<I'm not quite confident enough to think that anyone might read this for enjoyment or entertainment. Yet I see others write and think, "I'd like to do that!" So here we are, you and I (you and me?). Perhaps writing every day will cause my writing to improve and I'll have something more interesting to write about than the fact that I'm writing. And perhaps the self-consciousness will go away to and I won't wonder if I sound stupid or pretentious. Time will tell.>
So, what I'm thinking about today:
On any scale other than our own, extremely limited consciousness, our individual existence is meaningless. There is not a small enough unit to note that blip that is our time on the vast timeline that must be used for any significant universal event. Geologic time. Likewise, for scale. The entire Earth could vanish and the entirety of the universe - or even our solar system - would, mathematically, not be affected for a shocking number of places to the right of the decimal point. We are Sagan's pale blue dot in the vast abyss.
But as Gandhi famously said, "Everything you do will be unimportant - but it is very important that you do it." And I believe that to be true. Nothing we do will have the slightest effect on the totality of even a human time scale, if we're realistic with one another. The likelihood that anyone will remember us or our deeds even 100 years after we're gone is small. Remember - there are over 6 billion of us now! The best we can hope for is an overly-zealous descendant who gets the genealogy bug and preserves our memory for their small circle of interested relatives.
That's not to ignore the "ripple effect" whereby one good deed begets another and another, et cetera. What I'm saying is that even Mother Teresa - who devoted her entire life to being that pebble that caused the first ripple - who improved the life of thousands...in the cosmic scale, did nothing to effect the totality of human suffering or happiness.
So, what about happiness? I have a relative who believes that Earthly happiness is not relevant. He prefers to take stock in an eternal happiness that occurs after we die. The streets-made-of-gold philosophy, we'll call it. I see an appalling lack of evidence for such a notion. Certainly not enough to make it my life's quest.
I see happiness - personal happiness - as the best reason to exist. Note, I did not say it is why we exist, but it is a reason to exist. Cynically, procreation is the only reason we exist. But ignoring the existentialist "why" for a moment, we exist. Now what to do with it?
Here's what I've done. I embrace my utter insignificance. I revel in the fact that none of my deeds, heinous or holy will, in the end, be rewarded or punished. I contend that I should first effect my small circle of influence; my wife, my daughters, my friends, my family. So I scale my thinking back to that circle of influence. I do the things in that circle that, I believe, will make me happy. I know that what I'm doing here will not make me famous or wealthy. I limit my circle of concern to the most tribal level. Darfur? It's a shame. The collapse of the Greek economy? Hmmm. Capital gains tax? Preposterous. Whatever will I do about these things? If I devoted my life to any greater "circle of concern" topics and solved a problem afflicting all the world, what have I done? How have I done any more than the beggar on the street? And what have I left undone? If ever my circle of influence were to expand to the greater circle of concern, I would loathe still that my own house be left undone in the service of strangers. In limiting my scope, accepting my insignificance, I can effect a life of happiness and fulfillment for myself and with those people with whom I choose to make my life. It is certainly not as glorious as celebrity and the celebrated cause, but it is true and it is good and it is simple.
And in any case, neither choice will truly matter in the end.
