Change Order: February 2011

Friday, February 25, 2011

A Meaning of Life

Sometimes there are things running through your head that you just can't get out in words, or express them the way you want. Sometimes other people have those same things swirling around in their thought cages and are more capable of making those thoughts tangible. Luckily for me that other person happens to be a friend of mine and also happens to write a blog that I happen to enjoy reading. Here is one of such blogs about topics I think about ceaselessly. Bryan, thanks for having the skill to put thoughts to words.

I am human. I am the result of a series of accidents. My very existence is purely coincidental. I was born out of chaos and unto chaos in the form of my body. It has arms, legs, a mouth, a nose, toenails and a clavicle, among other things. Most importantly, my body has a brain. My brain controls my body--everything from my eyelids to my liver. Interestingly, my brain controls my liver without having the slightest idea of how a liver works at the conscious level. My brain controls all kinds of things I don't understand, yet controls them with perfection. Without my brain, I would cease to exist. My body would remain, but an immaterial part of me would vanish. You see, I am my body, but much more.

I am human. I was born out of chaos and unto chaos, a human body paired with a human soul. By pure coincidence, I appeared in this universe, on this planet with billions of others like me. By pure coincidence, I appeared on a certain part of this huge earth, in this vast universe, amongst a handful of other humans who look and think and feel and exist very much like I do. They make the world a less lonely place.

I am Bryan. I am identified by my human body paired with my human soul--without both, I am no longer Bryan. I was born out of chaos and unto chaos. By pure coincidence, I appeared in this universe, on this planet with billions of other humans who look and think and feel and exist very much like I do. By pure coincidence, I appeared on a certain part of this huge Earth, in this vast universe, amongst a handful of family and friends. I am thankful for them, because they make the world a less lonely place. There many things that I do not know. I do not know where the universe came from, I do not know if the soul dies, and I do not know how my liver works.

All I know is that I am alive now, I have been alive for nearly 21 years, and in all likelihood I have less than 100 years left in this life as I know it. I know that I love the people around me more than anything else in this short life I have. This is as close to truth as I can get, and I can make some inferences based on these truths:

Our ultimate human drive must be to find love, and I don't quite mean it in the sense that society has developed it to mean. Love is a connection, a bond, a sense that you are not and won't be alone in this world. Love is not a sexual or physical feeling (lust) and therefore makes no distinction between gender. A man can love his best friend, his wife, his kids, or his partner. Sexual attraction and sex itself are physical manifestations of the emotion of love, but do not constitute love itself. Sex can be had in the absence of love. The ultimate drive to find love is driven by the avoidance of our greatest fear--the opposite of love--loneliness. Love is not one-sided, it is reciprocal. One-sided love is not love, but lust or desire mired in loneliness. The search for love is not the search for someone to love, but for someone to love you back.

As for where we came from and where we're going? It is enough for me to accept that speculating will never lead me any closer to the real truth. The truth will be only be revealed when the time comes. Until then, I want to be sure that I am doing my best to spread the love. The universe is like my liver, I don't know or much care to know why it's there or how it works, just as long as it does its job and gives me my fair opportunity to live and love.