musingsandmeanings-blog

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"In the end, everything is a gag." —Charlie Chaplin (entertainer, UK, 19th/20th cent.)

Many areas in life are not meant to be taken seriously. Don't get offended, don't get over complicated, don't get disheartened, don't get bogged down by negativity, don't get obsessed with only one thing, don't get tricked into giving away your individuality, don't get disillusioned by those who will try to deceive you, don't get frustrated and furious with all those little things that will inevitably find themselves in your way—just live your life.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"I always remember an epitaph which is in the cemetery at Tombstone, Arizona. It says: 'Here lies Jack Williams. He done his damnesdest.' I think that is the greatest epitaph a man can have." —Harry S. Truman (politician, USA, 19th/20th cent.)

The best is all you can do; you can do no more or better. If this Jack Williams character truly did his damnedest while he was alive, then I agree with Truman—that is the best thing you can be remembered for. Trying your hardest, giving everything you do your all without holding back shows strength, perseverance, determination, aspiration, and maybe even courage. You can also be true to yourself, always knowing you only did what you could.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving, and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you will have been all of these." —George Washington Carver (scientist, USA, 19th/20th cent.)

Every person finds themselves in many positions in life. We are in one role, then at another time we are in the exact opposite. Young, then inevitably old; undulating between weakness and strength; possessing power, then losing it all. Understanding bridges the gap between us and others, making us relate to the places that they are in. This understanding strengthens our connections with other people, and only adds to our capital.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"I speak truth, not so much as I would, but as much as I dare; and I dare a little more, as I grow older." —Catherine Drinker Bowen (writer, USA, 19th/20th cent.)

Truth is not always told in its entirety, but by how much someone is willing to speak speak it. And, it seems to be the case that the older one gets, the more they seem to freely speak their mind. Some just think "Grandpa has gotten a little senile in his old age and doesn't know what he's saying," but perhaps there's a different reason. With age, you get more experience, and with more experience, you believe that you have a right to tell others what you hold to be true. And so, with age, a person's belief in something become more pronounced and steadfast, and more apt to become open to the world.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"Fear not for the future, weep not for the past." —Percy Bysshe Shelley (poet, England, 18th/19th cent.)

Focus on the present, as that is all that exists. The past that has already come and gone, so learn what lessons you can from it and continue on. Continue into the future, but realize that the future actually will never come, as it always is and will be the future, and the only thing that you have is the present, impossible to get ride of, yet never still, constantly shifting and moving iota by iota forward in time.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"I decline to accept the end of man. It is easy enough to say that man is immortal because he will endure: that when the last ding-dong of doom has clanged and faded from the last worthless rock hanging tideless in the last red and dying evening, that even then there will still be one more sound: that of his puny inexhaustible voice, still talking. I refuse to accept this. I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail. He is immortal, not because he alone among creates has an inexhaustible voice, but because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance." —William Faulkner (writer, USA, 19th/20th cent.)

I do like to think that humankind will prevail, that now, at this very current moment in our history, we are merely beginning our exploration of this wide and wondrous universe, and that we have the ability and maybe even the right to expand our empire and minds because of all those qualities that Faulkner listed. We will both endure, and then we will prevail, at least for a time.

Unfortunately, though, as with all things we will eventually meet our end. The day fades away to night; creatures are born, grow old, and die; and, following the pattern, humankind will one fateful day become nothing. I don't know when it will be (probably thousands upon thousands of years in the future), and I don't even know if I can fathom the reason why or how we will meet our demise, but I do know that it will happen. That is not to diminish the time that we will have in existence—in fact, I think it adds to it—but the fact is, neither we nor anything else are immortal in this place.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"Death ends a life, not a relationship." —Jack Lemmon (actor, USA, 20th/21st cent.)

I can't say that I really agree with what Lemmon is saying. The way I see it, a relationship requires that the other person in question to be, in the very least, existent, conscious. If someone is dead, I can't see a way that a relationship can possibly exist with them. There is no reciprocation, no way for the other person to respond to your actions. The memories of the relationship may exist, but, unfortunately, that relationship is over.

(Side not: It's interesting that people who are getting married say "Till death do us part," as if it is death that ends a relationship.)

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"Neither fire nor wind, birth nor death can erase our good deeds." —Buddha (religious figure, ancient India, 6th/5th cent. BCE)

Do good things, regardless of how permanent or impermanent they may be. Sometimes I do a good deed, and later realize that no one may ever notice that I did that good deed (e.g. I picked up some litter), or that the person I did the good deed to might quickly forget it. But, even if the memory of this righteous event is forgotten, or it is covered up due to some physical force, the fact that it actually took place will always be true and will never be changed.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened." —Sir Winston Churchill (politician, UK, 19th/20th cent.)

We all worry, often about things that have yet to happen, and sometimes about things that almost certainly will never happen. There are plenty of real things in this world that are there to worry us, so I find it funny that we humans concern ourselves so much with things that are not there. I admit, I can be very guilty of this sometimes, but I try to concern myself with things that I know that are at least somewhat likely to happen sometime in the future. Thoughts like "What if everyone laughs at me?" or "What if I fail?" are only natural, but nonetheless are very inhibiting and get in the way of what we really wish to accomplish.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"It's not over until it's over." —Yogi Berra (sports manager, USA, 20th/21th cent.)

Don't try to end something prematurely. Every part of an event matters, the beginning, the middle, and the end. Cutting out the conclusion of something makes it incomplete, and demonstrates impatience, and possibly even poor sportsmanship.

In fact, the end can be one of the most important parts of an event. I may not watch a lot of sports, but I've heard a few times that the last few minutes of a game is when it gets really interesting. Plenty of teams have had amazing comebacks just a few seconds before the end, and some of them even coming out victorious.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"The longer I live, the more beautiful life becomes." —Frank Lloyd Wright (architect, USA, 19th/20th cent.)

...To you. Of course, the world itself doesn't really change, but the older you get the more your perception of it changes. I suppose some people's view of the world gets darker, more uninterested with the passing of time, while others actually become more optimistic and involved in their lives. The older one gets, the more experience and perspective they have on everything, perhaps leading to a more complete, more beautiful life overall.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"To be able to look back upon one's life in satisfaction, is to live twice." —Kahlil Gibran (poet, Lebanon, 19th/20th cent.)

There are two experiences: the experience of doing something at the current moment in time, and the experience of examining that experience in retrospect. If we can examine good, useful or productive memories, and find them to be vivid enough, then we are essentially living that experience over again. That is why it is important to make life memorable, not for the sake of what ever you happen to be doing at that moment in time, but for yourself to fondly remember at some later point in the future.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"Sweet is a grief well ended." —Aeschylus (playwright, Ancient Greece, 6th/5th cent. BCE)

While pleasure by itself (definitionally) feels good, it can be argued the switch from pain to pleasure is even better. That is, ending your "grief," something ailing you or causing you misery, is a great feeling in itself. You don't even have to reach an intense level of pleasure or comfort, as simply getting rid of a pain creates a good feeling. Perhaps that is why we go through painful things (e.g., exercise, a difficult career) with the knowledge that they are painful. We know that, when it is over, and we come out of grief in the end, the feeling of victory will be sweet.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"Our fear of death is like our fear that summer will be short, but when we have had our swing of pleasure, our fill of fruit, and our swelter of heat, we say we have had our day." —Ralph Waldo Emerson (writer, USA, 19th cent.)

Death doesn't seem so scary, so unfair, when one has lived their life to the fullest. When you look back and don't see much you can be proud of—an unfulfilling career, a bad relationship, living in an uninteresting location—then you look to the future in hope things will be better. But, if you are nearing the end of your life and in your future is inevitable death, then you'll probably feel as if you are robbed of any chance of doing something meaningful with your time. In the end, though, life is full of opportunities to use it. Death shouldn't come as a surprise when you have done what you can to make your living worth while.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"The riders in a race do not stop short when they reach the goal. There is a little finishing canter before they ceom to a standstill.... The canter that brings you to a standstill need not be only coming to rest. It cannot be while you still live." —Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. (jurist, USA, 19th/20th cent.)

Finish your life with such energy and momentum that, even following your death, your effects are still felt all around. If you "slow down" as you advance in age, sadly your departure from this world may not be noticed by that many people. But always going, constantly having something to do or work on or somewhere to be pushes you and carries you through life. I believe that the only thing that should stop you from living life is the end of it—and, even after you are gone, your vivid memory makes people feel as though you are still here.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"I said to life, 'I would hear Death speak.' And Life raised her voice a little higher and said 'You hear him now.'" —Kahlil Gibran (poet, Lebanon, 19th/20th cent.)

Death and life are intertwined, inseparable. Without the other, one of these by themselves wouldn't have any significance—or even make any sense. Death is needed in life, as it adds balance to the world and makes us appreciate all the more every moment of consciousness we get to have.

Even today science is showing us how close life and death actually is. Medically, death is no longer looked at as a single moment, but a process. We go from a state of "living" to a state of "death" in a multitude of hours, and in a miracle few cases people have managed to regain life after technically being dead for an extended period of time. The line between those two moods of existence is fuzzy, impossible to pin down to any one particular instant.

[musingsandmeanings-blog]

"Be of good cheer about death and know this as a truth—that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death." —Socrates (philosopher, Ancient Greece, 5th/4th cent. BCE)

I can't say I believe that "no evil can happen to a good man." The whole "the good die young" thing, that, quite unfortunately, the world is full of unfair scenarios where relatively good human beings are treated unjustly. We do what we can to amend situations such as these, but we can be sure that there will always be more.

I do say that I agree with him that no evil happens after death. Death is equal for all, regardless of how life was lived. The way and experience someone dies is different for all people, but the end result, for the good, for the evil, and for the ambivalent, is always the same.