There are times, particularly when sleep is quite evasive, which lend themselves to musings of the soul, of the interior mind. At times these thoughts are interesting and at other times so boring they can bring back that elusive sleep. Other times they are simply discouraging, especially when one contemplates current humanity and our evidently permanent state of a barbarism and savagery thought to have been cut out of the human being. However wrong we were, however wrong we are at present, I do not hold out much hope for a change in the future unless we delve deep into our psyche and effect massive change, huge slabs of rehabilitation, along with tremendous changes wrought to our way of thinking. Can we do it? Hmmmm again. Doubtful, but perhaps there are enough of the sane and humane people around - if only they can be found.
Unfortunately, I believe the statement on an Earth Day poster of 1970 sets out the problem succinctly. "We have met the enemy, and he is us." Fair warning to the members of the human race - if we are going to get anywhere with our plans for regeneration of the positive, then we must begin with ourselves. We, the people, must be the firm foundation of the move to improve the human race.
How do we do this? Where do we begin? I believe the first step is to take an accounting of where we are, where we stand, and what we can realistically achieve within a decent amount of time. That will take a deep look within, to find a starting point, even as that search and the realization of that starting point are quite deflating of ego. Only if we understand that beginning can we look to possible forward movement.
Our starting point is the realization that we have created a hungry, never satisfied black hole. Into that black hole we consign all who displease us, those destroying our goals of power and wealth. Along with that, we toss in the detritus we accumulate in our destructive path through human history, far fiercer and more destructive than Sherman's march to the sea.
Success will result only when we realize that our characters are at point here. It entails, demands, an understanding of the import of a statement made by the ancient Greek philosopher, Heracleitus. "Character is destiny". What does that mean for our destiny? If our characters are faulty, incomplete, lacking traits necessary to enable and ensure positive forward movement, it then follows logically, that the first step is to improve our values, burnish our traits, upgrade them, and practice them in life, not only in words empty of any promise.
Until now, right now, we have practiced faulty behavior, held tight to false mores. We have been proof of the simple wisdom of Dr. Seuss who said, "adults are obsolete children". Thus we have behaved, using schoolyard behavior as national moves, insisting on the maintenance of destructive differences which could be settled with some truly adult wisdom. But we refuse that and instead create the detritus fed to the blackhole along with those good people we dispose of via that same always hungry black hole.
Review history and note how so much of the violence, the hate, the death and destruction, could have been avoided with just that bit of extra wisdom and thought. But, as children do, we refuse, and all insist on their way to the exclusion of all else. And the blood soaks the ground and the cries of the bereft split the heavens.
Proverbs tells us, warns us, that "they lie in wait for their own blood, ambush their own lives." WE are the ones lying in wait and WE are the ones we slaughter. There is no good, no actual winner at war, for both sides lose too much. Yet that behavior, that insistence, is the "Oh, yeah!" standard of the schoolyard and of the obsolete children we call adults.
Imagine an inhabitant on some planet in the vast universe tasked to observe the humans of earth. He has been keeping an eye on them, waiting watching, wondering. When will they ever grow up? When will they understand the truths of the universe? When will they understand the violence is unnecessary yet so beloved by them? In the meanwhile, all he can do is borrow the words of C.S. Lewis. "Let's pray that the human race never escapes from Earth to spread its iniquity elsewhere."
Amen to that. Amen to efforts to improve ourselves-------------------------------------------------
And amen to you, Yitzy, and the blessing, the gift, you were to us for such a short 13 years. We wanted more, needed more. Do you miss us as much as we miss you? Know that we love and miss you always.
Allways and forever. Always and forever.
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