The journey

Preoccupation

The overwhelming majority of people become so preoccupied with their day-to-day existence that they never stop to consider what it is all about. It helps if you aren’t in a stressful difficult situation maybe with money concerns or having to care for people in poor health. Then we have the myriad of distractions where we can’t even use the loo without something to read or play with. This is not a major issue as the ignorance paradox takes in people that explore, people that ignore, people that shy away from difficult subjects, all people, and the only difference between one that thinks they know more is a bit of smugness. In other words, in makes not one jot of difference how much you know at the final reckoning. People living in so-called ignorance can be as happy as anyone else and be as fulfilled as the next man. Where do you draw the line, how much knowledge is enough? Ignorance of the facts, ignorance due to lack of understanding and ignorance less to do with stupidity but not even knowing what you don’t know. Many live a whole life in hardship never discovering the riches close to hand.

We all know we can’t take our wealth with us, but some might be glad to leave any debts behind. Many build a tomb and have their treasure buried with them spiting those that could have made use of it. When you die, your skills, knowledge and years of learning evaporate. All that mastery and structure of your soul is no more. That is the real loss.

Did you make a contribution? Was it one that nobody else could have managed. Was it one nobody would have made at some later point. Will the world stop when you do, or will it carry on quite fine without you? Will you be missed? Maybe briefly and you come to the fore in a few people’s mind from time to time until they pass away too. Empires that you build crumble either quite quickly after you die or at some stage later on. The changes you made get changed again and all traces of you gets gradually wiped away to leave not much more than a name in a register or footnote in history.

It is not uncommon for some to initially proclaim that they are going to change the world. Then lower their sights on making a big difference to their country. As time passes this gets reduced to a more realistic aim of making a small mark on their immediate locality. From aspiring to rid the world of all diseases to getting a hole on the village hall roof fixed.

One high achievement in its own right is to get through to the end unscathed. To avoid being stabbed, shot, injured, or debilitated by the plethora of dangers. To be left unscarred by the losses of loved ones especially those that you were helpless to help is a big thing. It only takes one tiny body part, a gland, valve, a seemingly insignificant bit of your anatomy to go awry changing an outlook from heavenly to hellish in an instant.

The optimism of finding a definitive explanation for matters of life and living fade over one’s lifetime. So much ends with a conclusion that wasn't quite what was hoped for. You begin to see that there are at least two sides to everything, and we have to work out which to use in each scenario. Each judgement has to be made in context and nothing is quite as simple as we first thought. The early bird catches the worm, hence a worm does well to have a lie in. Writing this heap of words is like a policeman hunting a suspect for years on end, to finally find out that the culprit has died long ago. Never getting the chance to apprehend nor comprehend the waste of effort. All the policeman really set out to do was change a few neurons in their head. Case open to case closed.

Not only are these words futile in what they aimed to point out, but when it came to use them as a guiding force they failed miserably. Luck can play a bigger part than knowledge. I concede that knowing what ought to be the best way to play the game didn’t always help. Knowing how and being able is quite different. It takes skill to apply knowledge. It takes practice to apply knowledge skilfully. You don’t always get enough tries at it. Sometimes we can dream, but a dream is all it will ever be.

There is a vain hope that when it ends you will be given the answers. All will be revealed. If only that were so. Those whose mind has deteriorated by disease will surely have their memories fully restored so they too will get their vindication. You will be proven correct and only small details of where you erred will be filled in. The only blunder is having this belief and as the whiteness turns to dark you will not even be conscious of you own expiration. Another precious life completed. The world is no more as far as you are concerned. You die every night in effect and there will be no exciting beautiful fun unreal real dreams as an interlude. If you perish in a big calamity, blown up, smashed to pulp in an instant you won’t even get the last wonderful ride, the hallucinogenic peace making dreamy last few minutes of ultimate bliss.

People may stare at the stars and wonder at our insignificance, whereas others will have no such interest. They may deem subjects like astronomy as really dull and irrelevant. The whys and wherefores of existence have no relevance to what they are doing. You may wish to explore avenues of thought, but others won’t, they ‘have’ to get up in the morning and go to work. They have more pressing things on their mind that ‘must’ get done. The trap, the illusion, the compulsion to conform, the urge to fit in, the need, the greed, the want for more, the guilt, the toil, the fun, the pleasure. We will be doing it for ever and ever until the day we realise ‘our time is now’ is no longer.

Many people are looking for the meaning of life without realising that there is none. Some will treasure the connections with one another, friendships, kinships, relationships, and shared experiences and see that as the most immutable important currency. If you were hoping for a happy ending or some guidance as to what to do, here you will be disappointed. The ignorance paradox doesn’t tell you what you should do, there is no lesson to be learnt it is just a feature of life. And if you should be confused or fail to get the riddle just reread the beginning and once a few pages in again, you will see it no doubt. Any downheartedness turns to an uplifting sense of freedom. Maybe, but then why bother, we already have our own personal worthy aims.

Great but not impressed say you. It is a correct observation to see anyone challenging you as a type that is just pretentious. Nothing more than crystallising stuff we already half know. Some will blithely say “I could have thought of that”. Except you didn’t and wouldn’t unless it was fired at you. What has been laid out here might seem obvious now, but you haven’t the courage to admit that it was not at all obvious before.

Your problem is that you have not got a problem, that is what it seems. Neither a stumbling block nor self-doubt. You have day-to-day issues and mountains of things to contend with, problems of sorts, but your life is running swimmingly. You retain the idea of heading towards a day where you have even greater self-esteem. To be even more revered. In fact, you think of yourself as the wise one, the one people come to for help and a leg up. Scores to settle, points to prove with your peers, people nearly as rich or with more wealth, people with more influence or greater notoriety. The great guru the one who saw through the mess and picked wisely. The top chump who looks at the zookeeper with disdain. Everything will be done at a time of my choosing, everything is in control. I will work out what, when and to whom I will give my assets away. My life is sorted. The sleepwalker. Mr zookeeper knows they themselves are not superior. They aren’t looking down their nose at others. They are not laughing at them. They are not trying to change people, but they do like to instil some self-doubt in those around them.

Maybe it is me that has all these daft conjectures and everyone else is going along just fine. Nope, there are funerals every day, people retiring, people changing direction after pursuing schemes for ages. Let's not rock the boat and stop challenging people.

We see those that are sleepwalking, those that dabble a bit, plenty that plan their life, many self-assured, the completely uninterested and all those that are a mix of all these. Some will find meaning in life through what they are doing, but some are adamant that there is no ultimate meaning whatsoever. The thing that bothered me the most was how to justify saying that there is no meaning to life. How to put it into perspective?

We have those that are totally sure they are doing what they should be and will be making sure everyone else is following too. They are the ones lots of people look up to for reassurance that they are on the right path. The similarity to these groups of people and an ant colony is remarkable. There will be soldier ants on hand to guard against invaders, but also to keep the worker ants in check. Any ant that deviates from doing as they are told is quashed. Some will be inspired by the group effort seeing it for the good of all, however, it is in principle for the benefit of the king master ant the most.

The dabblers explore quite a lot. They feel semi-satisfied that on aggregate they have lived a virtuous life and need not worry about political or social problems that are too complex and too numerous. Plus, there is no point fussing day and night over things that are out of their control anyway. They meddle with a few bits and pieces to ‘expand their horizons’. With a little bit of charity work and some community involvement they are quite content.

The planners find an objective and do what is necessary to achieve it. They will have their long-term goals and set themselves a few side tasks. Getting to where they want to be is what it is all about for them. A university qualification, job upgrade, better house, faster car to developing an item or system that will transform life as we know it. It is all part of the distraction technique of being busy enough to feel it is unnecessary to consider deep meanings. Those that are the most occupied are the least interested in the underlying why.

Maybe we could live more in the moment. Yet why shy away from being nostalgic from time to time? It is enjoyable looking forward to things in the future as well. We can have balance, an equitable portion of all three, for all are good.

It is all about degrees, degrees of merit. Take a look at a dog, it can be fairly content with its lot. They don’t have the pressure of dog school and all the exams at the end of it, although some do get house trained and learn a few tricks. Any dog that goes on regular walks, has a balanced diet, and receives love and attention is seen as getting a fulfilling life. Lower down the scale we could point to a mouse. It will have a great time running up and down the pipes in your home and live a while before running out of steam. Does it have meaning in its short life with its heart beating many times quicker than yours.

Standing beside a stream I watched an insect swoop down to get a drink and got caught up in the flow. As it meandered down heading towards a stick, I was expecting it to grab onto it, get out and dry off before flying away. It was swirled about by the eddies and arrived near the bit of wood then, floosh, gobbled and gone by a crafty fish in wait for passing fodder. What meaning did that insect have in its life? Pare down to the bacteria and you get living things with ever shorter life cycles. We as humans propose that because we are much more advanced that there must be more to life than being born, fidgeting about a bit, then succumbing to some illness or dying in an accident. Having a greater thinking capacity gives us the illusion and delusion of being more than the dog, mouse, bacterium, and lump of wood.

I look at some people and wonder what makes them tick. I know the drives now, but to see an old codger, senile, plodding at a snail’s pace on a mission to fetch a simple loaf of bread with day after day of aimless aims, what am I not seeing? Their close cousin is the retard, the slow in mind, fast in unusual body movements with a gurning grin, docile manner and fruitlessness than makes us look the other way. Painted nails and plastic fantastic, fake, fudged, and self-consumed is thee that lays upon a cheap bed in the sun. Catering for this lovely one is the eternal slave sauntering along to open up, get things ready once again, knowing it is futile to even imagine anything more. The prim and proper, all tidy and discreet getting made up for another big event. To others it is an excuse to have a drink and be merry, for these it is a chance to demonstrate their class. A class act in a class of impressers. Who is here, who has been de-ranked and who has been up to no good in the eyes of those that make the rules?

What then makes people tick aside from each having a different clock and different objectives in the time available, not a lot. In a desert, we see a mirage and amble towards it, in life we think we see greater relevance in our life than in others. It is so hard to shed the notion that we have a purpose and are on the way to achieving something that makes all the effort worthwhile.

Open a tap and fill a bowl with water then me, you, anyone can stare at the reflection and see that a life is as transient as that image. Tap the bowl and watch the shimmering, your waves of beavering, busy, idle interaction that alters but changes nothing in the end. Equally valid and equally worthless are we. Though I say again, never confuse feeling worthless with less worthy than someone else.

It is a name, a number, a mark in the sand with nothing tangible of us left behind. It is all one big con. Think, ponder, postulate for as long as you like until the light in your head goes out and the chemicals stop flowing. No more curiosity, no more reward and no more self.

Why bring people down to earth? Once an appreciation of the ultimate futility is understood and becomes a feature of a person’s core, they can then find a firmer ladder to climb. After which a product of utility for all might manifest itself. No That is a joke too. We are a fruit from the flower from the tree. We start underripe, become ripe, soften, wrinkle then rot and smell. We have a shelf-life – a sweet one.