Want, Discontentment and Human Worth

Here bides the unrepentant night owl. He keeps his midnight vigil not to entertain some rakish desire, but rather to breathe deep the draughts of the evening (soon morning) air. This is the time in which his inner philosopher awakens and he takes a hard look at himself and asks, “What do I believe in?” Am I a prince or a pauper? Am I am reveler or a hermit? Yes. Yes I am. The tinkling chimes outside his window remind him of a poem taught not so long ago. The tintinnabulation of bells Poe described and used as a marker of a man’s stage of life. Are the chimes outside my door akin to the brazen, iron, or silver bells? Where in my journey do I stand? I assure myself that I am always on the precipice. But who knows what lies below? Surely I cannot peer through the shielding fog into the future. Can any man?

A friend suggests a page on discontentment. The night owl would have scribbled a tome before the ink was dry. All religions, all philosophies try to ease the discontent. Capitalism claims that it keeps us lean—the more we want the better we perform. Maybe I don’t buy it. It is a bit of a disease to me. Discontent is purple polka dots on my skin. I wear a dark shirt to hide them. What would people think if they saw my dots? The intelligent character in the back of my mind says that they might relate to you, while the overpowering brute says that they would think you were a loon. From this, a song sneaks in. There is a beastie on my shoulder. Jethro Tull had his own set of polka dots, it appears. Jethro Tull tells me to really give them hell. How do I do this? Where do I begin? The answer comes from Christianity; be satisfied with your lack of possessions, appreciate love and salvation. That is obviously the answer, but it is hard to do. It is especially hard if you are a mere mortal like I.

I don’t want much compared to some, but I do want. Therein lies the issue! While a small cabin would do for me where a great palace would only suffice for others it still does not change the fact that I want. I do not wish to want. Wanting only causes grief. My life has taught me this—hasn’t it? Certainly there have been occasions when I have wanted something so badly that I would myself slay Caesar to get them. Upon finally obtaining those desired things I found that I no longer wanted them or that I was unready for them. That is worst. You look like an incompetent fool who has bitten off more than he can chew. It hurts to say that I’ve been there. Now I’m convinced that I am ready for such things. Did I fail to learn a lesson or am I finally prepared? I can’t write a blog with good cohesion for Heaven’s sakes—how am I supposed to lead a cohesive life?

Since I was young I have always been competitive in the things that mattered to me. When people say ‘fiercely competitive’ frequently they discount the value of the phrase. I was out for blood. I had no interest in taking prisoners and I had no interest in second place. Likely that has made me bitter. In high school I devoted myself to public speaking. I practiced memorization, gestures, pronunciation and articulation constantly. Often I did very well. In fact, I was quite self-assured during this time. But, hubris is a deadly flaw. I never managed to rank in the top three in state competition. I can’t explain it. People that I had utterly destroyed the whole year long beat me handily at state. My polished presence, delivery and rebuttal skills proved little avail. Each and every year that I did this I was subjected to the same fate: a loss at the state level. This led to much gnashing of teeth on my part. What did it matter? Sure, I dedicated myself to excellence and you could write volumes of psycho-babble about the benefits of healthy competition and positive mindset and goal-setting and the effect of a missing parent on the social development of a child (where did that come from!?) but none of that means anything because competitions do not define who we are.

Failure is the most dangerous word in the human language. It has the power to literally destroy lives. I am not speaking of failure itself but of the label. The actual act of failing is much like a drop of water that falls on a stone instead of the plowed earth. It will get there eventually. But the label has the horrendous capacity to assign a decreased value to a person. This is especially true in college. We place so much value on excelling as a student. What about excelling as a person? This is where competitions are dangerous. If you do not make an ‘A’ grade in a class are you any less of a person? Do your worth and virtues suddenly disappear? No. It means nothing. Allow me to contradict myself. College is an invaluable farce. It is invaluable because of the people that we meet there and the knowledge that we gain. It is a farce because it is a racket designed to make money based on an arbitrary assessment of human worth based on fancy documents and grades.
Broken down elementally, college is only an extension of us wanting something. We want good grades. We want a well-paying job. We want a balanced life. We want a lovely wife. What do we need? Fundamentally, what do we need? We need very little. I need only this: the knowledge that there are absolute right and wrongs and that I am capable of acting in either capacity.

May God bless you will all that you need.



Mentioned works:
~The Bells, Edgar Allen Poe
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/medny/venturi-poebells.html

~Beastie, Jethro Tull
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zw2tjnWdmc