What's the Point? July 08 2019 1 Comment
I am a wanderer. I wander a lot. In wandering I usually find things that make this wanderer wonder. I love to wonder. I wonder lots of things about this little rock. Does it make you wonder? I wonder… Who made this? What was their name? What did they love about life? Who did they love? Did they have children? What were their names? What is the story of this chipped piece of volcanic glass? Did it provide a meal? Meals? Was it an old style or a newer style of point? What was it’s intended prey? How was that prey cooked? Did the man or woman who used this point have a wife or a husband? Did they like to get it on? What “religion” did they follow? How was this rock lost? Did an animal get away? Was it dropped on a long journey? The questions are endless and intriguing. How far have we come from this time? Are we, as a people, happier than the people who made and used this? Do we have as much “free” time as they did? Do we laugh and love as much as they did? Would they be considered richer or poorer than us? How much knowledge do we have in comparison to them? Would a field biologist today have half as much knowledge of the flora and fauna of their particular area as the people who created this? What was their thoughts on Universal creation? Where did they suppose they came from? The stars? Aren’t we all from the stars? At what age did this man or woman die? What “year” were they born? How old is this thing? Some of these questions may be answerable. Some may not be. Does it matter? Did these people feel that their way of life was destructive and toxic or beautiful and right? Could their way of life still have been going on as it always had if the current paradigm didn’t replace it? Where is our culture going? Are today’s news headlines inspiring? Or rather gloomy? I imagine these people were very resourceful and could find food and water on most any given day. Where does your food come from? Where does your water come from? Do you know what the wild land around you has to offer? Do you know the plants and animals that naturally occur in your area? Do you care? Or is all of that obsolete now? How many gallons of water per person per day did these people use? Did they have indoor plumbing? What was considered important to them? Were they in debt to banks? Were they in debt to feudal landlords? Did they know what rent was? Did they vote? Was housing a birthright and not a privilege? Was lying considered normal? Adultery? Were gay people discriminated against or people of lighter or darker shades of skin? It’s amazing what finding a rock can make you think about. Lots of interesting questions… These are but a few. What questions does it bring to you? I’d love to hear and so, probably, would they…
Comments
Bobby W. Baker on July 10 2019 at 09:24AM
Out of all those musings, the one that resonates with me is whether or not our predecessors were happier than us. I’ve been studying happiness for a few years now and I have discovered that being happy is an inside job. The ability to feel happy had seemed to me, for so many decades, to depend on outer circumstances. Something had to “make” us happy. I then had to depend on my external environment to do something that would make me happy.
But happiness is a feeling brought on by thinking. And we’re so much better off understanding that we can generate feelings of happiness with our own thoughts. No need for our outer world to be pinned with the responsibility of making us happy.
The rub comes in when we actually practice feeling happy deliberately with no apparent cause. That’s when we find out just how indoctrinated and half-asleep we really are. It should be a piece of cake, but it can sometimes be a struggle instead.
I truly believe though, that with practice, it can be a life-changing experience that will serve us right up until we fall into our grave. Maybe even longer.