Day: December 27, 2020

We live our lives surrounded by other human beings, but we only know them through our eyes, through the function of our other senses, through the emotional set up, and the hardwiring of our brain which we received through our genetic make up. Our feelings are a series of complex chemical reactions, triggered by exterior stimulus. The organism which we know as “us” is a very complicated piece of nature’s work.

And yet, there are those moments…those rare moments when I am experiencing the love I have for my little ones, and for others in my family, that I feel as though we are something more than simply an advanced species of mammalian life.

There are those thrilling moments of experiencing natural phenomena, such as the beauty of the world and the Universe around us, which have intrinsic value beyond that which ought to be experienced by beings to which they would have no other value to, other than the awe of their beauty.

Our evolutionary process has been long, and the whole of creation that I look out upon at night is so vast, that I cannot with good conscience preclude an interaction at some point with some thing…someone….some presence, which changed the basic nature of our species, and altered the direction we were headed. Was it like the scene from “2001 A Space Odyssey”? Nah…I don’t think it was that overt, but perhaps though, much more powerful. God? The creator of the Universe? Aww man….I just do not know, and neither do any of us, no matter what we say, do, or write. And the frustration is knowing that we may never know, even in death we may have no answers.

However, with all that being said, I hold out the hope…I pray each night, and hope my prayers are being heard, and not falling on deaf ears, or simply echoing out into an empty and cold outer space…I pray that there is something further along past the gateway we must all one day pass through.

In order for humanity to coexist in harmony we must first realize that everything changes sooner or later. Impermanence is the hallmark of the human race. Nothing we build or think is permanent. Not a skyscraper nor an idea.

As a child I used to put together jigsaw puzzles, and when I poured them out on the table, I thought to myself “this is impossible” these thousand pieces will never fit together! The shapes were so odd, so random. I started working slowly, and over a long period of time, with patience and study, I did it.

I believe every person should be required to put a thousand piece puzzle together. Every doctor, lawyer, preacher, teacher, politician ( oh yes especially them) and factory worker…should be required to fit the pieces together and complete the puzzle, before they can move on in their profession. Then, when they are through…take a picture of it and take it apart and put it back in the box. The picture to remind you that the most difficult problems, relationships, and situations can be solved if one does not give up. The box of pieces to show that things change, and nothing is forever.

Then imagine our lives as that puzzle, and take the picture out and look at it when we need encouragement.