perspective

When something is bigger than oneself, more widespread than even the mind can sometimes imagine, perceptions shift, edit, solidify. When you see how other people live and make the inevitable comparison of their lives to yours, you wonder, in times of struggle, for whom is the suffering insufferable?

Isn’t it bad taste to seek out a life that is more depressing than your own in order to make you feel better about yourself? We all do it all the time. Depressed? Overwhelmed? Feeling unaccomplished?

Take a mission trip. Volunteer at a poor house. Do something, anything to separate your mind from your dismal day-to-day. Ah fine, I am pessimistic. I cannot even pretend that at this stage it is realism that I exude. I also do not care. Something about turning thirty and I hear that with age this freedom flag continues to fly higher and higher.

I do not mind the search for perspective. I only want us to refrain from exploiting those less fortunate in the search for purpose. And how else are we supposed to change the lens with which we see?

In partnership, perspective is challenged. It is that idea that we are able to show one another what we can contribute and what we lack; reveal what we seek in others in order to become whole. Is that contradictory to the pursuit of one’s own personal happiness? The notion that no one can make another happy. The notion we all know is not true. So why then are we all looking so fervently for something we can never receive from someone else.

Maybe it is the pursuit itself. Have we considered that? Maybe it is not the end result that we seek, but the chase. That would not be surprising now would it. That would just confirm all the things we already know. How did we collectively arrive to conclusive perspective?