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This week, I’ve been forced to face the fact that I’ve wasted a decade on a company that is a professional dead end. I’ve wasted a number of brain cycles trying to determine whether it’s better to quit, transfer, or drink the Kool Aid, but after a run on the beach today, I thought, “None of this shit matters. None of it. It’s all bullshit.”
And it brought a smile to my face.
It may have been my distinct lack of oxygen, but the thought grew to include everything. Work, hobbies, morality, everything. We like to think that if we work hard, we’ll get the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. We like to think that honesty is the best policy and that the dishonest are always shown the error of their ways. The good guys always win. The fact of the matter is that people get ahead by lying, cheating, stealing, and dumb luck. We don’t like to believe it happens, but the world doesn’t really care what we like to believe.
Your local graveyard is littered with devils and angels, lying side by side, and the world still turns without them. Three generations after they died, most are all but forgotten. Good or bad, their choices had no lasting effect on the world.
And odds are, neither will yours.
The only effect that your values and actions will shape is you.
If the only important thing that you can truly shape is yourself, what will you become?
(Did anyone get the title reference?)
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April 30th, 2007 at 9:56 pm
I’m glad you back on the blogging scene.
It’s the philosophical posts of yours that I really enjoy.
Does it make you a self-indulgent person to try to shape yourself? Or does it depend on HOW you try to shape yourself that turns you to self-indulgence?
I know (or think) your religious views differ from mine quite a bit, but personally I try to be as humble as I can - but the fact that I’m saying I try to be humble almost makes me the absolute opposite.
You got the wheels turning on this one.
P.S. Must be nice to be able to take a run on the beach. I could take a run on the mountains I guess.
May 1st, 2007 at 5:07 am
this is so true. i’ve been thinking a lot about the same sort of thing lately. maybe we all just need to be self centered and forget about the reprocussions for everyone else. who knows.
meanwhile, your run on the beach made me miss the good ole ‘tasket. take a deep breath of ocean for me next time!!!
May 2nd, 2007 at 6:44 pm
The world will have you kneel and make promises that come due after you die. It’s easier for everyone that way.
But rebellion is a no way to spend a life, either.
The real question is what will you become?
May 2nd, 2007 at 9:33 pm
I don’t get the reference in the title. Makes me a little sad.
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:41 pm
For some reason, I’ve been carrying the following lines from Crazy People around in my head for almost 20 years now:
Kathy: Who here wants to be an advertising executive?
[several hands go up]
Emory Leeson: Who here wants to be a fire truck?
[everyone raises their hands, with several standing and commenting things like "Ooh, I do!" and "Me! Pick me!"]
May 3rd, 2007 at 2:45 am
I’m glad it wasn’t a play on words like the J-Dy one was.
‘Cause I was sitting there trying to put emphasis on the wrong syllables for a good five minutes before I gave up and came to the conclusion that there is no possible way that “A Firetruck” can be construed as anything other than “A Firetruck”
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:29 am
Definitely a classic post of yours. I think most of us are socialized into seeing our lives as a race, a journey to the finish line, in which you amass stuff, relationships, credentials, etc. I think, truly, one of the hardest things one can do is to focus on life as you are living it, how can you strive to be a truly happy fulfilled person, not just on a piece of paper, or an outside face to the world, but to be truly alone with yourself and happy with that person…