American culture, Communications, Society & Culture

Emoji’s & Emotions

Earlier this week, after finishing a family dinner, my wife and I randomly started listening to songs from our younger days while cleaning up.

Acting goofy at first, we probably looked like Ferris Bueller belting out some tunes in his shower at the start of a big day off. We picked a lot of fast paced songs, knowing it would draw some attention from the audience (OK, so it was our kids) if we kept up with the lyrics.

“You know a lot of words to a lot of songs, guys,” said our sweet-hearted 8-year-old daughter.

This comment sparked a conversation about how the words and lyrics to these old songs (weird to say, since most of them were late 90s and early 00s country songs) meant something different to both my wife and I.

As we sang in harmony (well, kinda), our daughter sat and stared for a little while. I could read her mind, and briefly, she seemed impressed that we had remembered and memorized the subtle voice inflections of each song.

Soon enough, her fascination ended and she went back to playing with her younger brothers, who were apparently caught in a game of home many pairs of underwear and ball shorts they could wear at once. They nicknamed themselves Capty Underwears and Capty Shorts, so clearly they weren’t listening to the songs to begin with. (And yes, this what 6-year-old and 3-year-old boys tend to do.) Our eldest son, turning 13 this Sunday, however, listened to the songs, but his eyes never came up from his iPad.

There was one song in particular that we listened to that made me realize how much our society has changed due to the technology advancements of just the past 10-15 years.

As my wife selected The Dixie Chicks “Travelin’ Soldier,” the overall themes found in the tragically sad love story of a young man sent off to Vietnam and the young girl he’d wrote letters to strike a different kind of chord with me.

It is painfully obvious that we’re drifting apart in our communications with each other. I have tackled this topic before, but I must admit, there is a hint of sadness within me that envelopes each advancement in technology and communications.

We don’t write love letters anymore.

We text emoji’s and short, grammatically incorrect phrases. And then we wonder why people don’t “get us” or wonder why we have a hard time communicating in serious relationships.

We don’t visit or call as much, we text and send Facebook messages and post on digital “walls.” And then we wonder why we don’t see our friends anymore.

Never has there been a more appropriate term than a Facebook “wall,” because in essence, I’ve come to realize that is truly what social media does: it builds walls.

We may be more “connected” than ever before in human history, but emotionally and spiritually, we are more disconnected than we can possibly imagine.

Last week, I read this story in the New York Times on the world of Middle School Instagram. Both fascinated and terrified, I couldn’t believe the emotional turmoil that takes place in the world of 7th grade girls and boys over who follows whom, their follower to followed ratios and who is tagged in each delicately planned post.

Look, I remember 7th grade. It’s no picnic. Hormones raging, self-doubt waging a war on perception versus reality. I cannot imagine having to do it in this social media driven world.

When we examine our exposure to and on these channels of communication, we come to find that we’ve often revealed too much for public consumption. I’ve heard many friends say this, and I agree: Had Facebook and Twitter been around in the 90s, I’m not sure I could get a job or be very well regarded today.

It’s not that I did anything illegal or terribly bad, it’s just that the whole world didn’t know about me and my buddies toilet papering a house in the fall of 1997, or the Spring Breaks in Florida, or…you know, I think I’ve proved my point.

It’s not that everything can be shared now so much as it is that not everything should be shared now.

Those private moments between you and some friends, you and a date, you and your wife or loved ones, those are yours. They build bonds and form deep friendship and companionship because you and they were the only ones to experience it, to know what it was like to be in that moment in time.

If you share every moment, trivial or significant, what is left to stand out? Why should the person who sat next to you in freshman algebra, but you haven’t spoken to since, well, freshman algebra, get to share that?

All I know is that I used to have deep, meaningful, philosophical conversations with several people who once meant a great deal to me – and still do. Mentors, family friends, buddies. For quite some time now, that has given way to text messages and birthday posts on a wall, joined by hundreds of other “friends” doing the same.

Time, distance, whatever the case may be, I miss those conversations. I miss those friends and mentors. My fear is that too much time has passed, too much left unspoken. Now, those relationships have been forever changed and altered. All because we stopped talking and started taking the time to take the time.

One of the strongest points of my relationship with my best friend, who happens to be my wife, is our commitment to talking. We started out talking in a college history class in the fall of 2003 and really haven’t shut up since.

I wrote her poems, she left notes on my truck windshield. I keep the first one she ever wrote in my wallet to this day.

For generations over, the world has communicated through talking face-to-face or with pen and paper. We had the time to thoughtfully prepare a letter, or a note.

Now, we can barely text 10 words with our thumbs without losing interest. We’re lazy in our friendships and relationships and the cracks are showing.

In the spaces in between TTYL and C YA SOON, lies what is unspoken, what is implied, what is missing. We’re connected, but we’re not connecting. I have fewer new memories with these family friends, buddies and mentors. While no doubt brought on by the busyness of life, we are fractured by what has not been said, what has not been mended or fixed, what lack of time has wrought.

As smiley face cannot replace a face with a smile. LOL cannot replace an a friend actually laughing out loud. These things are just meant to be placeholders until we can meet or talk again. Except for the part where we aren’t really getting together again.

Tonight, and for many more days and nights in the years ahead, my wife and I will try to combat the technological grip on societal interactions through our children. We’ll play music and listen to the words.

We will gather at dinner and talk about our days, our experiences, our frustrations and our successes.

We’ll try to get them to put the phones down and turn the TV off. We will encourage them to write notes and call their friends.

Emoji’s don’t equal emotions.

I’ve got a letter in my wallet that reminds me of that.

American culture, Philosophy, Politics

Revolutions & Evolutions

When John Lennon and The Beatles sang of everyone wanting a revolution and blaming an institution, there was an aura of credibility to the fact it was an era of uprising.

The powerful lyrics about evolution and changing the constitution ended with Lennon telling everyone it would be alright.

And he was right. The world’s axis has continued to spin for another 40-plus years since that song was recorded in 1968.

The 1960s are often referenced as the preeminent decade when the world was changing, a zero hour for counter-culture, and a revolutionary time when people really wanted to change the world.

In reality, the 1960s were just another decade where a lot of altering and history making events happened at the same time – different and yet much the same as potentially the 1770s, 1860s, 1950s or even the 1990s.

And each time, the message is much the same: We do not like the way things are and believe they can be better.

History, as they say, repeats itself. Sometimes, it just needs to mix up the beat or the chorus or the bridge. But we’ve been playing the same tracks over and over.

Some decades or eras are marked by violence, others by relative peace. But all are marked by men and women who fundamentally are consumed with the idea of seizing power and controlling the masses.

Whether it be a monarchy, a dictator, a president or a parliament, it is not about changing the world – it is about controlling the people in it.

The message is always the same: “I know what is right and what is best for the vast majority of you. Allow me to lead you to an unspecified time in the not too distant future where the world will shine brightly and we will be placed upon top of a hill.”

Be careful, therefore, of mortals who seek to be idolized by man. Ego, vanity, greed. These deadly sins have steered many men and women in the wrong direction, under the false pretense and belief they are part of a positive uprising, a part of the light, a part of truth, that they too shall be a part of history.

If you care to emotionally detach yourself from a political party, from a country, from a religion for a moment, you’ll eventually arrive at the assessment that all the world’s political and ideological dramas come from the same place: we are right and they are wrong.

Now, “we” and “they” could be anyone. It could be the United States, Russia, China, Great Britain, France or Spain. It could be Muslims, Catholics, Protestants, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, or Hindus. It could be Democrats, Republicans, Tea Parties or Green Parties. Perhaps it is Democracies or Communists. It could be Coke or Pepsi. Nike or Adidas. New York Yankees or Boston Red Sox. Gay or straight. Man or woman.

Each and every affiliation we have and cling to in this world generally has an opposite. We’ve taken ourselves to this generic labels of good and evil, dark and light, when in reality, we do not truly know which is which.

How often to do we look back at our own American history and see we were indeed the bad guys in a situation? At least a couple times, right? But let us move past slavery and our treatment of Native Americans because it was so long ago. Let’s not live in the past, right Mark McGwire?

We pretend to have evolved and changed, but that is all it is – a front which matches our social media pictures and status updates, yet hides the broken infrastructure of our marriages, homes and society.

The violence at home and abroad shifts and varies from year to year, decade to decade. What once took place in the act of war (and difficult to even imagine then) now takes place in our cities, trains, subways, schools and offices worldwide.

We pledge to stop it or solve it, but we’re only saying that to get elected. Seven years ago, we thought we’d turned over some great new chapter of hope and change. We have received roughly the same amount of political jabs, shades of gray and dishonesty as before and some change.

As we prepare to pick another political “leader” in roughly 22 months, we’ll be choosing most likely a new president from an old list. A man attempting for a third time who cannot believe he didn’t win in 2012. A woman doing exactly the same, whose husband was president 20 years ago. Another man whose brother and father were president.

They will all attack each other verbally. The media will attack them. In fact, they already have (at least the New York Times still puts Mr. and Mrs./Ms. in print, so there’s a tad bit of decorum left in the world, I suppose).

These candidates will all claim to be different than their relatives. They will also claim to be different than their records and their previous versions of themselves. We’ll all be left with trying to figure out who is lying and who is telling 40 percent of the truth and who can get five percent of what they say they want to accomplish, accomplished.

This dour message is both meant to depress, educate and invigorate.

Whether we’re discussing terrorism, religion, politics or something else, we do indeed have the power to impact the future.

However, we must first learn to evolve and grow beyond what we are now and what we have been in the past.

It is quite simply how and in what manner we treat each other as human beings. As long as we belittle and disrespect and disparage, all this only continues.

Last week it was Paris, next month it may be Rio. In 2007-08, George W. Bush had incredibly low approval ratings. In 2013-14, Barack Obama has had incredibly low approval ratings. We’re using arguments about past wars and past years as some sort of verbal weapon in an attack on something happening now. We’re attempting to repeal and rollback.

These may be valid or necessary – in the eyes of those doing the rolling and repealing and beyond – but we’re simply changing band-aids. Our cuts won’t heal without an ointment to salve our wounds. We just keep cutting the same areas over and over.

Ask those closest to you to describe you in one word. What would their answers be? Love? Faith? Smile? Funny? Caring? Or would it be something else? Depressed? Rude? Angry? Busy?

We’re constantly yearning for change, change, change. But we’re not quite ever sure what that looks like – and we’d most likely need the whole thing explained to us a few times, anyway.

Look at it this way: Ask yourself what you’re doing and what or whom you are doing it for.

No matter who you are, in roughly five or six generations, no one is going to even remember your name. In roughly two generations, they won’t recall what you did for your occupation, what your childhood was like, what your favorite songs or colors were. They won’t know what your favorite hat was, what you got your spouse for their birthday or what it was like when you got married.

It’s quite simple. From the words of Lao Tzu:

“If you are depressed, you are living in the past.

If you are anxious, you are living the future.

If you are at peace, you are living in the present.”

This is not meant to be depressing, either. On the contrary, it is quite freeing. You only need worry about the here and now. The past is over and the future has yet to occur.

Additionally, the world you live in now, the people you surround yourself with and how you treat them, which will be your legacy. Though your name may not last through the infinite time the universe will, your legacy in this world will.

How you treat and interact with your little world will influence those around you – your children, your family, your friends, your colleagues.

Perhaps their actions and behaviors will change as well. And that is something truly revolutionary.

Or maybe, just evolutionary.

Either way, it will indeed be alright.

American culture, Culture, culture war, Politics, pop culture, psychology, race relations, Society & Culture

As The World Burns

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas.

That is not such a good thing.

Here we sit, as the world burns around us, and lament the trivial, the inconsequential, the minutia. We fight over saving an extra 20 percent in the Target parking lot. black friday

I have come to the conclusion that we must secretly want it this way. Or we are lazy. Or we do not care. Or it is just easier to ignore it and focus on our first world problems, holiday plans, on the gifts we must buy. We do not really want to talk about it or do anything about it. We just want to complain about it for a hot minute and move on to the next thing.

We put a proverbial Band-Aid over it and hope it goes away?

Oh, you are probably wondering what “it” is. You want to define “it”? Fine, I suppose that is fair. “It” is undefinable. “It” is everything, anything and nothing at the same time.

“It” is the topic of the day. “It” is immigration, race relations, religion, poverty, politics, international affairs and the economy. “It” is gun control, Hollywood celebrity culture, concussion protocols, domestic violence, locker room language and bullying.

“It” is how families communicate, nuclear and extended. “It” is marriage, divorce, parenting and children. “It” is our increasing reliance on technology. “It” is our jobs, our anxiety, and our fears, our obsessions with the material and immaterial of the world.

“It” is every little thing we deal with on a day-to-day basis.

Perhaps most of all, “it” is you.

Yes, you – the one who thinks I am writing to everyone else and doesn’t think that these (hopefully) thought provoking pieces of less than literary prowess over the past few years are directed at them.

It is directed at you.

It is also meant for me.

When my writing changed a few years ago, it was because the way I think changed and evolved. A funny thing happens as you age, you start paying attention to more than just box scores. You marry, have children and find yourself watching less SportsCenter. Why? Because in the grand scheme of things, it just doesn’t matter as much, while what we are doing to ourselves does as a society matters all that much more.

But a key realization occurred along the way: talking does little. Writing seems to do less. People do not want to hear about the ills of the world, much less so what they can do to improve it. We do quite a bit of talking in our public and private lives. Actually addressing “it” and finding real solutions is a much more difficult proposition.

And this is because we simply do not listen.

We hear, but we don’t listen. We can’t talk about anything that leads to a civilized, give-and-take discussion and solution, because mostly, we’re unwilling to budge on our positions, to meet others halfway. We react, we get angry, we get hostile. To most, an idea of a solution to any problem is agreeing that we are right. It is part ego, part vanity.

Devaluing the ideas, thoughts, and concerns of others while simultaneously self-promoting our own as fact and truth is as dangerous as it is foolish.

To most of us, we might recognize this, so we back-off. It is not worth the argument, the fight. We Band-Aid our lives for the sake of doing the dance. We won’t talk about “it” – whatever “it” happens to be, because all it will end in is hurt feelings, angry words and emotional outbursts.

So we bottle it all up inside, allowing it to take residence in our proverbial mental garbage bin of all the things we’ve ignored, swallowed and tried to forget over the years. These situations become like sticks of unlit dynamite.

And then, at some unknown point in the future, the most meaningless thing sets off the wick and we explode, looking like we need a straight-jacket and some prescription drugs.

We’re all a little crazy.

But that is because we allow ourselves to be. We think we’re saving face. We’re not. Clear and honest communication is a central part, but actually listening and being willing to bend, to meet in the middle on whatever “it” is would most likely serve us all well.

This much is true: if we agreed to disagree from the beginning and worked to a solution that neither feels entirely great about, but comfortable with, we might actually get somewhere in this world.

Our world view is significantly altered by the fact that I am me and you are you. We’re a country and world full of people with specifically engineered lives, with experiences vastly independent from one another.

We share the same period of time and space in this universe, but we experience that time and space in very different ways, which means we do not – and cannot – see the world the same way.

So why are we so surprised when people of opposing viewpoints and political parties, living in different cities, towns and regions, with entirely different life experiences disagree with us?

We will never agree on anything because not one of us looks at everything the same way. It is not about forcing someone else to see why they are wrong and you are right.On the contrary, it is an attempt to build a bridge toward the middle where you see where they are coming from.

bridge

That is problem solving. That is relationship management. That is how we were designed to interact. We are not all geniuses in all aspects of life and its infinite mysteries, nor are we complete morons, either. We’re a melting pot of races, religions, ethnicities, social, cultural and economic backgrounds.

We – READ: you and I – would be better off if this were not just a pipe dream, but something we actually exercised ourselves and taught to our children. You – yes, you – will be wrong sometimes. You will be right sometimes.

Sometimes, you might be either, neither or both.

The same goes for me, your parents, in-laws, children, their friends, teachers, your co-workers, the guy working construction and the lawyer on 5th Avenue, the President, Congress, Roger Goodell, Chris Rock and the waiter at your restaurant.

Be in the world, not above it. People are people, their problems are real because they experience them. Don’t shut them down. When we refuse to grow, we refuse to change – and change is largely inevitable. Growth is good. Sticking to your old habits, beliefs and traditions is not necessarily something to be proud of.

So this holiday season, start a new tradition.

Try.

Try to be honest. Try to be kind.

Try to avoid the Social Media tar pits that cannot be one. Try not to take the bait. Try to understand there are people who do not have food, shelter or friends.

Try to not be too swayed – or angry – with those seeking your vote, your money, your donations and your time. Try to give back a little more than you take.

Try to understand the other side, someone else’s perspective as best you can. Try not to shut down or shut out. Try open minded. Try accepting what you can.

I don’t think you should necessarily succumb to the world, give in to all opposing views and beliefs and acknowledge they are somehow right. But the world is not going to fully come your direction, either.

Try to build a bridge.

At least your half of “it,” anyway.

belief, Culture, faith, family, Philosophy

A Bit Childish

It happened again today. In fact, it nearly happens every day.

Someone said it.

“You have FOUR kids?”

I might not ever get used to my reaction to their response, which usually consists of a mix of sarcasm, wit, a nervous laugh or a simple, “yep.”

No matter, it happens all the same. One day it might be the visitor to my office at work, noticing my family photo and asking, “are they all yours?”

Nah. I just liked the frame.

For a while, I used to think it was because we were younger and I took it as a compliment. For a bit of time, I was slightly embarrassed. Not of my family, or how many of us are there, but the implication that we’re not normal, or that the world thinks that’s too many kids.

We see or hear it everywhere.

At the grocery store checkout line, when three gallons of milk hit the counter, five quarts of strawberries, two loafs of bread and quantities of goods some families would not use for a month, the clerk just glances at me like I must be throwing a party.

I am, lady. Every night at the kitchen table. You should see bedtime. It’s like a rave.

Nowadays, I just feel bad though.

Oh no, not about us.

I feel bad for those who think that 1) there is a set amount of children that bring happiness and 2) they should certainly voice their opinion in not so subtle ways that lets me know they think my wife and I should have a lobotomy before having another baby.

We may be crazy, but the amount of children that comprise our family has very little to do with our sanity level, frankly.

People boldly ask if we are having anymore: “You guys are done, right?”

But if what was actually being thought was said, it would sound like this: “You can’t possibly want ANOTHER kid? What are you, insane? Why would you do that to yourselves?”

When my wife and I had our youngest a few years back, people wondered if we were trying or if it was an accident.

Um, what’s the difference again?

As someone else recently said in a blog, there is no more or less value to a child that is planned than one that is not.

This stigma that all “normal” families come in twos, one of each gender is a notion that prevents spontaneity and frankly, a true enjoyment of life.

Those that know me know how meticulously I clean and pick-up (even when dinner is still happening). So why would I bring more children into our home to add more cleaning and picking up to my already troublesome synapse that won’t allow me to let it all sit?

Because, it was never my decision to begin with.

Something greater than I put me on a path to meet my wife, for her to already have an 18-month old that I would come to treasure and raise exactly as if he were biologically mine. And something beyond human control decided my wife and I would have the children we have when we had them.

There are many in life that want children and cannot, for a variety of reasons, have them. This is whom I think of when I feel my face turning a little red upon the insinuation we’ve done something weird.

I do not think any of us know what normal is, anyway. We all come from families with diverse and wide-ranging backgrounds, with different beliefs. A wide-collection of blended families, second marriages, steps, in-laws and all the like. yet somehow we end up worried about sleepless nights? You pulled all nighters in college! Dirty clothes? Do you remember how your socks smelled after a ball game as a teenager? Worried about the cost of college? You didn’t mind dropping down money for a guy’s trip to Vegas or a girls shopping weekend in New York.

And I finally reached the point a while ago where I just stopped caring and ignored it. If the need to validate your own decisions comes from a condescending remark to someone you do not know, have at it, hoss.

Just submit your question and you can choose from one of my canned responses:

I do not know what I am doing “big picture”
I am aware of how much college costs nowadays and we’ll figure it out when the time comes
The youngest does indeed have red hair. You may be surprised, but my wife and I have known for some time. You have this many kids and you don’t know what’s coming out.
We may or may not have more children. I do not know because my DeLorean is in the shop (something wrong with the flux capacitor).
No, they are all different, you know, like you are. So no, that one doesn’t like ketchup, she isn’t a huge fan of onions, that one over there took a little longer to learn to read. In the end, I trust they will manage all the same.

The question we often get is why? Why so many? Why would you put yourself through that kind of running around? Why would you go to Disney World eight years in a row? That’s not a vacation! That’s torture. How can you run around all the time to various events? Aren’t you always cleaning up the kitchen?

Because look at them. They are magnificent. They are filled with wonder. They may each do something really awesome in this world. It might be because we took them to Disney for eight years in a row. It might be because they shared time together and with us.

Because why not?

Because this is normal to us. Because I don’t know what to do when I’m not counting heads. Because the peace and quiet are overrated. Because I act like a kid, it makes it more acceptable to play with their toys and games if they are mine. Because I love my wife. Because I cannot imagine life without each one of them. Because they were meant to be here. Because I like to give advice. Because it’s better to share in their joy and accomplishments than my own. Because they are funny. Because.

It was never our decision to begin with.

As is often the case in life, it’s your perspective that shapes it more than anything. If you think you’d be too tired to care for a large family, to provide them each with individual love and time, as well as a group, then you are right. If you think it’s too much of a burden on your plans, then you are right.

But for us, this was our plan: We have no plan.

We think the same thing we did 10 years ago. My wife and I love one another, our children and we will see where that takes us.

So far, this has been one hell of a trip.

We just needed more car seats than most along the way.

Sorry we’re not sorry. It’s normal to us because something allows us to handle it and cannot allow others to understand it.

As I said, it was not a decision.

It never will be.

Life, Philosophy, Society, Uncategorized

The Tooth of the Matter

A few weeks ago, our precocious five-year-old son lost a tooth. It was his first, but this tooth was lost unlike any other in family history: in Florida, on some side road just south of Fort Myers, in the rented mini-van, just after Mass.

Darn thing just literally popped right out of his mouth. We could not locate its whereabouts, and in the midst of a family vacation-slash-destination wedding, it became a moment that passed.

But not before it was destined to become a fun mental memento. Really, at the end of a day, a week, a year – a lifetime – what is left but memories?

As I told our children driving home, in 30 years they would randomly remember something that sparks a bunch of other memories about this trip. Perhaps it would be the bucket we took as a bathroom “back-up”. (Don’t judge.) Maybe it will be the lost tooth, or the family sing-alongs, the stop for breakfast at Cracker Barrel, the boat ride on an ocean inlet, the sunshine, and the smell of the air, a palm tree, their aunt’s wedding or the color of the couch at our condo.

But something will inevitably jog their memory, many years from now, about Spring Break 2014.

It will become just a drop into a bucket full of moments like this in their lives, which I truly hope overflows with smiles and happiness. Really, I wish that for us all.

Over the years – thousands of them – we humans have managed to create quite the environment for ourselves. We have created more types and kinds of work than our ancestors could possibly imagine.

We play with gadgets that were frankly incomprehensible just 10 years ago. We create these elaborate situations ourselves to impress upon others that we are busy, because busy in a universal modern language equates productivity, success, action.

We spend time polarizing ourselves from the world, choosing sides and wrestling with these really intense issues and topics of concern.

The older I get, the more I come to realize that we are more frequently than not alienating ourselves from the entire original theory: life is to be lived.

I think if I had my druthers – and a small fortune – I’d spend the majority of my days living. Oh sure, we all do that now – but I mean Matthew McConaughey-style: L-I-V-I-N.

And while I certainly sound as though I’ve turned into a free-spirited hippie, or someone who’s seen “Dazed and Confused” one too many times, you’re getting caught again in the semantics.

Make no mistake; there is often great value in what we all “do” on the daily. From doctors to teachers to janitors, most all of our professions, chosen or not, serve society in some way. There is certainly nothing wrong with working hard, burning the midnight oil and feeling as though what you are doing is somehow, in some way, making a difference and contributing something positive to society.

But it is a thin line between that emotion and seeing that notification number on our inboxes increase. If we are honest with ourselves, we have reached a point in the world where we have to take mental stock of where we sit on that line. Are we pushing it in the sand? Have we crossed over it into a domain of obsession and perfectionism over a bunch of tasks that adds up to very little in the end? How can we be sure the side we are currently on is good or bad?

I might suggest it is a matter of faith. Not necessarily a matter of faith in a biblical sense, though that could be appropriate, but just faith in general.

The kind of faith that allows you to rest easy, for example, that the light will stay green. And though your eyes scan the road to verify no cars are running the red light, you put trust and faith in yourself, the rules of the road and others, that allows you to not ride your brakes and go through the intersection.

We speak frequently of luck, of someone watching out for us or karma. No matter what you believe in, this faith tends to weaken if something bad happens. I would contend, however, this is not a matter of faith failing us or letting us down.

Something happened, yes, but not all situations have logic and reason. The same way sickness and poverty are not a punishment or a lesson or a curse. Whether or not you accept this relies entirely on your attitude and commitment to that general faith.

Will it be OK in the end? We really don’t know. But it will happen all the same.

Really, the only question in these moments is do we have the fortitude to focus our resolve?

The rest of the world calls this crazy – to believe in what you are doing when no one else does.

But this is my favorite kind of embrace of life. Who is it we are all listening to? Each other, so it would seem.

So, why are we taking financial advice from our friend that we used to sit next to in high school economics and doesn’t even know what TINSTAAFL means? Why are we taking love advice from the neighbor’s dog-walker’s-Aunt, who has been married three times?

Our situations are all generally just different enough that precedent does not really matter.

For everyone who thinks young marriage cannot last, I can show you dear friends of ours who are a shining example of how it can. For anyone that belittles your favorite movie or band, I’m sure we would mutually agree one of theirs was equally questionable.

This whole world we’ve created for ourselves inside the times we live is a byproduct of the likes and dislikes of someone else, what’s popular and what just did not catch on. This is why wearing sandals in the winter gathers stares (and perhaps a cold): because it is just not normal.

You know what? I say wear your sandals in the winter should you want to – but not out of irony. Being different to be different is missing the point as well. Still, there is much to be praised for being different, for finding the undefined spaces between the lines and making your mark there.

Faith in oneself, in what you believe, is nothing more than a coping mechanism for getting through this world with some sense of a compass in hand. If you believe in something, then you have something to guide you. In this way, you will know deep inside your heart whether or not you are living each day with a purpose – a purpose defined solely for you and no one else.

Kind of unique, right?

This uniqueness, this independence, this idea continues to mold me, shape me and drive me. We do not know when and where this will all end, only that it will. But in the time between now and then, what will we do to live? Not simply in just breathing and monitoring our day, completing our tasks, but to feel life, to live it?

There is great purpose in simply finding adventure in the day, in smiling, in laughing, in crying.

And yes, in losing a tooth.

Read. Think. Act Different.

Tag Archives: philosophy

Emoji’s & Emotions

Revolutions & Evolutions

As The World Burns

A Bit Childish

The Tooth of the Matter

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