The majority of people that know me would describe me, aptly, as a cynic. There are things that ignite my passions, that make me happy, but when looking at the big picture, I have a hard time finding hope. Again, some will point out the irony that a cynic would chose the path I have, but alas. We've been over it. Go back in time to understand.
I point out this personal oxymoron because I realize I'm about to reveal another.
For most of my life, I have felt a powerful connection with nature. I feel more human, like the better version of myself, when I am in nature. In 30 days, I'll forfeit electricity, indoor plumbing and most other things that make our country first world to experience and learn about nature in a completely intimate way. I am more human when I take myself out of civilization. I am barely religious, not particularly spiritual. But all this disappears when I sit outside and revel in the temporary and eternal that is nature.
On the morning of December 10, 2011, California and Nevada saw a lunar eclipse between the hours of 3 am and 6 am. Setting my alarm for 4, I woke up, wrapped myself in a blanket and watched the Earth begin to hide the moon. I sat outside for those two hours and watched and thought. I saw the moon disappear until there was only a shadow left. The sky burned orange as the sun began to rise from the other edge of the Earth. The process moved quickly if you blinked or looked away, but the longer I kept my eyes fixed, I seemed to be sucked into that eternity. Planets, space and time really show us how insignificant and unimportant we are.
Oh great, I hear you say. The cynic is raising her ugly head. Insignificant and unimportant contain, in a world build on self worth, a twinge of negativity. But are these things truly negative? I guess, if your goals and desires are to be remembered, permanent and important, then yes, they are. But what if your goals in life are to live and to exist fully and truly? Is there intrinsic significance there? And through intrinsic significance, the necessity of obvious importance fades away.
To live as a human. To be happy. To do no harm. These are traits many can appreciate, understand. By recognizing our own humanity, we recognize - intrinsically - that we are temporary. While our lifetimes may seem long and grand, 80 years is less than a blink to the universe. The freedom that comes when you realize you do not matter to the big picture means, once past the existential crisis, that you can pursue your own happiness. And the last one is obvious. Do no harm to others so that they may live in the manner that makes them happiest.
We have begun to think of our world as a thing to preserve. We must conserve, keep clean and protect. We look for homes to inhabit once the resources of ours run out. Moreover, we seek ways to make profitable our goal to preserve.
Does believing in the impermanence of life make me a pessimist? Does recognizing my own insignificance make me hopeless? Because I have little hope for the future past my existence, am I faithless? Is it right that the most ignored principle is to do no harm? Do all of these realizations make me the human I am, or is it despite them?
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