Ripples

I want you all to take a short voyage with me. Some of you may need life rafts along the way, as the sea of my thoughts can be overwhelming at times, so I will do my best. However, I want the rest of you to just cling to the raft and let the current of my musings take you where you need to go.

I have often wondered whether or not anyone actually reads my writings. After all, most of the world is too busy in their own lives, trying to keep their head above the tide, to even take notice of anyone else or their thoughts. I see it everywhere: relationships, cultures, political parties, institutions, religions, corporations, militaries, focus groups... all of these gatherings of people are not really a way to connect to one another. They are simply a way to raise our own Jolly Rogers, a way to voice our own opinions and be heard above the crash of the waves. Speaking specifically for first world countries, very few among us actually wish to cooperate with each other as we go about our daily lives. We want what is best for us: an escape from pain and the pursuit of pleasure. We want to feel good, to feel loved, and to feel wanted. Our desires are those of the sharks and the killer whales; we need to feed, to breathe, to live, and to repeat the cycle. Individual motivations are what make the tides of the world move.

However, like the tides of the ocean, our actions have effects that are both far-reaching and invisible to the naked eye. And, as the predators in this sea, those who are from first world countries take little notice of those in third world countries. And why should we? They are the tuna and the sea bass. They are beneath us, there only as background imagery in the grand scheme of our existence. We appear much the same to them, although the lives of these people are much different. Haunted by barracuda and dolphins, the great masses of people in other countries who do not have the benefits we are so blessed with go about their lives scurrying in fear, just trying to survive. But again, their actions too have effects which are not readily apparent.

The world is a complex system. Every single movement and every single organism in it has a purpose or an effect. But how often do we really consider the sheer volume of each of those? Rarely. If it is not within our immediate sphere of influence, we disregard it. It is not real to us; just some story in a news paper, some event in some other country, just another small wave on the surface of the sea. But, as with the sea, there are underlying currents to these movements. We can’t see them, but they are there. For many centuries, we have not even taken these tides into consideration. We have either operated on instinct or adapted the world around us to suit our needs.

Think of the human race as the crew of a small ship. Instead of using sails to guide us and using the current to sweep us across the globe, we have instead developed motors to cut through the currents. Now, on the one hand, this has helped us to advance and overcome difficulty. It has allowed for the expansion of thoughts, goods, and civilization itself. However, the inherent problem with this method is the lack of respect for the tides and for the world around us. I am not saying the environment cannot handle itself; in fact, I am stating the very opposite. The world around us, with all of its thoughts and movements and organisms, is a force which we do not comprehend. We plow our way through hurricanes and typhoons, hoping for the best. And, by some way or another, we have managed to keep our little raft afloat.

Now, homo sapien is a strong, capable species. We are very adept at adapting, and know how to survive using our intellects as well as our instincts. However, I fear we are a bit short sighted. We are still taking the perspective of the fish or the small predator, fighting to survive one day at a time. Even the most “intelligent” and “capable” among us, those who we elect to lead us or who take charge of civilizations, still only consider things from a limited perspective, their minds clouded by the beauty of beautiful pearls and precious underwater gems. Rarely does one come along who has the foresight to think about the course of our voyage on this raft of ours, through this universal ocean. And those who have usually differ largely in their opinions about how which direction we should steer our rudder.

But the way to see pas the clouds on the horizon is this: we must start reading the stars. We need to look beyond ourselves and our tidepools of daily life to consider that there are more important things out there. Even the ocean, for all of its cycles of death and rebirth and movement of the tides, is finite space. It is subject to the pull of the moon. We need to start thinking in the long term, rather than the fight to survive. Use the currents of the sea of thoughts and emotions in our societies to our advantage, instead of attempting to plow through them with the newest and most advanced machinery. Instead of acting as a gathering of sharks at a feeding frenzy all of the time, we should learn from the fish, working together when the time is right for the benefit of both the masses and the individual. Only this way will we be able to come up from the depths of to sail triumphantly across the open ocean.