The Person I Saw From Afar
I have seen a person from afar. Or rather didn’t ‘see’, as it often is these days.
All these great leaders of nations you see on TV – you will never see her be.
She is in the realm of magic, but since magic went out of fashion, she exists in no realm.
I have seen a person from afar. Or was she near? It’s hard to tell these days.
All the songs that sing of beautiful things, they didn’t sing of her.
Once there were ten millionaires – inexpensively, she gave something to expensive for money to buy.
I have seen a person from afar – when people spoke of technology, science and new things – their minds were to small to gasp her into view.
A person who can’t be seen.
A person who can’t be heard.
Would you believe me when I told you I once saw a person from afar?
The Rich and the Poor
1. All people have needs, and they are quite consistent across different people. We need about 2000 calories of food, some clothes, shelter and water. We have a spectrum of medical needs.
2. I knew a person who would immensely despise anyone that would have an unfulfilled need and ask for help. She would also despise people who would have, or seem to have, little money. She would have and extensive mental list of jobs which, according to her, made a person unworthy of respect. Examples of it were being a cleaning lady, elementary school teacher, or being a representative for a company or political group. She found certain jobs – cleaning, for example, so despicable, that not only would she never take such a job, but would actually prefer to live in a filthy place and eat off dirty dishes when she couldn’t make other people do it for her. It seems she felt like doing something like that would damage her somehow.
3. When you think of it, if you acquire anything you want or need in a way that is in accordance with your own morals, everything else really shouldn’t matter.
4. The person i wrote about came to value only money. She found it worthwhile to hang out with those who had enough, and avoided anyone who she didn’t consider ‘rich’ enough.
5. Greed for money seems to be based on the belief that – if you acquire something indirectly, you are therefore a more valuable person.
6. Money has become a culturally accepted way to clean your hands of blood. Compare the following scenarios:
a) A person walks down the road, shoots a stranger, takes his money, and walks off.
b) A person, knowing the consequences of smoking, works in a cigarette factory.
Another person buys the cigarettes they make. He and his daughter die of smoke-related illness.
Except for some numbers being calculated, the scenario is the same.
7. People who are greedy for money believe that when they will acquire enough money, it will make them faultless and divine – after all, they will not have those desperate, human, carnal needs anymore.
But humans are of the same human nature from life to death.
The Nurture of Perfection
In a perfect relationship, small impurities and annoyances always seem to creep in eventually.
The first instinct is to just push them away and forget about them.
The correct way to deal with them, however, is to deal with them. The reason for that is that they like to grow in the dark, acquire friends and stick together to make a huge problem that may become big enough to break the relationship.
The second one is that if you pretend that the problems don’t exist (or even if you fail to notice problems as they are arising), pretending that the other person is something he isn’t, you may as well draw a stick figure on paper and be in love with it. The partner, if you keep making him something he is not, is, after all a fabrication of your mind in that case.
Therefore, someone should try to find what annoys him about the other person as soon as possible, and resolve the painful part of it with the love and joy that a perfect relationship has plenty of. And really, almost all serious relationship are perfect when they are new.
The ‘How To’
The painful yearning of being in love is usually just a sign that one needs to take one step forward in trusting the other person.
Often, that one must do what is forbidden or impossible – and thus prove it otherwise.
Truth
There always seems to be this ignored, small, trivial problem, that later brings down the whole system (of belief, knowledge). Whether on a personal level or on the level of society.
Sheer Lazyness
Science
The most noble work is that that you will never do again.
Art
The most noble work is that that is never finished. Even after it is finished, people who see it should add to it by their own contemplation and interpretation.
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I think there is too much art in science today.
The Enchantment of the Fountain Pen
The elegance of the fountain pen lies chiefly in its apparent simplicity. Its point, a simple gap in metal, everything else tidily put away in its body.
It is like a drop of ink, transferred to paper by creative thought.
Ink.
It is not in a fountain pen where the writing lies, i realize, nor in the water of the ink.
It is the pigment that shows the word; and in knowing that, the means of transferring it to the page becomes irrelevant.
It does not matter if a diamond is transferred from place to place by bus or plane – its value remains the same.
Be it from fountain pen, pencil or chalk, diluted, old – it is in its nature to color the creativity of man, making it visible to the world.
Questions, Answers, Improvement
I.
Some books contain questions, some contain answers. Reading one with answers to a person without a question will leave him disappointed. Reading one with questions to a person full of them will make no change.
They will be asking themselves “When does the author shut up already”?
The one is not better then the other. We make use of different kinds at different times in our lives.
Kinda like kids – suddenly a child is all questions; or sometimes they just keep telling and showing you stuff you don’t really care about. They intuitively know how growth, learning and improvement is done. Adults should learn from them.
To often, people push the question kind of book on others, telling them it is art or faith.
To often, people push the answer kind of book on others, telling them it is science.
But they are really not apart from each other: human experience is both art and science – first, it is great to come across a great question; then it is great to come across a great answer. Both are equally needed for us to improve.
II.
If you look at the design of most textbooks, you will see how they try to force this process (which is not bad in itself, since it makes people learn fast). They include both the question, and the answer. If the problem is not specifically posted, the titles are usually actually questions. For example, they will say: Principles of Biochemistry; meaning “What is it, that Biochemistry is based on? What concepts will i find most often in any problem in the field?”.
The many people having problems focusing on their schoolwork (or people who tend to worship “experts” too much) should try this if they don’t do this already – make the title into the question. It may often make the answer more intuitive and easier to learn.
Interior Design
The way of arranging and aquiring stuff tells of a feeling we would like to re-experience. An opens space feels like freedom, a filled one feels safe. This is because there is nothing worse then experiencing – in terms of emotions – something new. If we do – are we still going back to where we are, or spin into madness?
What you know is what you know you can cope with.
Decoration is simply slavery to our own emotions. As they rule the mind, rationalizations about why we own what we do are becoming an art themselves. There no rational explanation for owning knick-knacks.
Don’t be afraid. Instead of walking around with a duster, you could be walking around with a friend.
Times of Slavery
Once upon a time, if a person was born a slave, he would prepare dinners, clean the rooms, take the kids to school. It would make for a better environment for him and his master. Slaves grew food and helped repair things. Their life was that of a slave, but somebody got something out of it. Occasionally, even though they were slaves, their work was appreciated, and some of them were freed.
Todays wage slaves don’t have it this awesome. They work in factories, where they produce chemicals and knickacks. For a bowl of food a day, they work their lives off for fake plastic fish and fake shitting pigs.
Who cares for that? Will they ever be made free men because someone will appreciate their work enough as may have happened to some slaves in the past?
Don’t waste your money on enslaving people, and making their lives so purpuseless. Be mindful of the things you buy. With money comes power to buy objects that further human knowledge (like buying a new computer), creativity, or just waste human time and life. With money, you are likely making people do what they really don’t feel like doing. Be kind, make their (and possibly your future) work worthwhile and appreciated.
zacione 