Something Worthwhile

 We are young. Human beings. Whether or not we advance into a higher form of life, this is true. We are young. The universe is ancient. Older than we can imagine, likely more complicated and unknowable than we can use language to fathom. And what a thing language is. What movement, this. What emergence. 

To dwell in the mystery feels like a good use of time. 

To jot down samples, observations of the mystery feels like a good use of time. 

To think about spaces, creating other forms of spaces, for others to join in the mystery, consider the mystery, appreciate the mystery, even to notice the mystery. That feels like a good use of time. 

We are young. Those of us who jot down ideas. Literature. Language is young. It will change, it will transform. It already has. Through technology. Through social media. Networks. Through entertainment, it has changed. And it is to be more than we know, more than it is. 

Think of the internet, in its shape, in its iterations. It will change in ways we can't imagine yet. 

But we can begin to imagine them. 

There is destruction, there is poverty, there is suffering. 

There is suffering. 

There are ways to alleviate suffering. 

This is one way, this jotting down, this noticing, this encouragement of others' noticing. 

We are young. There is time. These are our tools, these screens and keyboards and networks. 

Maybe we can build something worthwhile. What else is there to do, but this. 

Let's build something worthwhile. 

Authenticity

It seems like millenials are becoming more religious.

I understand. It's hard not to have structure in life. That's one of the few things I miss about Catholocism.

But I don't think I can get onboard with any of it anymore. I've thought about it. I've read about it a lot. I've even tried, in moments of honest contemplation, to pray, or at least ask myself if I could believe again. I can't. 

Not just because the belief isn't there; it isn't, but that's not the only reason. It's also because I oppose the beliefs I was raised with. Morally oppose them. I find them grotesquely inhuman. 

I feel that the religion I was raised with despises discernment, which I've come to think of as my highest ideal. True discernment. True understanding of oneself. Authenticity. It's maybe the hardest thing in the world for me to maintain. When I speak to other people, I feel my discernment recede. I feel my authentic desires and emotions dissipate. I am lost in the shadow of another. 

And this is natural, this is learned, this is what I have always done. I say to myself, no more, but no more is a process. No more is not all at once. It takes years. It takes my life. I will spend my life on authenticity. Trying to embody it. To carve out spaces for others to live inside it as well. This is my project. To live authentically, to encourage living authentically. I will spend days and months and years trying to be this, to cultivate this. And that is ok. It is ok never to do something, as long as you try. It's not the thought that counts. It's the intention.