Experience carves paths in my brain. I am driven by a complex ant farm of paths, creating a mind-web of learnings, each connected to the next through innumerable points of data gleaned from nearly 30 years of life."Some ask whether a tree falling in the forest makes noise when nobody is around to hear it. I wonder if it matters whether a man lost in the woods struggles to live, if he is going to die either way."
JB 02/14/2012
I wonder what an ant considers when it reaches the plastic casing at the end of the world. Does it stop to wonder at all or does it just turn and keep moving, convinced that the grand ant farm mosaic required that seemingly pointless tunnel to be dug in order to complete the picture? I'm not sure the ant does stop, for to keep moving inexorably onward seems to be the nature of ants.
I am no ant, however, and I stop... maybe even too often. If I were a cup and thinking were a liquid... there would be no question.
I am more than half full.
I believe that we are more than our physical selves - that these physical husks are necessary in this life and not beyond, but that the lives we lead here serve a greater purpose in enabling us to prepare for the life hereafter. This is reassuring in some ways, but it is this belief which at times has been known to give me pause.
As I am unable to step back to see the grand mosaic of... myself... and I desire to make it ever more grand, I am often left to guess at the 'why' of given life experiences (aren't we all). I seek to know the paths and to learn from them... to guide the interconnectedness of thoughts in my mind, instead of allowing for it to happen naturally... haphazardly... yet this is often held back from my vision. I suppose that this is just another path - that 'not knowing' is an experience to be had. If so, it happens doubly, as the reason my 'not knowing' is necessary is also unknown.
Sometimes I think it is about the search. Maybe the point is just to keep me looking beyond myself. Maybe I would grow heedless, apathetic - so a built-in impetus has been provided. I think the answer to my own question is that, yes, a man's struggle matters... for that is all life is when you boil it down- an often sweet, often bitter struggle.
Sometimes, however, that thought is not enough and I grow frustrated by that which appears pointless. Still, I doubt I would change things even if I could. There is quite a bit of danger in changing things when I don't know their utility or purpose.
After all, would the absence of a single strand cause my specific and original mind-web to unravel?
I think so, and it's enough to turn a man prematurely grey.
