The Path

I’ve come to believe that as human’s we really do not live life the way we should. It seems that life is in fact a constant struggle. A never ending battle between the path that should be taken and the one that should not. A great deal of this struggle emulates from the desire for money and a great deal from our desire to be social. It seems like the whole world revolves around these two elements and is driven by it. It permeates our very being and wraps itself insidiously around our psyche. And for most there never seems to be enough but I often wonder how much of that is driven by the others around us. There is a strong desire in humans to be social. This is part of our genetic makeup and even the most anti social of us has a desire to be with someone. Ahhh but there is the problem right there, as human’s we are constantly surrounded by others who are simply not compatible with us. From the moment we exit the womb, someone is trying to control us and we are fighting against it. If as a baby everything was perfect, its unlikely that you would cry. But as a baby, the entire world does not spin around you and mom doesn’t hold you 24 hours a day. She too has wants and needs and desires and some of those, like rest, preclude the baby from getting 100% of what it needs and wants. So occasionally it cries in a battle to get its way. And that battle continues throughout our life.

We constantly want something, a bigger house, a nice trip, a fancy car and although we don’t sit down and cry until we get it, that’s only because we know it won’t happen if we do. So we start to learn that if we want something we have to do certain things in life to get the things we want. We go to school, we get a job, we try to get along with people so we can stay employed. In the old days that also meant getting along with your neighbors because often you needed them to buy the stuff you made and to help you in an emergency. That has long gone and we don’t even need to know our neighbors anymore. And in some regards that’s good because in the old days if you weren’t part of the in crowd, you might just starve to death. Now you can separate home and work life enough that you can war with your neighbors and still keep the money rolling in. This has lead to an enviable peace in Western countries while having a devastating effect elsewhere in the world where clams, and religious sects and groups have torn apart societies through intolerance.

The interesting thing about social networks is that they exist for the purpose of getting something. Take a moment and ask yourself why are you friends with the people you are friends with. I mean really why are you friends. Not because we like them or they make us laugh. What really draws people together? In high school, we obtain friends to do stuff with but not really. We in fact obtain friends to belong to something or to not be outcast. In fact some of us simply don’t fit in while others of us seem to have a magical ability to attract other people. And as young people, having friends doesn’t bring us any closer to more cash so we can’t blame money for our deteriorating carefree lifestyle. Or can we? Why is it that we are drawn to certain people? Well I can tell you that as a young biy, I was drawn to the opposite sex purely based on a physical attraction initially. That’s a crush. I obviously didn’t know that person that well nor did my friends know the girls that they were attracted to. They could have been horrific axe murders for all we knew but something about their physical person attracted us. The cute girl in class syndrom. The only thought’s we had about cash or material things was a bike or some candy and we usually managed to scrounge some allowance for that. Now here’s the funny part. I hung out with my friends because we were alike and we wanted to hang out with girls we thought were attractive and that was the sum total of our lives and it was idyllic and carefree. And since that time, life changed and the idyllic worl began to crumble. So what changed? Money and relationships, that's what changed.

So what made our life idyllic whereas now it’s a hell hole? Well firstly although we really wanted some new toy, there really weren’t a lot of them because consumerism was rampant and out of control like it is now. Trips were camping, clothes didn’t have designer labels, cars moved you from one place to another and we all rode a bus, walked or biked to go somewhere, oh ya and we all went to school or played sports in our neighborhhod (that's within walking distance to our homes). If I had asked my parents to drive me to my friends house, I would have still heard the laughter as I walked down the street. I do remember however that the first cracks in the façade began to occur when we began to interact with more kids. All of a sudden, personalities started to enter the mix and loud obnoxious kids, kids with problems and jealous kids began to exert an influence over our world. The odd fight ensued, arguments were more common and suddenly we were thrust into difficult situations and suffered things we hadn’t before. Rejection, anger, hurt feelings, empathy, etc. Things we really didn’t have to worry about too much in our pristine little world near our homes had suddenly introduced us to angst. But why did we let it since it was screwing up our happy world. That's an item called competition and its also out of control today.

As we grew older, things really began to change. Those early crushes became relationships of a sort and jealousy and game playing became more prevalent. Suddenly who you hung out with had some importance and the people you grew up with may not be so compatible anymore. Also class distinction began to show up because some people could go to the movies while others couldn’t. Now money had entered the picture along with designer clothes. And why would we care? Well we wanted to be closer to that girl but we’d needed to look or act cooler which meant we needed money and a better class of friends. And girls for their part were focused on guys who looked and acted cool. And if you didn’t start acting cool then pretty soon your friends were disappearing to hang out with cooler friends.

This all eventually culminates after high school when suddenly you realize your friends are starting to get their own lives, school and jobs and they just don’t mesh with your life anymore. Your loud funny drunk life-of-the-party friend is now annoying to your girlfriend and your buddy with the two kids can't go to the bar on Friday night. Now what do you do? Well you start to find new friends probably related to your work, which is good because it helps secure your job which means securing your income. This is necessary because now you have some really big desires and so does your wife for things like a good car to get you to work and possible a home or the biggest money puller of all, children.

And there it is. By the time you stop and look back to your youth, usually when your in your forties, you realize that your life has become a constant series of battles with co-workers, your spouse, your kids, your family, your neighbors, other people all trying to gain an advantage over you. Because from the time you were in elementary school life became a competition for the girl, for the marks, for the job and you never even knew what hit you. And if you think back to the most idyllic time in your life, it was the time when you competed with no one but just simply lived for the sake of the day. Lying in the sun, playing games, laughing and dreaming about the cute girl in class. Maybe that was really the start of the problems right there.

I can still remember the most perfect days in my life and most came when I wasn’t thinking about money or work or relationships but just enjoying what was without a care in the world.

I wish I could taste it one more time.