I'm Confused (Tara Taylor Quinn)

People. Human beings. Think about us. We're exactly the same in that we have to breathe to live. We breathe in basically the same way. We have our bodily functions and most of us put on clothes on a regular basis. We even put on pants one leg at a time, no matter how rich or poor or successful or unhappy we are. We all need water. And love. We have language. And thoughts. We all sleep. We cry, feel anger and joy. We want to have fun. We crave good feeling. Unless something has happened to us to change our original form we all have two arms and legs and a head and ears and eyes and a nose and mouth. We all have the same organs that work in pretty much the same way. Fire burns us. Pain hurts. Sharp objects cut us. We all bleed.

And yet...take any two of us with eyes that see, have us look at a picture and I'll bet we see two different things. Have any two of us with ears listen to a speech, I'll bet we'd give two different exposes afterward. Some of us think Star Wars is the best movie ever made. Some of us are bored stiff by the very thought of having to sit in front of the screen while the film is playing. Some of us find blonds attractive. Others go for dark eyes. I detest squash. My husband likes it.

The differences go beyond just physical likes and dislikes. They go to the core of life. And that's what I find most amazing. In a good sense. And in a confusing sense as well. Two people can look at an action of another and one finds it atrocious and another finds it acceptable. Take 9/11, even. There were human beings who thought that flying a plane of innocent people into a building filled with innocent people, that massacreing thousands of people, was a spiritual command that would give them nirvana in the afterlife. I feel certain they found a much less palatable place awaiting them.

It gets so complicated. Our realities are shaped by every single thing that happens to us and since not one of us has walked the exact same path since birth (even identical twins walk on opposite sides of each other) not one of us has exactly the same reality. And when you take a society full of people with diversely different paths, you end up living side by side with diversely different realities. You end up co-existing in worlds that sometimes make no sense at all.

To one who grew up in a loving home where letting it all fly, no matter what words came out, was considered a freedom of expression, hard words are normal, healthy. To another, they're abusive, unloving. Cruel.

I'm simplifying here, mostly because this morning, I'm more baffled by life than on top of it. I have a villain who's committed heinous crimes and I've grown to like him. I hate what he's done, but his motives are pure gold. Heroic. He's the bad guy. He has to go down in this the last book of a suspense trilogy. The victims in all three of the books are waiting to see justice done. And yet, as I sit facing this deadline, the guy won't die.

And I look at life around me and I see so many parallels to this work of fiction, this thriller that chills my bones even as I make the stuff up, and I wonder what happens when people with such diverse realities are forced to mingle in the same space. When a yeller is in the same space as a peaceful kind worder, what happens? Does the yeller learn not to yell? Or does the kind worder have to get tough and take it? Can someone whose reality has always been one of making peace and trying to be kind, who truly values kindness and who is sensitive and needs kindness, live happily with yelling? Can someone whose instinct is to yell, to purge the bad stuff and go on in a more healthy frame of mind and emotion, still be healthy if she can't purge?

And there's more. No I'm not done yet. I wish I was. I'm not sure I'd be done if I continued on long into the night. Blogger might be done with me. You all might be done with me. But the questions continue. There's so much to consider. Like selfishness for instance. In some realities, looking out for self is the way to happiness. And the belief follows that if you're happy, you'll make those around you happy. But what about those around you that you hurt by putting your needs above theirs? Yes, we all have our own lives and an inalienable right to live them a we choose (As long as we stay within the boundaries of society's laws, but then who makes those laws? What reality gets to choose?) And what happens when the way I choose to live my life directly effects the life of someone else? Is the choice still mine alone? Can I act on my own cognizance, because in my reality it feels totally and completely right, disregarding the erroneous reality of the person next door?

Here's another issue. Turning the other cheek. When is it healthy and when is it allowing yourself to be abused? When is it right to fight back? Or is it never right?

And then there's the reality that believes there is no right and wrong, that judgement isn't authentic living, but rather, that we are charged to make the decision that takes us closer to our authentic purpose for existence, whatever that might be. And in that reality if we get results that appear to be negative, they aren't. They are simply providing an opportunity for learning and growth.

I got another Jewel cd for Christmas. She's not everyone's cup of tea, but this is a singer/song writer who speaks to me. Some think she's negative. I think she puts life out there in many of its realities and challenges her listeners to see that life is many things on many levels to many people, as opposed to just being aware of only our own reality. She challenges us to see that our own reality is only real to us. One line that has been sticking with me this week - everything ends if given enough time.

That confuses me, too. I guess she's right. On some levels. But I've got this spiritual thread that runs through me and won't let go and it argues with the pragmatist in my brain - and in Jewels - but is that just my reality versus hers?

I watched the movie Ever After the other night. It's a Cinderella story and starts with the Anderson brothers visiting an older woman. Makes sense. They write fairy tales and we all know that Cinderella is a fairy tale. But at the end of the movie, the old lady, in producing a shoe and a picture of her great great grandmother says to the fairy tale writers, 'and while they lived happily ever after, the important thing, gentlemen, is that they lived.'

I loved that. I'm still thinking about it days later and I've seen the movie numerous times. To that woman, Cinderella lived. She was giving thema different reality. And not only that, to her, no matter what reality anyone accepted, the important thing is that the realities are alive. And that's what's important. At least in my reality.

Well now, if I haven't thoroughly confused you, too, you may return to regularly scheduled programming. And I'll go back to this book that has taken over my brain and is searing thought cells as it finds it way out of me. Maybe, if I can type really fast and let the thing go, purge it with typing instead of yelling, I'll find the answers. The eternal truths.

Or maybe life really is just confusing. Anybody know?