WTF? Part I

Random Essay

Understand... you are a universe, a collection of worlds within worlds. Your mind is possibly the most complex and amazing creation in existence. The vast expanse of your imagination is capable of art, music, science, philosophy, literature, languages, and war. Your capacities for love and compassion coexist with your potential for hatred, aggression and... murder? You are the most challenging riddle ever written, an enigma perhaps even to yourself. You are a unique event in human history. Yet, at the same time, you are an image of everyone who has ever lived. Socrates said: "Know thyself," and while we must envy those who have walked on the moon or explored the dream-like depths of the ocean, the ultimate frontier lies so much closer to home. What, really, could be more fascinating than a journey of self-discovery?

So where shall we start? At the beginning? Remember... every new beginning is nothing more than the end of whatever came before. So we shall start small... imagine yourself smaller than one one-hundredth the size of the period at the end of this sentence. Now step into the bizarre perspective of the microscopic world. Surrounding you are spider web tangles branching in every direction, delicate, feathery fibers, and transparent globes. Pulsing waves of energy flash through the ends of the tentacles, scattering showers of pinwheel flame in every direction. You are bathed in a sea of exotic chemicals. Indeed a strange realm, but there is beauty here in the complexity of a conglomeration of over 100 billion cells. Nerve cells that make up the human brain. Crack opens the fragile eggshell of the skull and find, in the truest sense, worlds within worlds within worlds. That mass of neurons, weighing a little over three pounds, is what enables individuals to pluck music from the air to write exquisite symphonies, carve beautiful sculpture from amorphous rock, write novels, read novels, or contemplate the universe. With so much raw possibility churning right under your hat... what on Earth will you do with it? What are you here for? According toEinstein: "We come into this world uninvited, stay a while and then die, without ever having known why we were here."Won't someone tell me please, what is this life all about?

Ahhh... so now your mind burns with the question, so you sit down to think, to ponder, wonder, wander off into the darkest cobweb-cluttered corners of your brain where your neurons flick like a light switch and twitch at the opportunity to get turned on. Being the human-beast that you are, terminally trapped in gravity plagued skin sack; you always seem to notice the Holy 5 senses screaming at you first. So inventory down the sensory list: You know when your gut is empty as it churns and bubbles, chewing restlessly at its own protective mucus lining which must be replaced every two hours lest your stomach devour itself. You know when your skin prickles up the erector-papillae muscles against the cold or beads up with sweat to evaporate in the heat. It's obvious when your crotch is happy. Hmmm, so if it's not you, maybe it's them. Maybe it all of those other people on the outside looking in. Do you really think that they know something about you that you don't know; that you should know? Maybe you could excavate their skulls and find out what it's all about. Maybe they can lead you, teach you, order you around or preach to you. Maybe they have a mirror you can borrow. Maybe they can answer some of those burning questions... but let's not get too personal.

© 2004