#oh I forgot how it felt to go down the rabbit hole of dragon age theories

[thevulturesquadron]

Sure, why not. In retrospect, he wasn’t subtle.

[raisingsupergirl]

A Daydream In Defense of Classical Education: Love the Lord Your God With all Your Solid, Liquid, Gas, and Plasma

LentWatch 2020, Week One: Freedom!

Change is hard. Breaking habits is harder. And breaking habits without accountability is the hardest, which is probably why I've already "failed" at my personal Lent goals by snacking after dinner (c'mon, it was just a few cookies… and some meat-n-cheese… and some chips). But despite realizing my limits and having to drop that one goal, I've held strong to the rest (which you can read about by clicking here), and the results have been like a long sigh after months of holding my breath.

At first, I felt a little lost. Especially regarding social media and YouTube videos. It's amazing how we, in the 21st century, have lost the ability to sit idle. Every spare moment is taken up by checking our phones. Waiting at doctor's offices, going to the bathroom, five-second pauses in friendly conversation—they all fall victim to Instagram notifications, leaving no room for actual thought. And I almost forgot the joy of such idleness before I gave these little things up. And that, combined with cutting television down to a minimum and alcohol down to zero, has made way for that glorious thing that used to be so condemned by teachers and parents: daydreaming!

Now, one can't just cut out all entertainment cold turkey. I'm not even convinced that a human can survive on work and sleep alone. There must be some in-between where we recharge and enjoy pleasures of our own choosing. And so, instead of Facebook and Netflix and beers, I've been reading—at night, mostly, but also in the morning, and even a little during the day. As I said in my previous post, I started re-reading Celebration of Discipline. But I'm also reading The Book of Revelation, The Time Machine, and a creative young adult trilogy called The Illuminae Files. I've never been one to read multiple things at one time, but gosh, it seems like my mind has been hungry for too long, and now it's chowing down. And with the glut of all these stories and ideas, I'm finding that I pause every page or so to just think.

What am I thinking about? All kinds of stuff! For example, why water can't (typically) get hotter than 212 degrees Fahrenheit. Or why an open refrigerator will actually heat a room. Or whether Einstein was wrong about exceeding the speed of light. Or why four separate books of the Bible seem to disagree about how to love God (and thus, what it means to be human). You know, normal stuff.

WARNING: What follows is some serious musing and rambling. If you're strapped for time or are easily irritated by random details, skip to the last paragraph. You'll have no idea what the title of this post means, but hey, I'm not sure I really know, so…

Now, if you haven't checked out, you're probably just intrigued enough to wonder if I've completely lost it. But it may surprise you to know that all of the thoughts I listed above are quite related. And I never would have had them (or their subsequent "higher" questions) if I hadn't "wasted" tens of thousands of dollars on a bunch of classes that I "didn't need" in college. I would have just read the books I listed earlier with interest, and then I would have moved on with my life. But, you see, there are things that bind us—things that connect us to art, literature, history, architecture, mathematics, science, religion, and back to art again. And, for me at least, the more I fill in the gaps between these elements of the human experience, the more I appreciate it all.

I get that not everyone is like me. I get that most people are happy to learn a craft—become an expert, even—work at that craft, leave a legacy, and catch the last episode of their favorite TV shows. And that's the way it's always been. I mean, not everyone in ancient Greece was a philosopher. Not everyone in the Middle Ages received a classical education. But there may have been soldiers and peasants who would have enjoyed the experience had they been given the opportunity. And I, for one, am one of those peasants.

As I've said in previous posts, my young life was characterized by impulsiveness, which culminate in the idea that, "I should go to college and become a physical therapist." I just kind of had the idea one day, so I did it. I resonate with Elle Woods (from Legally Blonde) when she applied to Harvard Law School and said, "What, like it's hard?" Now, of course college was hard (and PT school was much more so), but I enjoyed it. All of it. Even the classes that I didn't need to take: philosophy, freshman English (in which I learned only about Little Red Riding Hood in all of her iterations throughout history…), physics, Old Testament studies, American history. Learning to enjoy education was a slow burn, and it definitely didn't peak until college. If I'd have followed my first inclinations as a senior in high school, I would have joined the military or the police academy, and I would have had a fulfilling career in either (likely with a more impactful contribution to society), but I never would have understood the universe in the way that I do now. And that would have been a real shame.

But I did go to college, and I did rack up student loans (which I'm scheduled to pay off this spring!). And I did come close to what could be called a classical education, which laid the foundation for me to continue to learn, grow, and connect thoughts and ideas into new and creative concepts… some of which are kind of insane, like the one's I mentioned above, which I will now explain briefly (but only if you see the dragon in this picture I took below. Why? Because it’s awesome, and if you don’t see it, you’re not worthy--aka weird enough--to continue):

Thanks to the books I'm reading in tandem—along with plenty of breaks spent daydreaming in idle, wandering thought—I've dredged up an old fascination of mine: Why is the Great Commandment represented in four different ways in the Bible? "Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength." That's how the author of Deuteronomy puts it. But then when the verse is quoted by Jesus thousands of years later, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all put it in slightly different terms: "heart, soul, and mind," "heart, soul, mind, and strength," and "heart, soul, strength, and mind," respectively. Now, I realize the differences are subtle, and Mark and Luke both say the same things in a different order, but they are different. And when the essence of the phrase is, "Love God with everything you have," it's easy to wonder if these components make up everything it means to be human. And further research into the original languages in which these phrases were written sheds some light onto the discrepancy: English (and Greek, for that matter) doesn't have the words to describe the original Hebrew text, so slight variations are represented based on who's writing it and in what language.

But the intrigue remains. What does make up a human? And the answer, for someone like me (OCD, science-minded, Christian foundation), it's clear that we're bound together by a multifaceted system, like the Holy Trinity or the Four States of Matter. And so, if we take the States of Matter approach, what if our strength (bones, muscles, tendons) is akin to "solids," our heart (hormones, neurotransmitters, basic emotions) is akin to "liquids," our mind (cortical thought, short-term memories, self-awareness) is akin to "gas," and our soul (that ethereal, immortal morality not bound to social constructs or genetic influence) is akin to "plasma?" And so, such extrapolation (i.e. going down the Wikipedia rabbit hole) naturally leads to all sorts of allegory and thought puzzles. Oh, what fun it is to dream!

LAST PARAGRAPH BELOW FOR NORMAL PEOPLE:

Like I said, cutting the distractions from my day has allowed me to get back to the things that bring me true joy: quiet contemplation, purposeful living, and totally normal ideas about what it means to be human. Week one has been a success. I'm thankful for the money I "wasted" on my education because it's made me the man I am today, and I'm thankful for Lent because, even though I will inevitably fail at some of it, my ultimate victory will be remembering who I am as a man (which, apparently, boils down to the various states of matter…). So, thanks for reading, y'all. You could have been doing a bunch of other things (and you probably wish you had), but hopefully my rambling forced you to have at least one thought of your own.

And maybe, just maybe, that thought will lead to a daydream…