Particulars

I think there is something to be said about those people that can best handle what is required. There is some bliss in the simplicity of life. I do fear however that we, as a whole, are beginning to interfere with yourselves as we continue to live. How many of us have looked and seen our own lives and compared them to another? If you were to rank the qualities of humanity that best equate to happiness or success, which would they be?

Foresight?
Dedication?
Ambition?
Self Awareness?

It is hard to say, I think. However, I am beginning to believe (like some many other things) that it is none of the above that makes us great. It is the will to do what is necessary that pushes us ever forward. Those that can most easily brush aside the simplest task, regardless of the requirements are the best equipped for success.

Imprisonment

What is it that makes ambition such a proud and wonderful trait? Is it the presentation of personal satisfaction to others? Or maybe the contentment that comes with the validated passing of judgment over others. We are all guilty of believing that we are meant for something greater than our current selves, but there is a point where this can no longer be true. There seems to be a place in time where we are no longer able to push ourselves to towards the greatness we all feel that we deserve. Does this mean that we can no longer reach the heights of which we had previously dreamt? Obviously not in all cases, as for many the pursuit of success is a lifelong journey that cannot be derailed by something as simple as failure. However, we are not speaking about the great, but about the average. We are not all great people, in morality or in achievement, so a different question appears.

If we cannot be great, what place do we have?

Failure, as relative as it remains, dwells constantly on the minds of those that cannot bring themselves to identify with real success, real greatness. Does this makes them weak? Absolutely, but weakness is not automatically a point of fault, contrary to popular belief. I have a hard time reconciling the idea of the achievements of others, or of myself, as a matter of superiority. Should we not celebrate human achievement rather than compare it to ourselves?

When do we decide that we can never be great, that we can never achieve all of the things our parents promised us when we were too young to understand? Can we ever really let go of that need to think that things could always be better if we just try that much harder?

Actualization

What motivates you?

Do we all have a secret act that proves key to our continued life and happiness within it? I am beginning to believe so, though it is unfortunate. For those of us lucky enough to have discovered what it is that keeps us moving forward in the cliched sense, life must truly be a wonder. If I had ever felt that what was naturally interesting was the best way to push on in life, I would have been struck down with surprise. Continuing that personal note, I have never understood why someone would sacrifice their own personal happiness for any reason, and yet I find myself continually confronted with the idea that without that said sacrifice, happiness is not only a frightfully complex process, but also one that appears simply impossible to achieve.

When I was younger, I remember wondering how it is that people who do a very simple, uninteresting, and repetitive task for their living prevent themselves from going insane. The answer now, I find, is that they are self-anesthetized to their own life. Numb to the idea that their life is now less than what they once believed it could be. The sagging shoulders of a soul that could once have balanced the infinite weight of the world. Can we be so easily broken? Are some of us just not built for success?

Some would say that an element of fate enters into the situation, that yes, success and happiness is just not on the cards for everyone. I say that we have built a world that crushes those that are even fractionally fragile, leaving behind living stepping stones to be used by the next, most ambitious soul. Fate has little to do with life when life is a series of emotionally and intellectually crippling hammer blows and little else. How can we be expected to stay afloat when there is no interest from our fellow man in the continued well-being of others?

For now, I see the mundane as a blessing. When you are without thought or interest, your life becomes a miracle of simplicity. That simplicity is the future of most, and while at first it might seem a less than positive truth, eventually we all learn to embrace it. Mediocrity is not as terrible as it is made out, and happiness is as just as much "not for everyone" as "success" is a predetermined ideal.

Collapse

I have always been a supporter of introspection as a form of self-realization, but I have recently come to see that is not a commonly shared view. Now, while how we identify as what "makes sense" to us most naturally is a topic for discussion in and of itself, I prefer to focus instead on the idea of teaching yourself about life through the observations of others rather than yourself.

I realize the narrowness of using my own point of view as a based of the examination of this idea, especially since I only very reluctantly admit that there might be some value in it, but I will continue nonetheless. I feel as though there is something to be said for the internal viewpoint of the common man as opposed to a permanently objective ideal state of observation. With that, I will say that I have very rarely had the pleasure of another party providing anything more than, at best, a moderately in-depth observation of personality, and never a revelation of an aspect of the unknown. I find this troubling because at some point you would expect that you would be graced with an "outside looking in" idea that would give you some perspective into your world. Naturally, a certain amount of thought goes into teaching yourself about yourself, but how much of it comes as a direct result of the input of others? More importantly, how important does the person that grants you a greater internal dialogue become, should that be the case?

I would think that if you were to spend time dedicated to the pursuit of self-realization that you would learn that you cannot know yourself very well at all until you have to come to identify with those that are around you. Oppositely, where is the line drawn between furthering your own intellectual and emotional pursuits and where you become a product of the people which which you surround yourself (for better or for worse)? Assuming that a "happy" medium can be found, as it can be in most aspects of life in general, I do wonder if there is a way of identifying it.

Reapplication

Whatever it is that makes us as people, also makes us impossible to understand. What is it that makes us so complex that we ourselves cannot decide what decides our actions? I have always had a hard time understanding the part of life where we make decisions based on limited our even totally unfounded means. How often have we said that we have done things "because we felt like it", regardless of age or status? I find it increasingly difficult to manage this idea within my own mind as there is no practical basis (obviously) for this element of being human.

It should be noted that I am not promoting that people do not follow their feelings and that we should all obey the laws of common sense at all times.

My question is, why is it do we feel things that sometimes defy all explanation, even in our own minds and hearts?

Is this a question of psychology, where we can psychoanalyze ourselves until some hidden past leads us to the point where we can see why our minds have spat out a thought or feeling? If so, is this the human experience as an intangible reaching out to us as a collective and testing our ability to maintain a semblance of "normality" among thoughts of the truly bizarre?

Are we all slowly going insane?

I have thought that perhaps these are not the thoughts of an overworked (or under worked) brain, but of the immense complexity of what it is to be human, which is a question for another time. If you want to call it a question of the soul, that's fine, but I prefer to leave that sort of intangible without a name, because attaching an often-used label does bring unwanted assumptions with it. Perhaps one day we will be able to see what chemicals in ourselves give us a reason to think, but I would hate to think that we would find that there would be nothing to it in the end.

Would it be a shame if our deepest thoughts and emotions were the products of us being alive, rather than the works of a greater meaning to our lives?

Decay

Does anyone out there have any idea where all the great fiction writers went? It's pretty obvious that we live in a time where the content of literature matters less than the ability for it to sell, but there are typically a few that remain unfortunately unnoticed. Is literature really the same anymore? Do we really have to rely on the next Chuck Palahniuk book to provide with validation for how we feel about our fellow man?

It should be expected I suppose as on a basic level the idea of writing as a form of creative expression is continuously oppressed, and twisted into a horrible parody of itself. There is a natural human need to grind every once of worth from anything, or to latch onto the things that bring us the most joy and accentuate them until you alienate everyone but yourself. I believe this is why poetry has become such a modern joke. But it applies to modern fiction as well. In the same way that poetry is now an pillar of self-validation for ultra-cool coffee shops and underground beatnik clubs, fiction has become an endless conveyor belt of souped-up glamour novels filled based on 16th century Europe.

Whatever happened to realistic fiction as a commentary on modern life? Is there not room on the shelves next to the 10,000th book about how the Iraq war is bad for a statement on the ridiculous construction of American society? I am beginning to think that people are failing to understand the difference between entertainment and learning. As if reading about the standard operating procedure for a billion dollar company will teach them anything about their own lives and the world they live in.

I have always believed that fiction writing was the cry of the unappreciated. Thus, my theory is that we (and I'm not sure if this is America or just natural human society) treat everything as if it the most important and cherished thing ever created by man. Do we really have standards for literature that are so low we have to publish anything that comes though the doors to soothe the egos of the already rich and self important? I know there are great writers out there, what I don't understand is why they are not given a fair shot when the non-fiction celebrity trash remains a constant.

Provocation

Welcome to Post Revolution.

I'd like to start out by saying that I want this blog to be an expression of people, not individuals. We're all in this, and if you think that you are something unique and interesting you're probably right, but as someone once told me a long time ago; "You are not special." Humility is the most underrated virtue.

I like to listen to people. Specifically, their observations of life in the modern world. I'm fascinated by the evolution of people within their own lifetimes, their lives, their foibles, their interests, their mistakes, and the effect they have on the world. If you have a story, a observation, a thought, a life, Post Revolution is the place for you.