still feel compelled to conquer - which effectively starts the entire process again. Given this predicament, how are we to prevail over such a seemingly impossible task of standing our ground and not lose our sanity from all the confusion that our nature brings?
Perspective. I remember a particular episode of the animated series Adams' Family when Gomez was trying desperately to fail because he succeeded in everything that he did. In that episode, he went through lengths to fail, trying things that he knew nothing about thinking that he would fail at them. Unfortunately, he succeeded in every single thing he tried. Then at the episode's conclusion, he realized that he actually failed. He failed at failing. By being successful, he actually succeeded in failing. Then again, by failing at failing, he also succeeded because his intent was to fail which brings him back to his initial motive - to fail. Did he fail or did he succeed? Perhaps both? The logic in this is so cyclical that I am finding it impossibly hard to write them down into comprehensible sentences. The beauty however that this episode exposes is the resilience of the human spirit. We have an intrinsic ability to adapt to various situations and stimuli. When confronted with questions, our very nature of inquisitiveness is what drives us to pursue actions that would lead us to discover the answers to those questions. Gomez taught me that life is riddled with layers that we have to peel off in order for us to find the truth. It is not always black and white on the surface because even light is composed of a spectrum of colors. When broken down into rays through a prism, light is seen as a consolidation of colors with each color broken down further into several hues contained in a single color. That must certainly be what all this is about. The ironies that we are confounded by have layers that we need to peel off in order for us to see a spectrum of colors that would expose to us the components of reality that is mostly invisible to the naked eye. Our senses merely scratch the surface of truth, it is the mind that breaks it down into its base components.
One might assume that a queen who has countless opportunities accorded to her by her stature would find it effortless to find a king. Ironically, this queen is without a king. Like every irony, this queen feels that she has so much love to offer but no one to give it to. However, in her search for her king, she realized that a queen's role is to reign. In doing so, she effectively has found not just one but an entire kingdom to give her love to. So, rather than pointlessly spend her days searching for a king, she busies herself with ruling her kingdom. Whether or not she finds a king, she has already found the answer to her own irony - her kingdom. She actually got more than what she sought, although not in the same light as she wanted but peeling off the layers, the truth in her intent is that she only wanted to give love. Perspective.
xoxo
QB
It makes one question whether we are by nature discontented with our existence. Is it logic that dictates us to search for things that aren't there because it is pointless to look for things that are already there? What is the significance of asking a question that has already been answered or one that you already know the answer to? Is life meant to be an ambiguous search for congruence between daily events? Or is life a mere collection of random events that we spend our energy on trying to synchronize into a single coherent and consistent entity. Just asking these questions made me realize that our natural state is not of discontent, rather, it is one of inquisition.
There is an innate desire in each of us to acquire an understanding of things that we experience and an intense drive to search for the things that we do not possess or experience things that we have not yet encountered. If our nature is to inquire, then it must follow that we are entitled to want things that we do not have. However, with wanting, disappointment and discontent are constant companions. They cause us to bear feelings of longing, disappointment, or discontent when we are unable to acquire that which we have pursued. Are we then trapped in a vicious cycle of seeking and failing? Yes there are times when we are able to achieve the results we seek but that opens more doors to things that we still feel compelled to conquer - which effectively starts the entire process again. Given this predicament, how are we to prevail over such a seemingly impossible task of standing our ground and not lose our sanity from all the confusion that our nature brings?
Perspective. I remember a particular episode of the animated series Adams' Family when Gomez was trying desperately to fail because he succeeded in everything that he did. In that episode, he went through lengths to fail, trying things that he knew nothing about thinking that he would fail at them. Unfortunately, he succeeded in every single thing he tried. Then at the episode's conclusion, he realized that he actually failed. He failed at failing. By being successful, he actually succeeded in failing. Then again, by failing at failing, he also succeeded because his intent was to fail which brings him back to his initial motive - to fail. Did he fail or did he succeed? Perhaps both? The logic in this is so cyclical that I am finding it impossibly hard to write them down into comprehensible sentences. The beauty however that this episode exposes is the resilience of the human spirit. We have an intrinsic ability to adapt to various situations and stimuli. When confronted with questions, our very nature of inquisitiveness is what drives us to pursue actions that would lead us to discover the answers to those questions. Gomez taught me that life is riddled with layers that we have to peel off in order for us to find the truth. It is not always black and white on the surface because even light is composed of a spectrum of colors. When broken down into rays through a prism, light is seen as a consolidation of colors with each color broken down further into several hues contained in a single color. That must certainly be what all this is about. The ironies that we are confounded by have layers that we need to peel off in order for us to see a spectrum of colors that would expose to us the components of reality that is mostly invisible to the naked eye. Our senses merely scratch the surface of truth, it is the mind that breaks it down into its base components.
One might assume that a queen who has countless opportunities accorded to her by her stature would find it effortless to find a king. Ironically, this queen is without a king. Like every irony, this queen feels that she has so much love to offer but no one to give it to. However, in her search for her king, she realized that a queen's role is to reign. In doing so, she effectively has found not just one but an entire kingdom to give her love to. So, rather than pointlessly spend her days searching for a king, she busies herself with ruling her kingdom. Whether or not she finds a king, she has already found the answer to her own irony - her kingdom. She actually got more than what she sought, although not in the same light as she wanted but peeling off the layers, the truth in her intent is that she only wanted to give love. Perspective.
xoxo
QB
No comments:
Post a Comment