Archive for October, 2008

Response-Ability

“For every thousand hacking away at the leaves of evil, there is one striking at the root.” – Henry David Thoreau

Faults can always be found, yet never accurately placed on another.  Every attempt to accuse, to incriminate, and to blame is a solidification of the fact that the accusative party is in some partial or even whole fashion responsible and that their sole purpose in action is to thwart what is already concrete.  We must take responsibility for our own actions.  This is a precious behavioral value readily passed down from generation to generation, yet the current status of many prestigious adults resembles that of a child, unknowingly representing the mind that has not yet cultivated the idea of paying for one’s mistakes in order to learn.  True responsibility in humans will breed a healthy, personally and professionally successful, and truely happy society – one that thrives on its own inner strength and solidarity.  When one examines the opposite, the crumbling, unstable, jealous, unhappy, bitter society, one finds a world of hatred and distrust.  Paying millions of dollars in “bonuses” to top executives months before going bankrupt is a perfect example.  This is a business practice as crooked as a lightning bolt.  It shows that if someone cannot accept the fact that they have failed (especially in a catastrophic manner), then the power they once held was a facade and it wasn’t real enough to survive the mistakes that are inevitable in everyone’s life.  Continuing this example, the empire these weak people build around themselves is just as lacking in mortar between the bricks that enables the empire to thrive as they are lacking that mortar within themselves.  I honestly believe that there are many important things that enable people and the businesses and groups they represent to be invaluable contributors to the greater good; however the most important is a sense of wholehearted responsibility.  It is time to quit pissing away our God-given time quarrelling over petty things and attack that which matters most – securing our future through elimination of that which plagues us.

Life is a Verb

It is to the advantage of the faithful to destroy all that which evil, so that which is good may flourish.

We must find in ourselves the meaning of our existence if we are to believe that we are here for a purpose other than to breath, eat, sleep, and consume the resources of this planet. The irony here, of course, is that we humans could have a purpose which is defined by the search for the definition of the purpose itself. This sounds like an infinite loop – a dismal vortex of repeated, insane-thought-provoking patterns. The purpose of the author writing these words today is to explain that this is not the case. Life is an action, a verb if you will, rather than an object, or noun. We experience life rather than simply possess it. It is this experience – both the good and the bad – that creates in us a sense of purpose. When one fails, one must learn.When one succeeds, one must rejoice. In either case, we continue down the path of life searching for our purpose. The path may be curved, twisted with entanglements and blockades that hinder all but the most nimble of minds and bodies. This is the process. This is the way. The weakest and most insane man is the one who has been given all, yet has given nothing. The purpose for pain is so that you understand and appreciate joy. One may go so far as to define one’s success simply by compounding the number and severity of the failures they have overcome.