A la Clarity

Each day comes stacked atop the days before it, with the things that have happened, and are happening, and are going to happen in the days to come ahead. Until the last one.

It’s an entanglement. But I'm not. I'm me, moving through the days like all the other things, but I don’t have to be entangled in them, if I understand that that’s what they are.

And some are more important than others, or at least I think they are.

How many things do we say we would die for? And for how many do we actually do?

Fanatics die for things. Religious, political, romantic, whatever else.

We all have things that guide us, and things we say we hold dear. They're not the same things.

This isn't a story about politics or religion or romance.

We don’t know much, but if we take the time, we know more than we know that we know.

I don’t know anything.

And the things I know, I could be wrong about.

We start our day reacting. We have twenty four hours, and much of it is filled for us. You can look this stuff up.

We tell a lot of stories about people who turn their lives around overnight. They hit rock bottom and realize they need to change. They become heroes.

We tell myths but people don't change like that.

They change slow, from the day they’re born to the day they die, transforming. So slow you usually don't notice. Or control it.

We let the things around us guide or dictate or constrict us. We let them define us. 

If you ask yourself what you want to be, really ask, you might get a clear answer. I don't want to ask.

But what about the things we do from day to day? What are those actions saying we want to be?

What we do, what happens every day, might not match what we say we want to be. But it is.

We make the meaning of our dreams. In that way, we make the meaning of our days too. I don't remember my dreams a lot.

Everything's usually gone before I wake up.

Detachment isn’t the same thing as disengagement. 

I'm curious. Everyone is. So what does it mean? 

Some people decide what to be curious about, like their dreams when they're asleep or awake. But who provides the options?

I guess it depends on what we come across in the paths we've decided or have been decided by us.

I heard about an experiment once at a monkey sanctuary. They put bananas at the top of a tree and surrounded the top with an electric perimeter that shocked the monkeys when they got too close.

When the monkeys were brought in, they were curious about the tree and wanted the bananas. 

A couple of them got shocked and the rest didn't try. Then the scientists started replacing the monkeys one by one, but even when the monkeys who got shocked and the monkeys who saw the monkeys get shocked were all gone, none of the monkeys ever tried to climb up to the top of that tree again. 

The lack of curiosity didn't kill them. They had other food. Would they have kept trying if it were the only option?

It's not just curiosity then.

Curiosity killed the cat. It's a cliche that's a cliche to point out it's a cliche. 

Yuck.

But clarity brings alacrity.

I'm ready.