Journey

On the "Big Red Journey" front, the coming week is the last week of classes. My first semester is, astonishingly, almost over! I'll compose a review of it at some point in the near future, but right now, as happens frequently, I find myself contemplating the bigger picture.

Life is so fragile and so tenacious. It's almost ridiculously easy to destroy any single organism, or any given population, but life continues to survive and evolve and find new ways to keep going. Life is an overwhelming force.

Human nature has an amazing capacity for the beautiful and good, and yet so often we make mistakes, our efforts fall short, we're overcome by fear, or we're hurt by someone else. Accidents and malicious acts alike cause grief. I go back and forth about whether or not I think evil actually exists as such, or whether evil behavior has roots in fear and pain.

I'm getting closer to being able to do work every single day that will help change the world for the better. I'm confident that I can and will make a difference, and that my efforts will combine with those made by others to make human life more sustainable.

But I know that I'll make mistakes and suffer failures, too. Today my sense of my human foibles is intense, and I realize that I can try my very best and sometimes, that won't be enough. I'll go looking for love in the wrong places, I'll attach myself to a solution that turns out to be impractical, I'll inadvertently do or say something that will cause pain to somebody else, I'll misunderstand, I'll become afraid and forget that courage is the belief that there are things more important than fear. On some days, my best efforts will slip through my fingers like water. I will mess up, and there is nothing I can do about that except try to clean up the mess as best as I can.

The pain of limitations is something we all have to deal with, and I can't help but wonder if, on a metaphysical level, we're infinite beings who have been molded in finite shells and placed in a finite world. I have no idea what end would be served by this, but it makes sense to me when I consider that most of what we humans want is good - food, clothing, shelter, community, freedom, love - and that our greatest mistakes are often made in pursuit of these desires.

The only conclusion I can come to is that I have to try in good faith and accept that some of my attempts will fail. There's a sort of poignant beauty in that realization that somehow lets me believe that things will be ok - we will still have love and compassion even if the world is crashing down around our heads.