JOY! shipmate—joy!(Pleas’d to my Soul at death I cry;)
Our life is closed—our life begins;
The long, long anchorage we leave,
The ship is clear at last—she leaps!
She swiftly courses from the shore;
Joy! shipmate—joy!
Walt Whitman (1819–1892). Leaves of Grass.
BACKHUYSEN, Ludolf
Ships in Distress off a Rocky Coast
1667
Don't we all sometimes feel like we are just a bottle tossed around in a vast ocean. A day ends and we reflect on what we think we have achieved and what we think we have to do tomorrow. Yet closer inspection makes me realize that I am merely a grain of sand pushing through an endless desert looking for solace yet always reaching the beginning of what I thought was the end of a journey. Such is life.
Every step makes me think that I am nearing a destination but only to realize that what I have started is a brand new journey. Humility sinks in and while I shall not equate this awakening to a word as grand as an epiphany, I do realize that unconsciously I have harbored the notion that I am aware of such tribulations. The end of a journey merely is a milestone upon a new sight and a new quest.
We lament that our lives are mundane and blame this existential voyage on our lackluster luck or even fate. Well a voyage need not have to be one of the being but also of the mind. A journey from arrogant to humility is one that not many may ever be able to embark on, or even from timid to courageous perhaps. I protest my boredom but upon realization of my predicament I realized it wasn’t what I was doing that was the problem, but it was what I was thinking.
The mind’s journey is measured not in miles nor in what we see, but by the humble fact of what we realize and what we feel. What was once a challenging debate of right and wrong today turns into a mere discussion on your point of view against mine. No need for escalated voices nor heightened emotions, just a matured conversation. Some ask what happened to you Zed? Why the lost of the fire in the belly? Where is your hunger? Have you turned soft? Such skepticism brought upon by what one needs to see rather then what really is important – the respect for another and the joy of living a journey rather then pursuing a destination.
Some reading this may say, Zed you are just being too cryptic. I beg to differ. Such description of life could not be more clear to me nor to you my mates in this vast sea of words over the internet. We all share one thing in common and always will. We seek self actualization because that was what we were taught to search for, and upon actualizing ourselves we realize the grand hoax of it all. Actualization really is only the awakening to realize that we need only to accept who we are against what we really are. A lonely soul that seeks solace in the lord and felicity amongst fellow mankind.
A 61 year old man may go to jail. At the end of his time here on earth he may spend it in a cell contemplating his pursuits for life and what it meant to him. While another man is dead for what he thought was the right path to righteousness. Yet another 64 year old man seeks new beginnings with his new bride and may his last days be as promising as it seems. These men in the publics eye is a mere drop in the ocean of souls that seeks their daily grind and puts forth hope for a better tomorrow. I wish I could share the feeling of realizing that today is all you have and what you do today inevitably is a single step in the thousands that may or may not come. Live life as it is meant to be looking forward to being the best we can to god, and to our fellow travelers in this mass of dirt hurling through the universe and perhaps we will all realize that this puzzle wasn’t one to solve by but instead just one to live by.
Such is life.
(Zed's Note: Or maybe it is just me growing old! ROTFL)
