"An unexamined life is not worth living." -Socrates
Leading with an inspirational quote will be utterly contradictory to what I'm about to divulge. But for all intents and purposes, it is both the instigator and the motivator for the current burdens on my weary mind.
People are noted for their quotes because they bear some sort of explanation. They give consolation to someone in need of reassurance, or hope for the future, or what have you. The right one comes along and it can speak a truth in your life. You say to yourself, "Perfect! I'll live by this from now on."
And yet when we reenter the world with this new found knowledge, applying it becomes extraordinarily secondary. Our routines kick in and that ever-so-bothersome and ever-so-innate human irrationality takes the throne once again. We face our imperfections with what is easy rather than what is right.
I know I don't speak for everyone though. Certainly there are people who are influenced by these quotes of wisdom and self-actualization. Enough so to change their behavior for the better. Perhaps that is my obstacle. After all, accepting an argument is true means a potential change in behavior. Perhaps I'm not prepared to do that.
My point being, in life we come across many quotes and people who change our lives. Reflecting on these many thought-provoking moments in the last few years, I've noticed it happens way too freakin' much.
Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. But can it be? Is it all good?
Yes. Though you have many differing ideals flying at you at the same time, and though it's extremely frustrating sifting through them to find the ones with the most abundant truth, it's the rock-solid fact that we're able to do all this in the first place that gives it any meaning. It's essentially choices.
Thank God we have choices. Thank God we're able to choose for ourselves between right and wrong.
We're united in our differences. So yes, Thank God we have the ability to open our mind and hearts to new thoughts and ideas.
In everyday dilemmas, however, this reasoning is easy to throw on the back burner. It's so goddamn easy to bid rationality farewell and allow anger or apathy to reign.
A personal difficulty I face is coping with outside influence altogether. I have enough doubts and questions and complication internally. So the last thing I need is other people coming into my life and presenting new ways of thinking. This line of thought seems ridiculous, and it is. But it's this very concept that I need to strive to avoid. The concept that other ideals and ways of thinking are unneeded and bothersome.
How do we sort it out? All of these ideas, quotes, people, religions, moralities, rights and wrongs, the understandable emotions from the absurd. Are all emotions understandable? Simply an inevitability, bound to crop up? Without it we couldn't challenge ourselves, I suppose.
The more I type, the more I come to realize that there might not be one answer. Another unanswerable question for humanity.
In my twenty years, five months and four days of life, I've never come across a more frequent conclusion. That hey, you know what, it might just be "another one of those unanswerable questions."
The beauty in lacking truth comes from its apparent ugliness.
What do ya know, there's a quote for ya.
What's life without a little mystery?
Lates,
Tyler
There is a saying that has always perplexed me.
