On the Game Change

For most of my life my primary concern has been myself.  Sure I would care about other people, as much as my programming would allow.  In the end though my universe was centered around me.  That may sound selfish, but if I'm not around then everything else for me doesn't really matter.  It may not have been the best way to run a ship, still it was my way and it was working for me.  Mostly.  There have been times where I'm watching a show or movie and I see people behaving how I wish I could be.  It's an idealized version of friendship.  Almost as though a Norman Rockwell painting has come to life.  I know this and I still sometimes want it for myself and the people I call friends.  That's not to say what I have is bad in any way.  It's just more real.  People can be thoughtless.  I can be thoughtless.  More often than not the thing I meant to say comes out as something else and people look at me like I'm trying to swallow a whole octopus.  Even with all these blunders, I still knew what to expect.

Watching a lot of movies and television I felt like I had seen the story where a character is going to have a baby plenty of times.  Sometimes they're sad, a lot of times they are happy, but almost always they are freaked the hell out.  Just when you think you've got the game figured out, a new player comes onto the board.  These characters would run around doing all sorts of wacky things or go through montages where they buy baby books, find a good doctor after sifting through all the crazy ones, and then going to various appointments.  All this normally happens in the span of like twenty minutes because in the end the movie is still about the characters and not the tiny alien that's gestating inside one of them.  The movie comes to an end with the birth of said alien and if you're lucky they may show a little bit of how wonderful it all is.  Aw that's nice.  I feel like I'm prepared.

We've been having babies since before we could call ourselves human.  While I'm not sure I'd say we are exactly experts at the whole thing.  I do feel like we've learned enough to be dangerous, but not quite deadly.  Honestly it's a miracle that we're alive.  Think about all the things that had to happen for you to be here right now?  If the exact scenario of your conception didn't happen it's likely you wouldn't be around to read this.  Millions of things have to go right for each person to be born.  Change the timing and a boy may be a girl.  Change the environment and maybe the whole thing falls apart halfway through.  Our bodies are these complex mechanisms that we really have very little control over.  Sure we can shovel fuel in the form of our favorite flavors into it in order to keep things running, but we can't exactly tell our kidneys to step up their game.  Most of the time I can't get my stomach on board with the same food I've eaten a hundred times before  Sometimes I wish there was some kind of external monitoring system that told me what the hell was going on inside of me.  I suppose it wouldn't matter because without control that information is useless.  I could tell you my heart rate right now, but that doesn't really give me the whole picture of all the other things connected to that piece of information.  Now think about how inside someone they're building a completely new person from scratch.  Sure I helped in my small way, but it was really a fire and forget.  Somehow it's putting together its own brain.  If it's doing that then it means we did that ourselves at some point.  We really created ourselves.

Knowing this it kind of makes me sad to think how easily we forget about the miracle that is our own lives.  Sure reality means there's more to it than simply marveling at how amazing our bodies are.  As adults we're kind of over the whole magic of life and the world around us.  Now go watch a little kid in the same environment and notice how ensorcelled they are by the smallest things.  I can't quite remember when the world stopped being so overwhelmingly magical to me.  I think with the internet and the world being full of people who are genuinely trying to hold onto or at least recapture that sense of wonder, it's not a lost cause.  Children are the constant reminder that the world can be a wondrous place.  While they're running around being amazed at everything in the world, the adults are running right behind them being terrified of that same world consuming the tiny versions of ourselves.  This means my primary concern is no longer myself.  Instead it's going to be this external portion of myself that is scampering off to go eat dirt and actively put itself into dangerous situations because it has no idea that a mountain lion wielding a chainsaw isn't something you run towards.

On Timing

It seems that I have inherited my father's strange timing.  Mostly when it comes to other people though.  He has this ability to draw people to him.  For instance the street he lives on could be nearly empty.  Traffic has been light all day.  Then he gets in the car and goes for a drive and what does he find?  A tractor going 15 mph and ten cars trailing it, meaning he's now stuck in traffic that didn't exist until he went for a drive.  I can do the same thing now.  I'll be wandering through a store in the evening.  There aren't a lot of people there.  I go down an aisle to look at something and within seconds not one, but several people will arrive in the same exact location and stand inches away from me, in what was once an empty spot on the planet.  The thing is though that these people may be thinking the same thing about me.

The whole idea got me wondering about all the strange bits of timing that we run into where it feels like the world is conspiring against us or no matter where we go there is resistance.  Then I started to think, what about all the stuff that we miss?  You're driving along a narrow road and there is something just slightly in your lane that you try to avoid and at that exact moment there is a car coming from the opposite direction.  You hadn't seen a car for the last twenty minutes and don't see another on the road after that, but at that precise moment your timing brought you to this meeting.  How many things are we missing?  Those instances where we're clued in on what's going on around us makes it seem like a cruel twist of fate that you can't go anywhere without drawing traffic to you.  What if though we're silently and unknowingly avoiding things that are potentially much worse...or much better?  Afterwards we tend to say to ourselves 'If only I had...' in some attempt to rationalize that if our actions had only been slightly different, we could have changed the outcome.  Maybe if I hadn't stopped for that extra minute then I would have been in the intersection when the truck ran the red light.  What's to say though that in changing that single action on your part everything else would remain the same?  The truth is that our actions are such a small part of a greater chaotic system.

Still we tend to be the center of our own universe and we tend to think that our actions matter.  That we brought ourselves to this moment and weren't carried here by unseen forces of a chance.  Maybe these little moments in time where we run into, or almost run into, something that feels like a world working against us, we're actually peeking behind the curtain a bit to see just how random everything is.  Sure you tried to make a quick trip to the grocery store and managed to leave at the exact time when the power goes out in your neighborhood.  It could feel like you have the worst timing.  Then think about all the times you read about how something happened and you were nowhere near it, but close enough to think you could have been.  Those are just the things that we're aware of going on around us.  When those weird things happen it may be helpful to think about all the random stuff that we sailed through without problem.

On the China Shop

I go through these phases where I feel clumsy.  Not just physically clumsy, but also like I'm barely able to get the right words out.  I've talked about feeling a step out of sync with things before, but this is a little bit different.  This feels as though at any moment I'll crash into something.  When I'm driving I feel like at any moment I'll be caught looking the wrong way and turn to see a train headed right for me, even if I'm not near any train tracks.  Overall it feels like I should just keep my head down and wait for whatever this is to pass.  The only problem is that you can't just hide away and hope it goes away because you have to keep on living your life, even if people around you seem to be looking at you as though something is hanging from your nose.

The thing is that maybe when this clumsiness cloud has centered on you, other people can sense it.  It could be like walking into a familiar room and knowing something is out of place.  Something about you is out of place and people notice it, even if only subconsciously.  Then again maybe part of the problem is that everything you see is off kilter so people are looking at you normally and instead you see them as staring back at you like some sort of alien doofus that's going to break something.  Maybe it's a bit of both.  I've considered the somewhat cosmic scenario where these situations are just a manifestation of us being in the wrong place at the wrong time in our own lives.  We feel clumsy or out of sorts because we're not where we should be and until we get back into place we feel as though we're smashing through life.  While that could be true, I sometimes wonder if maybe it's also something physical and mental.

We've all had times where we feel like we're on fire (in the good way).  Everything is going our way.  Maybe we find ourselves a little more quick witted than usual.  Maybe we feel especially lucky for a certain period of time.  What if during those moments, no matter how long they last, everything inside of us is operating exactly how it should be.  It might not be perfection, but it's about as close as you can get while still being a mortal.  Nothing lasts forever and we eventually go back to "normal" where there are good times and bad times, hopefully either equaling out or balancing more towards the good.  If those times of near perfection where we just feel like we're spot on are possible because of something internal then it would stand to reason that sometimes things aren't working perfectly.  Now the opposite of perfection is total disaster and while I don't think that's always what's at work, I do think maybe it's some minor monkey wrench within us that's throwing everything off.  This whatever-it-is is enough to make it so that words don't come out right or we constantly think we're going to bump into something.

So I suppose the question really isn't just what do we do to fix this when it happens, but also how do we prevent it from happening again?  One could argue that the internal is directly related to the external, meaning that our environment is as much a contributor to what happens inside of us and what is inside of us also shapes what surrounds us.  If one aspect isn't right then does that mean it throws off the whole picture?  Plus there is so much of our lives and ourselves that we simply can't control so it can sometimes feel like we're at the mercy of randomness.  That of course bring up the whole notion of if there is truly random events in the world or just parts of some greater series of events that we can't always see.  Maybe if you could see your lifeline on a map, showing exactly where you were headed and where you were supposed to be going, you could make out the time when you are wobbling out of control and deviating from what should be your path.  Those minor deviations could be those times when you feel like a bull in a china shop, crashing into life around.

On Money

They say money changes you and I started to wonder why that is. What is it about money that inherently changes the way people behave. It can drive someone to lie, steal, cheat, and even kill to get it. What is it about money that causes that level of reaction, or overreaction? Why do we want money so badly? Is it because of the things we believe it can get for us? Maybe that's all it really comes down to. Money is just a concept we use. It's our way to keeping track of just how much of what you want you can have. I guess in that regard then money can equal freedom, at least in our society's terms of what freedom is. Currently our society is a capitalistic one, where one's success is rewarded with money. We tend to associate money with power because money gets you what you want. Just look at the Hollywood movie producer, who is a multi-millionaire, that controls the lives of not on the movies they produce, but also the lives of the people involved in them. They wield a ridiculous amount of power, and not just within their own little world. That is thanks to not only their own wealth, but also their ability to make money for others. Money can influence even political power. Look at our own elections. In order to be even nominated you have to generate a huge amount of money. This is just to be seen. Then if you're elected, you have to start bringing in even more money for your eventual reelection. In addition to normal skills like being able to lead, understand the law, and navigate the world of professional politics, one has to be a fundraiser as well. Does that mean money is the root of all evil or just a necessary one?
Not all that long ago it used to be that we would barter for our goods and services. You want that sack of flour then you'll need to work on my roof for a few hours. Time and energy were exchanged for equal (hopefully) time and energy. Somewhere along the way that changed. Instead of a direct exchange of services, we now tend to hand over whatever currency is accepted in exchange for something. So now if you want that bag of flour you're not going to be talking to the guy who milled it. Instead you're talking to the supermarket chain that worked out a deal with said guy or group of guys to pay them a specific amount of money for their product in exchange for the ability to take that bag of flour out beyond the reach of what the guy could have hoped to done on his own. I'm not saying this setup is bad because I don't know any guys who mill flour, which means if I want it then my options are kind of limited. No, the problem really comes from other situations where we're exchanging our time and energy for something other than equal time and energy. I have agreed to work 40 hours in a week so that you'll pay me an agreed upon of money that I can then turn around and spend on whatever I want, which is usually bills. The basic assumption is that the money you're giving me is going to have value equal to the time I invested in getting it. When you think about it though, does the money ever really match up in value to the time it took to get it? And it makes me wonder as well are we devaluing ourselves in the process? It can be rare to see your time and energy get turned into something tangible rather than some numbers put into your bank account where the other numbers live.

How is it that a majority of the world's wealth is kept by a very small minority of people? It's seemingly always been that way too be it monarchies, business owners, or extraordinary individuals who did something special. I can't fault someone for wanting to maintain their level of wealth. Very rarely do people want to go backwards in what they have. So we ask ourselves how does that billionaire justify making another fifty million dollars when they already have more than enough. Couldn't some resident in a third world nation ask that of a middle class family who is living on the combined salaries that is less than eighty thousand dollars a year, which could be exponentially greater than anything they could hope to make in their own lifetime? The family that's living on eighty thousand dollars may be very comfortable. They'll have bills and complications like everyone else, including the billionaire. Sure the billionaire is able to fly to Monaco to race a car made of diamonds against a solid gold robot he had commissioned, but some way or another he has to pay for all that, even if his reserves are much greater than the average person. The middle class family is able to keep their fridge stocked with food, their kids in new clothes, and has access to just about any medicine they would need for non-emergencies.
I'm not saying that billionaires should give their money away. I'm not mad or jealous of them for having that money. I'm just curious what they did to get it and in such high amounts. As with many things I'm sure a lot of circumstances had to come into play. They say it's easy to make money if you already have plenty to start with, which is why a lot of people will assume that if someone comes from a wealthy family then it is assumed they'll always be rich as long as nothing catastrophic happens. Is that really successful though? If you start out with a million dollars to your name and you turn that into a billion aren't you just doing what most other people are doing? Someone who starts with a thousand dollars is likely to turn that into something greater than a thousand dollars. So what are these people with money doing with their wealth? Sure some of them may be sitting on it because like Scrooge McDuck believes, the ownership of money is its own reward. Others though are spending that money. When money is spent is has to be going somewhere. Does it all just sort of circulate back to the original owner in those cases? I guess my question is how is it there are trillions of dollars moving around through the economy and yet for the most part everyone's portion of it stays roughly the same throughout their life?
Is the accumulation of wealth all just arbitrary? If tomorrow your bank account said zero then the world around you would immediately decide you have zero worth, at least until you sort out the problem, assuming you could sort out the problem. That doesn't address the larger issue though, which is that our very money, regardless of how much you have in the bank, under the mattress, or invested in offshore accounts has a value that we all have to agree upon. Currently our money isn't backed by gold like it used to be. It's backed by something else now and it's an elaborate game to keep convincing everyone we know that it's still worth the value printed on it. I don't think that tomorrow our money is suddenly going to become worthless. I doubt even that our personal value of money is going to change all that much. I do wonder though about recent situations where it's becoming painfully clear that our money isn't exactly safe and those who are supposed to be in charge of it seem to be more interested in maintaining their own levels than performing the services they were expected to do for their customers. I find it hard to believe that other countries have their economies crumble and even collapse while our own country soldiers on. Sure we have recessions and depressions. One has to wonder though does each time that happen does it make our dollar just a little bit weaker? Will it eventually get to the point where we all ask ourselves why we're using this piece of paper, which is a note saying we have some numbers in a bank, is so important to how we live? If and when that happens will we turn our attention back to something more tangible in value?

On Morality

I've always had what could be considered morally gray disposition. Like most people I tend to think of myself as a generally good person, but I know for a fact that I won't be getting nominated for any humanitarian awards in the near future. And I'm ok with that. My philosophy has always been to try and be good and do good where you can, but occasionally I listen to the voice in my head that says "Take what you can, when you can". Now that may sound a bit greedy. I tend to think of it as opportunistic. The universe sometimes provides you with an opportunity and it's up to you to take it or leave it. It's at moments like this that there may be a bit of moral dilemma where your conscience may start yelling in your ear that you should or shouldn't do something. Now of course it depends on the situation, but I often treat these situations like I do with food. It's generally best to accept food when it's offered because you never know when it may be offered again. I admit that type of thinking may sound like someone who lived on the streets of a Dickens story. I'm not out to hurt anyone and I try to be somewhat socially conscious of how my actions may impact others. These can be little things like not littering or putting my shopping cart back in the cart corral. They can also be bigger things like doing what I can to help those who need it. Still I would say at least on a weekly basis I do things that a part of me knows is wrong.

We all attempt to justify our actions. Leaving work early even though you came in late. You worked extra last week or will work more tomorrow. The salesman forgot to ring up an item. Given how much money they make it won't hurt them to miss this one thing. You burned that guy's shed to the ground because he had it coming for that thing with the guy that one time. Granted some of our justifications are more rational than others. In the end though it's just how we tell ourselves that our actions are ok. I would imagine that most socially functional people know the difference between right and wrong. It's just that we tell ourselves that because we had a good reason to do something that we are in the right for doing something wrong. We like to label those people who don't seem to care about right or wrong as sociopaths (actually I read an interview from a psychologist who said that term is incorrect and the proper term should be psychopaths) because it helps to separate us from those people who are socially "broken".  The thing is that to an outsider a lot of our actions could be considered psychotic bordering on self-destructive. Now maybe you're not sitting in a bathroom cutting lines into your thigh or taking drugs that slowly burn away the bad thoughts, but let's face it, we all do things that we ourselves look back on and wonder why we thought that was the right thing to do at the time when it seems obvious that just the opposite action was probably the better choice.

I guess the question really comes down to what is the basis of our morals?  Who or what is really the moral authority?  I tend to believe that we allow society to somewhat dictate what is moral, even though it really comes down to the individual to decide. Very few of us get through life without letting those around us influence our behavior. Even those people who claim they don't care what other people think are often bound by the general rules of society. In the end though we are our own moral authority. We decide what we believe to be right. Now those beliefs are shaped and built by everything in our lives. While society may say it's wrong to commit murder, you may believe that in some circumstances murder may be necessary, if not justified. Does that make you wrong?  I've often wondered what our morals will look like a thousand years from now. If we as a species are still around will we still even have a concept like morals or ethics?  I suppose it depends on our situation at the time. Morals are a lot like civil liberties, in times of crisis they can be considered a luxury that can get you killed. Some people though feel that no matter the situation you shouldn't compromise your ideals. Doing so only compromises your self. It's hard to know if those people are right or wrong because while their moral code may ultimately cost them here, there may be a much greater picture to consider than just what happens in the here and now. Is the possibility of a giant cosmic tapestry enough to prevent people from doing whatever they think they can get away with or at least feel bad about it when they break their own moral guidelines?

On Chaos

"You know the thing about chaos? It's fair." I was driving the other day and saw there was roadwork being done on the side of the road. There was a sign that said a flagman may be present to help direct traffic, but when I got there it was just three guys standing by the side of the road, looking up at the fourth man in the cherry picker doing whatever he needed to. They were standing to the side of the road and it was apparent they were banking on the assumption that no one would go out of their way to disrupt their work. In that moment it made me realize just how many different aspects of our lives are being gambled on. The gamble is that since the past has shown the situation to be safe that it will continue to be safe. That and most rational people aren't interested in throwing the world into chaos. With a simple jerk of the wheel I could have disrupted the quiet order of the world. Not just their world, but everyone associated would have been affected because when others heard about it, they would have realized safety is an illusion.

There are a lot of assumptions when it comes to the rules. We assume that for the most part that everyone is going to play along with the rules that society has set out. Only those on the fringes will disregard the laws. In a way there is an assumption there too. Drug dealers will deal drugs and eventually get into fights with other drug dealers or the cops. If you don't take or sell drugs then it's assumed that your world will never bump into that one. We hear about crime, but for the most part that's all it is, something we hear about. It's when it comes wandering into our backyard that we see the rules are only for those who choose to follow them. It's a strange thing to know that we even have rules of engagement when it comes to war. We'd like to believe that we're more civilized that those that came before us. It's alright to shoot this person, but not that person. They blew this up so we're allowed to respond by blowing up that. It's expected. It's how we're supposed to behave, assuming everyone is in agreement.

I think that is part of the thrill we get from post apocalyptic stories. It shows us a world where the rules have been thrown out. Society is only polite as long as the lights stay on and there is food on the table. In those stories people only worry about one thing and that's to survive, regardless of what's necessary to get through to tomorrow. You can feel guilty about it later, but they know that you have to be alive in order to feel anything. There are times in our lives when it seems like the rules are put in place to hold us back or keep us down. There are times too when we'd like nothing more than to rage against the system. The rational part of our mind may understand that it won't help anything in the long run, but the part of us that's still behaves like a three year old wants what we want and anything less deserves to get smashed into a million pieces as we stomp our feet in anger. Every day we go out into the world and live by the unspoken rules where we're not going to rock the boat so that everyone around us can continue to go about their lives without incident. It's when there is a complete disregard for those rules that really scares us. Could it be that the next time it's easier to continue that disregard? Or could it escalate into complete anarchy?

On the Disconnect

There seems to be two types of disconnect going on in today's world. As I've mentioned the world has become so interconnected in some ways that it's nearly impossible for us to do anything without someone else being involved. At the same time we may find ourselves disassociated from those people around us. It's not just the people either. The whole world around has become filtered in such a way that we've willingly disconnected various aspects for the sake of others. I've mentioned how the internet is full of information. There's so much of it that we create custom views of it, filtering out everything unwanted. We all do it. We pay attention only to what interests us. I've found myself going weeks or months without really knowing what's going on the in the world around me. Sure I could tell you about the latest video game developments or which movies are coming out, but I couldn't tell you why those people in Wisconsin were so upset or the impact of the natural disasters around the world. The ability to filter information means the potential for a complete disconnect goes up as time goes on.

Several years ago I moved to a new town for a job. I had never lived there before and only knew the person who recommended me for the job. The company had this policy that after six months of work you would be eligible to work from home one to two days a week. Since the position was a lot of talking on the phone with customers, it was the kind of work that could be done from really anywhere. When I heard about it I was very excited to get to the point where I could telecommute multiple days a week. The idea is great in theory. You save on time by not having to fight traffic either on the way to or from the office. You save money on the gas you would have used on that trip. There was the added benefit that it allowed you to create a better balance between your life and job so that you wouldn't feel shackled to your desk. It also could potentially save the company money on resources by not having an employee come into the office. Those are all good reasons to have a policy and as I said, in theory it's a very good idea all around.

Somewhere along the way the employees started to push past the two days and make it three days. There were even some people who lived far enough away that they were able to negotiate working from home permanently. This meant that in a given work week you would spend more time away from the office than you would spend in it. For many people this started off as a good thing. We each have our own lives to live. We have responsibilities and interests that go beyond what we do at our jobs. In fact for a lot of us our jobs are simply a means to generate income to support our life outside of work. For me it was a chance to keep people constantly at arm's length why maintaining the appearance of being a part of something. Now by the time they started going to three days a week I had been with the company for several years and had become established in what was once a new town. Even still I found myself drifting further away from people. It became easier to let myself be isolated by essentially hiding in my apartment. Now sure I still had to go into the office two days a week, but the way it worked out on the days that I came into the office others were spending their working from home. It got to the point that weeks could go by without really seeing certain people. There are some people who would love nothing more than to be on their own. They want to do their job and be left alone. Now these people may be personable outside of work, but it's such a slippery slope that disconnecting from one thing may trigger a disconnect from something else.

Our society is very individualistic, which in a lot of ways is a good thing. It has allowed certain people to achieve greatness because they are not hindered by the group. In other ways though it has created a society of trees, but not a forest. I once had to give a friend a ride to another friend's apartment. My friend made the comment that the apartment complex looked like honeycomb in a bee hive, which was an interesting analogy since he was saying it in the fact that each of us went into our little hole and was completely isolated from everyone, even the person next to us. It's true though that we maintain these invisible barriers around us. I lived in a single apartment complex for nearly six years and I couldn't tell you the name of any of the people who lived next door. Sure I had seen them coming and going. I'd said hi, but like them, I never went any further than that. Maybe a part of it is a fear of having someone so close to home that turns out to be unfriendly. So instead it's better to keep the people as an unknown quantity. From a strictly safety perspective I guess I can see its validity, but on the immediate flip side it meant you allowed yourself to be surrounded by strangers. In an emergency could you even ask the person standing next to you for help?

Even with all that self-imposed isolation from people we still find ourselves saying we need to disconnect for a little bit. We need time to be alone with ourselves or with only the people we really care about. It's not easy always being 'on' and having to maintain our outside persona. There are times when we need to just be ourselves. The version that doesn't have to be polite or considerate because we're alone. It also allows us to break away from the constant barrage of information that it coming at us. It's usually at this point that we put those filters back up. We reevaluate what we want in our lives and in some cases make a conscious effort to limit things even further. It's strange that for many of us the duration we can go outside in the world gets shorter and shorter even though we spend so much time trying to separate ourselves from everyone else. Maybe it's a perpetuating cycle, the more time we spend disconnected the easier it becomes to stay that way. If it stays that way then won't we all just be a bunch of strangers?

On Failure

Did you know that at this very moment something in your life has started it's journey towards eventual failure? This could be some mechanical part in your car or computer. It could be an internal organ that for whatever reason, has begun breaking down in such a way that after time it will eventually fail. We would like to imagine that the time in which this failure is going to happen is set for some far off future. It never occurs to us that is has any connection with the day that's already started. There is an idea about the Law of Entropy, which states that order will always eventually move towards disorder. Or said another way, given enough time, all things will break down. It may be considered a somewhat cynical way to view the world, however, there may be some truth to that idea. If you've ever experience something breaking on you then it can feel as though everything is simply holding on as long as possible until it can no longer sustain order and fails.

The thing is life is made up of failure. It's necessary for success. As I've mentioned before, there are mistakes that have to be made so that you learn a lesson from it. Without failure, we would have no basis for what will work and what will go horribly wrong. Unfortunately the lesson learned from either our failure or the failure of someone else doesn't make it any less painful. There are people out there who seem to go through life doing everything right, or so it would seem. To the outside observer it appears as though they simply don't make mistakes or fail in any way. It's very unlikely that anyone will go too long before failing at something. Those who don't are postponing the inevitable. I went white water rafting once. The river guide joked that everyone in the boat should get into the water at some point because everyone would find their way into water before the day was done. I didn't take him seriously and while others were bucked out of the boat or voluntarily jumped in, I stayed in the boat. Just before the end of our trip down the river there was a section of the river which was more treacherous than anything we had gone through before. The river guide told us to do everything possible to stay in the boat because you didn't want to fall out in this section. Sure enough the first several hits pitched me right out of the boat. Now one could look at that and say that regardless of if I got out of the boat before, I was going to fall in at that moment. Another way to look at it is that I put off getting in the river up until that point and in a way tempted fate to shove me overboard. What could have happened was that both mentally and physically I was focused on not falling out of the boat and in turn created a situation where there was no other option but to fall in. Then again it could have just been the rock we slammed up against that tossed me over the side.

The fear of failure is a powerful force. It can stop people more effectively than a physical wall. I've read that fear of public speaking rivals the fear of death for the number one fear people tend to have. In the end it comes down to people being afraid of failing in front of a group of people, which will lead to judgements from those same people. Failure isn't fun, but it doesn't always have to be a bad thing either. Thomas Edison went through nearly 10,000 experiments before finally perfecting the electric light bulb. Up until then he had 9999 ways to not have the perfect electric light bulb. From each of those failures he learned something and took that knowledge forward with him. For some though that initial failure has such a negative impact for whatever reason that going through it again is too much. It reminds me of people who won't ask someone out because they're afraid of being rejected, which will mean they have failed. In the past they could have tried and it didn't work and the feeling that came from it not working was not something they wanted to relive. While I understand not wanting to experience the pain of failure or in this case rejection, the greater problem is that never chancing failure means that you'll have no chance at success.

Going back to my original point, given enough time all things have the potential to fail. It's just the nature of things. Nothing lasts forever and even with maintenance there will come a time when something stops working as intended. It usually feels like this comes at the worst possible time. You car never stops working at some time that's convenient. It's more likely you find out there is a problem as you're trying to go to work in a hurry. In those situations one has to wonder why there weren't warning signs that could be seen. Instead it goes from fully functional to completely broken in the blink of an eye. I wonder if that's just how we see things. As I mentioned, the road to ruin has started today, we just don't know it. Catastrophic failure is categorized a sudden and total failure of some system from which recovery is not possible. I have a feeling that in most cases it only seems sudden. The failure was building quietly without anyone's knowledge. Well hopefully without their knowledge. With the space shuttle Challenger it was revealed afterwards that several people knew something was potentially wrong. When it left the tower there was a sigh of relief because the the thought was if the problem was really as bad as they feared, then it would explode before it left the ground. In the end it was an O-ring to a rocket booster that ultimately failed, which caused the entire craft to be destroyed.

We've all head that phrase "Failure is not an option." It's kind of ridiculous to say something like that. Obviously most undertakings aren't done with failure as the final goal. Failure should be expected. Failure is an eventuality given enough time. Failure should be avoided if possible and if not, then learned from in such a way that the next failure doesn't hurt as much. Our failures are what propel us closer towards our successes.

On Food

We are what we eat and yet most people probably couldn't tell you exactly what they're eating on a regular basis. Sure it may taste like chicken, but is it really chicken? Today's food is a mystery of ingredients, most of which can't be pronounced without a decoder ring. Lately there has been a big push for organic food. I think part of that is because it's trendy, but also because obesity has become the leading killer in America. That's something our founding fathers probably never would have imagined happening. People are living so well that they are literally eating themselves to death. Granted the food we put in our mouths would probably not be recognizable to people back then. Even today's white bread would most likely be thought of as cake as far as nutritional value is concerned. Our society is so specialized that many of us could go through our entire lives without ever producing our own food. We will have allowed someone else to provide us everything we eat.

There have been several well-made documentaries regarding the food and food industry today. All of them have a message that they're trying to get across so you may have to take what they're saying with a grain of salt. One examined how we as a country are eating more corn than ever before. Most people probably haven't thought about it until it's pointed out to them. Corn is in almost everything we eat today. Farmers who grow it are experiencing a strange time where the crops they grow can't be used directly as food. Try eating corn straight from the stalk. Unless it was grown specifically for eating, it's probably going to taste like sawdust. It's not until that corn is processed that it can actually be used for anything. That's how it is with most things these days. Processing because this term that gets used that summarizes all sorts of things. By the time they get done processing it, it tastes fantastic, but it may not resemble the original except on the surface. We live in a world where a private company has a patent on food itself. Monsanto has genetically altered soybeans in such a way that if farmers want to grow soy as their primary crop then they have to get their seeds from them. Part of me wonders if that's only the start. We have name brand food providers. McDonald's the probably one of the most recognizable of these. Imagine if they figured out a way to genetically alter cows in such a way that they would produce more beef. Or even flavored beef. Like Monsanto they could control the very supply at its source. It could only be a matter of time before companies start looking at ways to increase their hold on the particular market. Companies are working at owning food at its source. Will they eventually try to patent flavors?

Going back to what we eat, growing up it always seemed like the stuff that was good for you tasted the worst. It's been shown that food flavors have more intensity when we're young so it's very likely that food tastes different to children than it does to adults. Sure an apple is going to taste like an apple, but only more so for a kid, who hasn't experienced all the various flavors the world has to offer. As we get older the taste buds get used to everything and flavors get a bit more muted. That could explain why we tend to remember things tasting better when we were young. For us they probably did have more taste. Plus our tastes change as we grow. I used to despise mushrooms as a kid, but now I can't get enough of them. I couldn't tell you the precise moment when that happened, but it did. I'm sure if I think about it there are foods that I loved as a kid which I can't stomach anymore. As I've mentioned before our bodies become something new as time goes on. Every cell is eventually replaced so after a time we're literally someone new. That could account for why we lose a taste for certain things after awhile. Then again certain things will remain constant. Liver & onions can go straight to hell and I don't care if Bobby Flay were preparing them, it wouldn't be something I'd want to put in my mouth.

Now I'm not a picky eater. Most usually stance is that I want whatever will not make me hungry anymore. At the same time, there are moments where I need a flavor. I normally can't identify exactly what I want. I just know that I want something. Have you ever had a taste for something so specific that nothing else will do? I get that all the time and usually end up settling for whatever is closest to me. It's strange that as children food flavor was more intense naturally and now companies are working at intensifying food to match. Food has become much more than just sustenance. Who knows what it will become next.

On the Background

Normally I'd ask do you notice how we tend to overlook so many things in our lives, but that's kind of the whole point of this topic. We don't notice them anymore. All too often it seems as though the majority of the things in our life fall to the background, almost as though they've been painted in to give the illusion of substance. It's not exactly taking them for granted, but we may to fail to see them. How often do you really look at the things within your life? If we're not paying attention to what's around us, then what are we paying attention to?

When I say things in our lives, it can really mean a bunch of different aspects. The first one is the most obvious one, the stuff we collect as we travel through life. This could be furniture, cars, gadgets, or even houses. It's the accumulation of things that surround us. Even if you're something of a minimalist, you will gather up various things throughout your life. In a lot of cases those things aren't in the forefront of our perception of life. They're largely ignored once we have them. If you don't believe me, think about all the stuff you own. Then think about the last time you even touched everything you own. You know it's there and maybe there is a bit of comfort knowing that even if you don't touch it, you know it's there when you want it. As the saying goes "you don't know what you've got until it's gone" it's only when something is removed that you realize the hole it may leave. Sometimes we behave like a child and only want something because it's gone. Prior to that we may have just assumed it was there whenever we wanted it. Maybe that's just our idea of what comes with ownership. It's ours to do with what we want, even if we want to do nothing with it.

A larger problem is when we do the same thing with the people in our life. Now not everyone you know is going to be the focus of your attention all the time. It's just not realistic. Still there are probably people in your life that you assume will be there regardless of if you talk to them. They're doing their thing and you're doing yours. By that logic then it's very likely you yourself are in the background of someone else. People often wonder how they drifted apart from someone they were once close to. There could be a lot of circumstances for that, but it really comes down to allowing them to fall out of focus, where eventually we start to overlook their presence at all. It's not always a bad thing though. Sometimes in life people just go down different paths and those roads don't have the same destination.

It brings up the question of if something is in the background does that make it less important to us? Now I'm not saying you need to be hyper-aware of your surroundings or the people in your life, but it's interesting just how much of our life blurs into the background. It's very similar to how most of our life is in the past. We seem to be aware of only a fraction of the entire picture that makes up our life.

On the Straw

Everyone has a breaking point and in most cases it's not just a single thing that's going to push us past it. More often than not it's a culmination of things or events that lead us to finally snap. That's how life is, it's not just one thing, but a series of things, the weight of which may eventually become overwhelming. It's the straw that people tend to focus on though. How many times have you found yourself losing your temper over something seemingly benign? You suddenly snap at someone who said something you didn't like or you see red when someone cuts you off while driving. The individual incident itself may have been frustrating, but all the events leading up to it contributed to the final melt down. Visualize all your stress as weights being added to your shoulders. Eventually you'll get to a point where you just can't hold it up any longer.

Frith told El-Ahrairah "All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and when they catch you, they will kill you... but first they must catch you." Some days it feels like the whole world is working against you. The frustration of feeling that way may be too much for us. Suddenly losing control of your emotions isn't fun, but what's worse is when you know it's coming and feel almost powerless to stop it. It's almost like watching an avalanche from the top. I guess an important question would be how do we know when it's all becoming too much before it actually overtakes us? It would come down to understanding what is it in your life that's working against you or even the things that contribute to your stress. Granted just about everything in life causes some kind of stress, either good or bad. There must be something that can be done to counter it at the time rather than letting it build up. I suppose that is something easier said than done though.

Some of the problem could originate within ourselves. We can have a tendency to overextend ourselves or underestimate the impact of certain things will have on our lives. Young children can be easily overwhelmed just by going too long without rest. If you've ever spent time around small children you'll know what I mean when it's around bed time or when they've been sick. Everything may seem fine to them and then it's like a switch was flipped and they completely lose it. Now sometimes it's just that one particular thing that sets them off, but in a lot of cases it's multiple things. They're overly tired or had just too much excitement that their tiny little brains essentially give out for a moment. For children they're just not mature enough to know how to identify that the situation is quickly moving out of control, much less understand how to cope with it. Instead they flip out and go straight into emotional reaction. Unfortunately as adults we may revert to this type of behavior from time to time. And in some cases people never learned how to appropriately deal with an accumulation of stress.

It makes me wonder if it's physiological thing, at least partially. There needs to be a certain level of emotional maturity there as well, but I wonder if some people are experiencing a physical reaction to stress. You know how some people carry their stress in their shoulders. That's just the part of the body that's taken to absorbing the stress the person feels. I think everyone has an area of the body that does that for them. For some it's their back. For others it's their stomach. Whatever it may be, the body is experiencing physical alterations to non-physical stimulus. Even if we're not conscious of it, our mind is registering that added stress in some way. Eventually the mind and body need to shed some of that stress, almost like venting heat from a reactor. It's when we go too long that things start to get really ugly for us. So maybe we should stop looking at the straw that broke our back and instead look at all the weight that was slowly being added before. It might save us a little bit of pain.

On the Keystone

There is the eternal question of what's the meaning of life that has had people wondering what it's all about. That question has had countless answers, each one may be specific to the person answering the question. The one I like most and makes the most sense is that it really comes down to one thing. That one thing is your meaning for life and it's up to each of us to decide what that thing is. I've started to think of this thing as a sort of keystone to life. It's what holds everything else together. Without it there will always be something missing. With anything in life things can be broken up into several different categories: What you can't live without, what you can live with, and what you'd be willing to compromise on. This is true for buying a car, picking a mate, or ordering a pizza. The same premise extends beyond those little life choices and straight onto the bigger picture of life itself. The keystone is the piece that you can't live without, which brings up the question: Can you ever be happy without the keystone?

When looking at your life it's easy to see all the things you don't have. Sometimes that leads us to take for granted the things we do have. Still there are certain things in life that can't be overlooked. What is the most important thing in your life? It could be your family. It could be your job. It could be some sense of accomplishment that what you're doing has meaning. Regardless of what it is, it's the linchpin to your happiness. I'm not saying it's the only thing that drives whether you're happy or not because that would be oversimplifying life. I'm sure for most people at some point in their life there was a sense that something was missing. For some people it's being single and wanting to be in a relationship. They may be successful in nearly every other aspect of their life, but because they are single, they feel as though there is a hole in their life. For me it's always been this almost indescribable feeling like I don't belong where I am. I don't know that it's exactly a geographical issue. Sometimes it can be isolated to knowing that I shouldn't be somewhere specific, but more often than not it's a feeling that I'm out of position from where I'm supposed to be. Now other things in my life might be very good. I have plenty of good friends. I have a good job. I have my health. From the outside it would seem like I should be happy. It's that seemingly missing piece that stops things from feeling complete. Almost like a painting with an unpainted section right in the middle of it.

I used the word complete knowing full well that most people will always have a sense of life as a journey and not a destination. So in a way even if you have everything, you will always be looking off in the distance at what comes next. Even knowing that there is a hope that at some point we will be content with our life. Hopefully we will always strive to be better or make improvements on our situation. Is it possible if it feels like the most important thing is missing? In some cases is may not be the most important thing. It may in fact just be something that we put more importance on than it should have. Regardless of its true importance in the grand scheme of things, it's importance to us is really what matters.

There are things in life that we feel we just can't live without. I'm not talking about water or air, although I suppose those would be keystones in their own way. Ask a parent if they could live without their children. To a lesser degree ask someone to give up sex or the red meat. For each of us there is something that if taken away would cause us to seriously wonder what's the point of going on. The thing is in a lot of cases if we're forced to lose that thing it turns out we keep on going. It may feel horrible at the time, but as they say, life goes on. Life goes on even if you wish it wouldn't. For some people if they lose that certain something they never recover. Parents who lose a child may never feel completely right again. Sure life goes on, but it's forever changed by that loss. It's been said that it's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all. Try telling that to someone who has lost the most important thing in their life. The feeling of loss may not outweigh all the good memories that came before, but I bet there are moments when a person wishes that they had never known what it was like to have that one thing in their life. That way they wouldn't have to experience losing it.

That's assuming you had the keystone and due to some circumstance it was taken away. So which is worse, never finding your keystone or having it and then losing it? I suppose each person would answer that question differently. Never finding it or achieving some level of completion could haunt a person. The question of what their life could have been like would always be there. For some that would be like an itch that could never be scratched. When we were young we had all these dreams about what we would do. All these wonderful ideas about life and how we would get what we want. Then as we get older those dreams may fade. They may fade so much that you forget you even had them. In those situations are we forgetting who we were? In other cases you may just accept that just because you want something doesn't mean it's something you'll ever get. And maybe that's not a bad thing. Maybe coming to that realization forces a person to stop trying to grasp the unachievable and instead focus on the life they have now.

I guess in the end you should never stop trying to find happiness, but in that search you shouldn't overlook all that you already have. If you allow any one thing to dictate your happiness then maybe you're setting yourself up for disappointment if it doesn't work out exactly how you hoped. Maybe what seems like the keystone to life, that specific thing that's supposed to hold everything else in place, is also the one thing that can keep you from ever finding true contentment.

On Autopilot

Lately it feels as though I'm not in control of myself. That's not to say that I feel out of control. It's more that I'm in some kind of strange autopilot and that what I do or say has very little conscious control from me.

Have you ever woken up and found yourself at work, but you don't really remember how exactly you got there? Obviously your mind was in charge of taking from your bed to work, but you weren't fully aware of the fact that you were doing it. Maybe you can chalk it up to muscle memory or your mind's capability to run routine tasks without input from you. So if you aren't the one in charge of what's going on with your own body then who has control over you?

I've known several people who feel the need to constantly be in control of the world around them. It's a weird idea though because the world is inherently out of control at any given point. I've talked about how even when you think you're in control, you may in fact be experiencing the illusion of control. Still these people worry and stress about all the things that they must have power over, because if for some reason they aren't in charge then...well I'm not entirely sure what they believe will happen. I remember asking someone once what would happen if they couldn't have things a certain way. I asked what would they do if they couldn't be in charge. The answer I got was something along the lines of "If I couldn't have it my way then I wouldn't have it any other way", which I suppose is to be expected because it's a hypothetical question. If one was forced to give up control about something you have two options: 1) Accept it or 2) Fight against it. There is a somewhat controversial idea to break OCD-type behavior where you force the person to experience whatever it is they are being compulsive about. For instance someone has to open and close a door five times before they can walk through it, well you don't allow them to open it more than once and then force them to walk through it. This way it makes them understand that they can continue on even though their brain is screaming at them that it can't unless a certain criteria is met.

My point is that sometimes our own mind is working against us for control. So in a sense we are fighting ourselves for control and in some cases we lose the battle against ourselves. When that happens I wonder where we go. I think everyone has experienced this one. You're reading a book. You get to the end of the page or several pages and realize you have no idea what you just read. Your body was in the process of reading, which was controlled by your mind in some way, and yet you yourself were no longer conscious of what was happening around you. So where did you go while that was happening? You could have been thinking about any number of things, but essentially you walked away from your body to do something else. The same thing happens when you're in class or a meeting. If it were possible to visualize, I bet during a meeting you'd see several people leave their bodies at various points, snapping back into place as needed.

Going back to what I was originally talking about. I feel like my mind and body are running without me. I'm aware of what's going on though. When asked a question the answer comes automatically, even though I didn't really think about it. I do various tasks and it's almost like I'm watching someone else do them. It's almost as though I'm a passenger in my own body. Occasionally I regain control and carry on with things as normal, but I can never tell when another part of me is going to push my conscious mind into autopilot again. It makes me wonder if my body can run without me behind the wheel then what could I be doing while some other aspect of me takes care of the mundane tasks.

On Sex...Again

I've heard it been said by several adults that a young woman's virginity is the most precious gift she can give. I'm not exactly sure why that is though. In the end sex is really just about friction. It's skin rubbing against skin, which happens to feel really good. That's kind of like saying that the best gift you can give someone is a really good scratch on the back. By the way scientists are actually researching why scratching feels good, so who knows maybe there is some connection. The most precious gift is allowing someone else to rub your skin for you? Wouldn't it make more sense for the most precious thing you can give to someone else be a part of your soul? In the grand scheme of things if there is an eternal soul then sharing that with another would be more lasting and hopefully more important than the fleeting pleasure of skin on skin.

I think part of the problem is the amount of importance that it's given. It starts at an early age too. Parents try very hard to hide it from children because their parents hid it from them. So it becomes this mystery that everyone wants to know more about, but because the people with the most knowledge and experience aren't talking, kids have to go and find out for themselves. As I've mentioned before, there is a certain amount of guilt associated with sex, usually put there by adults and/or society in general. If it feels that good then it must be wrong. What if we got the same amount of pleasure from eating a specific food or hearing music? Would that food or that music then be associated with guilt as well? For some reason that who mentality makes me wonder why certain substances are illegal. Is it because they are "harmful" or is it because they've crossed over from good feeling to guilty good? I suppose that's a subject for another time. So we're taught that sex is wrong or dirty and yet it's somehow magically ok once you get married. Marriage for the most part is just the government's recognition of two people as a couple. Essentially you're asking the government for permission to have sex then. I'm guessing that's how some people want it though.

To make matters worse there are some people out there who think that any form of information will only lead to more sex. That mystery I mentioned before must remain a mystery. The idea that abstinence is sex education is something that seems to have made a bit of a comeback. Not teaching children about sex is a bit like sticking your head in the sand. When doctors, who are experts, are asked about how to proceed with sex education, they tend to say that more information is better, not less. And yet for the most part that advice is largely ignored by so many groups. The consensus from experts is that teaching abstinence doesn't prevent teenagers from having sex, it only prevents them from having safe sex. In their attempts to suppress anything sexual, those who want nothing to do with sex have in fact helped perpetuate all that they are afraid of.

Sex can be great. It can be fun. It can be one of the best things physically you do with another person. In fact it's that hope that a lot of people prey on. I'm not even talking about just porn, which is blatant in its promise of sex. Sure you could be on some less than family-oriented site where there are ads to grow your penis or how there are thousands of horny girls just begging for you to give it to them. It's the hollow promise that if you click on their link then you'll be rewarded with fantastic sex. In actuality it's probably just something to distract you so they can take your money when you have your pants around your ankles. It's an old trick with modern parts. Anyway as I was saying, it's not just porn, but nearly every commercial that uses sex as its basis. Buy this product because the implication is that it is sexy or will help you to get laid. Often times we're very simple creatures and it's not that hard to manipulate us. The thing is that even the best sex is fleeting. I'm not talking about the time it takes for the actual act (which even in marathon mode is short in the big picture), but rather the time it takes before it stops being great. In a weird way sex is like working out. The first few times your muscles are not used to the strain and are getting the most benefit from lifting the weight or running a certain distance. In a usually short time the muscles have adapted and the same number of repetitions are no longer producing the same results. You either have to increase the weight, the repetitions, or change the rotation. If you don't the work out becomes stale. Sex isn't much different. What was great yesterday may not be great tomorrow. Even if you change things up on a regular basis that firey passion will eventually fade. That isn't a bad thing. If you're lucky, what comes after the passion can be better.

So maybe you're with someone whom you've had great sex with. Maybe it's not great anymore, but still very good. It's not to say that there won't be great moments again, but that peak was reached awhile ago. It's in those times when things aren't as good as they once were that people may start looking for that high again. It's very similar to drug use and chasing after that first initial rush. We as a species can become bored quickly. It's easy to stop appreciating what you have because it's not new anymore. Some people watch bad TV when they're bored. Some people eat even when they're not hungry. And some people go out and have sex when they're bored. Now I haven't taken a survey or anything, but I would imagine the rates of adultery go up in the winter when there is less to do. The same is probably true during times of war, but that's most likely less out of boredom and more from the fact that people just get lonely. I suppose one could also argue that there is some biological imperative built-in. If your mate is absent and likely to die then the most logical thing to do to continue the bloodline is to sleep with your neighbor.

In the end we become pretty stupid when it comes to getting a little bit of pleasure. It's been the basis for wars, murder, lies, and heartbreak. Strange how something that can feel so good can cause so much pain.

On Control

An animated sheep once said "There are two types of things in this world: Things you can control and things you can't. Why worry about either?" The thing is how much in our world do we really control? Even our own bodies are outside of our control. We may think we're in command, but given the complexity of the human body, there are several mundane tasks going on that we can't do anything about. Do you think you can regulate pancreatic function or how your blood flows? Technically you can't even force yourself to stop breathing for very long. So maybe the inner workings of our bodies is out of our control, but we must be in charge of our own minds. Nope. We don't really have too much impact there either. It's been said that we may not be able to control what others do, but we can control how we react to what they do. That's partially true. For the most part you can exert some form of self-control and not immediately just say whatever comes to mind, like a child. However, our brains are governed by a sea of neurochemicals and having any of them slightly out of balance can cause severe changes to our mood, thoughts, or even personality. We can't even have power over our own reality because neurotransmitters could be misfiring, causing us to believe that we can fly, or that people are after us, or cause us to surge into a rage over a perceived insult. So if you think about it, we're in a body with countless functions occurring every second that we can't really do anything about, and it's all being controlled by a mind that is essentially a chemistry experiment that could easily explode at any moment.

Still we fight for some form of control. When we were children the older we got the more we fought against our parents' control. Toddlers are constantly wanting to do things on their own because for the first time in their lives they have the ability to manage how things go. Teenagers are in that strange limbo of not quite being a child, but not quite being an adult, so they also rebel against everything, even themselves, in an attempt to maintain some kind of control on where their lives are going. Meanwhile parents are waging their own war trying to control their children in a way that boundaries are established and maintained. Then as we get older we find that we once again aren't in command of so many things. The longer we live the less we finally control. You'd think that given time we'd finally get a knack for things, but it just doesn't work out that way.

Even every relationship has some level of control between the people involved, even if it's as minor as maintaining clearly defined roles. I once knew someone who always had to have things their way when it came to other people. They wouldn't answer the phone, only text. They wouldn't talk face to face, instead they would use instant messenger or email. That way the conversation was always controlled. Everything could be read and analyzed or tweaked. I'm sure they were master of the backspace. The problem with that is that they never allowed anyone else to have any kind of control of the conversation. Your option was to either submit to how they wanted it or not have any contact. Given enough time resentment will form because no one likes to have control always taken away from them.

I've known a few people who will not drink to the point of being drunk because they don't like to be out of control. There is an ever-present concern that while under the influence they will do something they may regret later. Maybe that comes from a bad experience or maybe it's just part of their personality that they never want to let go of whatever power they have. Given what I've seen and experienced with alcohol I know that it lowers your ability to regulate yourself, so in a way you're free from who you may normally be. For some people that makes them uncomfortable. For others it becomes an escape that's used all too often because they want to let go.

Maybe the trick to getting by in a world that's essentially chaos you have to accept that your control is limited. That's not to say you aren't responsible. Too often people like to throw their hands in the air and say it's not their fault. It wasn't me. It's my genes that are responsible. While it may seem counterintuitive to what I've been saying this whole time, we are in control, even if only slightly. It's that fraction of power that we call free will. It's what keeps us separate from animals who rely only on instinct. With all that said, take a look at your own life. What do you control? What elements are more than just influenced by your decisions? Maybe influence is enough. Think of how many things in this universe can be drastically altered by just a nudge in one direction or another. It's those small corrections that shape reality. So maybe we are in command of everything and it just feels like we're constantly skidding out of control.

On Sex

I was originally going to write about another topic, but I couldn't remember what it was so I'm just going to write about this instead.

What's the deal with sex? Why is there such a taboo with it and everything surrounding it? Along with money it seems to be one of the major driving forces for nearly everything (and I suspect that in a lot of cases the money is just a means to sex). I get that it feels good, but what I don't get is how it can mess with people in strange ways.

Let's start at the beginning. We're one of the few known species that has sex for reasons other than procreation. This can be for fun, for control, for anger, or for sheer boredom. Most other species stick with its original purpose, to continue the species. Whatever force or circumstances that created us this way saw to it that sex was pleasurable, mostly as an incentive for passing along the genes. It makes me wonder if other species feel pleasure during the act or if they're incapable of expending precious energy simply for fun. I'm sure ancient man figured out pretty quickly that while it was necessary to make sure there were enough littles ones around to replace them that the act of replacing themselves was its own reward. Back then it important for the strongest of the species to continue on so fidelity was less about love or commitment and more to do with making sure you weren't wasting time on someone else's genes. I think there is a part of that ancient thought process still embedded in our brains today.

If you've ever been cheated on then you know that feeling that you've been betrayed. The thing is do you know why you're upset about it? If the other person has sex with someone else it would seem obvious, but why? People say all the time that they want others to be happy. So wouldn't it stand to reason that when having sex, even with someone else, that the other person is happy at that moment? As a side note to that I don't believe that someone has to have sex in order to cheat. For me it's all about intention. If you go to have coffee with the intention of doing something more, then you're cheating. Whether you get naked or not doesn't matter because mentally and emotionally you've already stepped out on your partner. Maybe that's an overly strict sense of cheating, but that's how I think. Anyway back to what I was saying. So your partner is in bed with someone else and unless they've done so to intentionally hurt you then why is it such an act of disloyalty? Is it going back to that old thought of someone else could be passing along their genes with the one you've chosen? Is it just about the pleasure associated?

People have a lot of insecurity when it comes to sex. Are you well-equipped physically? Do you know how to do that thing with your mouth? Can you go for hours? And more importantly, how do you compare to others? It seems we've been brought up to constantly worry about these types of things. Sometimes we think about them to the point that they paralyze us from ever acting or create this fear that we'll never measure up (metaphorically).

What is it about the act that feels so personal? A hug feels good. Eating a well made meal can bring us gratification. Something about sex goes beyond those feelings and outside of certain drugs, it's the best feeling we can have. Is it because it's potentially the best thing our bodies can experience that with it also can come the price of having the worst possible emotional fallout? I think there is a bit of ego involved when it comes to sex. We all want to believe that we're good at what we do. People want to believe that the feeling they experience is somewhat unique to them or at least between them and someone else. So when someone cheats is the problem with the fact that the other person went somewhere else to find pleasure, making it seem that what you're doing is simply not enough? Is it just a matter of a bruised ego or is there something more to it?

Saying sex feels good is kind of like saying the ocean is wet. The fact that it feels so good I think is part of the problem we have with it. It's a guilt thing that's been hammered into our heads, be it from religion or other people. There is this weird idea that we shouldn't feel this good and if you do then you're doing something wrong. By nature I think humans are sexual creatures and attempting to suppress those feelings leads to larger problems. It doesn't seem natural to only have sex with one person and only after you've had a ceremony that says you're committed to just them. Or stranger still are those out there that never have any kind of sex because it's going against their beliefs. It's been said the only abnormal sex life is no sex life.

I've joked that the only time I'm not thinking about sex is about 30 seconds after I've had sex. On any given day how often do you think about sex? It can be as subtle as seeing an attractive person or as overt as a fantasy about the act itself. I have to assume it constantly paints the way we see things on a moment by moment basis. There are studies on its effects on the psyche. There is a billion dollar industry dedicated to showing us people having sex in every way possible. Obviously even when people are having regular sex there is some kind of need for more. It's not exactly something that is forgotten about the moment after it's done.

Some could argue that it's the most intimate you can be with another person so that's why it's so meaningful to us. Still there are those out there that have sex casually and think of it as just something fun to do with another person. For them there is no emotional attachment. I guess either point of view is valid. The question is why have we allowed it to become so important to us?