"I don't care what you believe, but believe in something."You have to have faith. Not necessarily the believe in God type faith, but faith in life, faith in yourself, faith that things will work out the way they are supposed to work out. We make choices, we learn lessons. Sometimes the most important lessons are learned after the fact. We hope and pray that we haven't damaged anything to the point where we cannot return, but generally, we have, and we can't.
- Shepherd Book, Serenity
Faith is like hope, but not the double edged sword. Hope can lead us to believe that something we want to happen will, even though it may have no chance. Faith believes that things will happen the way they are supposed to happen, and to have faith allows us to pursue our own happiness. Even if we're unsure that we're on the right path.
So have a little faith. Believe that, as Voltaire said, things happen for a reason, and therefore it must be the very best reason.
Just some random thoughts from today about life in general. I haven't done any studies and I'm just going to ramble about what I think, which isn't really out of the norm.
Every individual is born in a group. If it's just the mother and father, it's still a group. If it's a single mother with no father around, at one point, there still was a group. A child cannot be created without the "group." I remember as a child one of the rituals to becoming a Weeblo was the three sticks (representing the kid and his parents). One cannot stand alone, two cannot stand, but three can be balanced.
We are born into this life and if we're lucky we end up part of a family. We spend the rest of our lives creating new relationships with people we know of as our friends. Some of our friends are brief, some last a lifetime.
Sidenote: I remember Doug writing something about this (reference to types of people in our lives) a while ago, if I can find the link I'll post that.
We all travel this road and make choices. Ultimately, on some level, we are alone, but the whole time we're constantly creating these friendships so we can share this life we've created. Sometimes we become more than friends and have a mutual bond that is friendship, but much deeper. Regardless of the type of relationship, these people create who we are as people.
Here's where I start to get confused. Society (at least from my perspective right now) seems to be turning away from this. The individual is the important piece. Work hard and achieve what you can. You don't need help. I don't mean that society is telling us to abandon others, but there's a perspective that we MUST be independent.
I understand the need to be able to do for oneself, take care of oneself. But is there a problem with leaning? Asking for help? After all, we create friendships specifically for that purpose.
Somewhere along the way we question our existence or our purpose. Everyone wants to hope that at some point in time, after we're gone, we'll be remembered. That in some way we've created something that somebody else will remember. Most of us will never be famous musicians, actors, or authors, so all we can hope for is that those people that we called our friends will remember us and who we were. I find it ironic that we will try to accomplish things independently, but the only way it will have any meaning after we're gone is if somebody else remembers. That someone else are our friends.
...
I may try to clean this up. I just read it (first draft, as always), and I see where it needs some serious editing, but I don't have time right now. Sometimes it's just best to just get the general thought down. I hope it at least made some sense.
Apparently, everyone is claiming victory. The city of San Francisco, the Chinese, and the protesters, well, they're not really happy, but I'd say they probably won. I'm not sure how hiding the torch so no one except the randomly lucky can see it is a victory for San Francisco or China, but I get confused easily.
The protesters were upset they didn't get to do their chanting or cause a ruckus...gee, now there's a surprise. They got the entire city of San Francisco to act like a giant coward and they're not happy?
Sounds like they got exactly what they wanted. Quit protesting for the sake of protesting. You got your message across now shut up and go home.
I'm watching coverage of the Olympic Torch "run" through the streets of San Francisco. For anyone who doesn't know anything about what's going on, there have been protests around the world (wherever the torch is) about China's treatment of Tibet.
Ok, I get it. China's treatment of Tibet=bad. I don't support the Chinese government but I fail to see how this is in any way productive.
Which one of the torch bearers is actually oppressing anyone?
It's a protest. Have your protest, but don't actually stop the event. The Olympics are NOT about you. There was a group of Buddhists who apparently walked across the Golden Gate Bridge in protest this morning. They didn't stop anything but they were noticed. That's what a protest is supposed to be.
That being said, the Olympics are supposed to be non-political. Granted, one can make many references to them being a political event: Jesse Owens (can't have a Black man showing up the Aryan race and Hitler in front of Germans)/Berlin, Israel/Munich, US (protesting USSR's invasion of Afghanistan)/Moscow, USSR (retaliation for US not going to Moscow)/Los Angeles...but the fact is it's supposed to be about the athletes. These people that have spent their lives (albeit short at this point, most are in their 20s) trying to get here.
Yes, the run is symbolic, but I don't see how anyone is learning anything new about Tibet based on stopping a torch run through a city. I understand protests and getting one's point across, but to me this is just stupid.
It's just a table by the window. It's a nice table, and probably the best seat in the place, but it's just a table.
This table however, has a history. Eight months ago I brought my girlfriend to Q with Doug. We were seated at this table. A couple months later, we broke up. I was devastated, so that night, Doug and I went back to Q, were seated at this table again. I ended up sending a bunch of texts back and forth with her. We ended up getting back together.
Now, eight months later, we've broken up again and Doug and I went to Q ... were seated at the same table.
Doug sent me a text, "this isn't from her." It was pretty entertaining. We laughed. We had a bottle of wine called "Writer's Block." Same bottle we had in July.
Life definitely has a sense of humor.
I posted a review on High Fidelity back in 2003. What a great movie. I watched it last back in September on my computer (because the DVD player on the TV wasn't set up) with a good friend of mine (perhaps a story for another time).
Knowing it's a great movie, and knowing the plot, I decided to take it over to Doug's. Maybe it's the state of mind I'm in, maybe it's just a fantastic movie written by people with a pretty firm grasp on what life is like.
It definitely makes my top 5 movies of all time.
Eight months ago I posted this.
We "met" again, soon after, and it has been a fantastic eight months. But rather than state how much better I feel about the whole thing and how much more I understand, and how I finally "get it" (as much as one can), I'm posting it again.
When she saw the original post she asked if it was a reference to the James Blunt song "Goodbye My Lover." I had never heard it.
I've heard it now.
How can one be so ridiculously sure of how good things are and be so wrong?
I can't remember ever being this confused.