The paradox is humiliating

Sitting alone in a dark room. No light, no sound, nothing to smell or feel. You open a window and see the fight over politics, the yelling, the righteous indignation. You hear the words and feel the anger, hope and futility of it all. People slanting the narrative so you believe what they are saying, vying for power and perceived importance. You close that window and open another one, feed the hungry is the plan of the day, and nations come together to get food to those that have none, only for it to be taken away by gangs and ugly people of power to use as leverage to get the hungry to do their bidding. You close that window and open one that shows the Vatican. The hiding of secrets and treasures, to maintain power over people seeking faith, reason for wars and unkindness. All things controlled by bullies, it seems. People wanting power and control over other people. How do you stop the bullies, by being a bigger one? The paradox is humiliating.

Close the windows, welcome back the darkness, the quiet, the ease of no emotions. No sadness, no fear, no joy, no happiness. Just numb. Is that painless? Is it enough? Can you have joy without sadness, happiness without fear?  The paradox is humiliating.

Look inside at all you are. Are you controlled by others? Or do you do the controlling? Do you find yourself spending all your time not letting others control or bully you, in turn giving you no time to grow and thrive? Do you allow others to decide your fate, giving you more time to think about things you wish for, knowing you can’t have them?  Do you let the past control your future or do you learn from it and let it go? Have you figured out how to control yourself? Or did you let someone tell you how.  The paradox is humiliating.

Human beings are not simple creatures. Faith teaches us to be humble, to love one another. Yet people that are in power behind the guise of faith want you to help them buy a jet, feed the coffers, give to their current cause.  Standing alone helps no one, but can be freeing. There is a Buddhist monk that can water ski on his feet. He has mastered something so irrelevant to the naked eye, it helps no one, yet these people are revered.  Yogis master the art of meditation, purely a selfish thing, yet people strive to find the nirvana within. The paradox is humiliating.

I thought we were here to help each other. People in horrible places want to join those in the perceived good places. But because of gangs and other hateful people that got there first, they are unwanted. We are too civilized to get rid of the hateful people, we put them in jails that are full, we feed and house them away from the rest of the world. We don’t help, because they just keep on coming, looking to overcome neighborhoods, cities, states, countries. Wanting to spread their fear and control. But we don’t stop them. The paradox is humiliating.

We battle ourselves with kinds of things I’ve been talking about, every day. We make decisions that will change our world every time we have a thought. We don’t know the answers and fear failure. The balance is so hard to achieve. We listen to others, we weigh and measure, guess at outcomes, if we are right well then, we are right. If we are wrong we learn something and grow. The paradox is humilitating.

And finally we get older, we worked hard, saved money, and finally can slow down a bit. While we are growing we find we either had time or the money to do the things we wanted to do but seldom both. We worked so hard to achieve this state, the knowledge, the time, a little extra cash we finally have all the things to complete that goal.  And because of that hard work, the body fails us. The paradox is humiliating.