This recently concluded month of October is — I swear to god — the most fucked up month in my 27 years of existence. And that’s saying a lot, considering I’ve been through shit.
Excusez mon français.
Oh man, it’s so bad, I mean, not because of any serious interpersonal, financial or existential crises or any of those things, but it was just plain crappy. There was no flare in the manner by which I did my tasks at work. There was no particular event that had excited me even by the smallest degree. There wasn’t any significant change or anything that was even remotely interesting.
I don’t know — it could have been just like any other dull, ordinary month, but it wasn’t. It was way worse than any month I can remember. I practically slithered and squirmed my way out of those 31 days with extreme, lingering satisfaction that it was all over.
Since then I’ve been imagining what it would be like to spend a lifetime of “perpetual Octobers”. I know, I’m such a dick for even allowing myself to reflect that way and torture my head, but I can’t help but think of it (sorry, brain). And I’m pretty sure — although I hope I’m wrong — that there are people out there who breathe and live in literal hell, each and every day.
And it just plain sucks that some people have to go through life with constant struggle. I can understand how the universe must sometimes scheme a story wherein a palpable misfortunate must befall on someone, but not throughout most of his or her life! I mean, c'mon, give them a break, for crissake.
That just makes the entire concept of having “someone up there” much more of a BS fairy-tale. Why would an entity — with all the might to do literally anything — inflict suffering on those he supposedly “loves unconditionally”? To teach a lesson? Cruel. To earn their worship? Selfish. Just because he can? Mean.
I don’t get it.
Let’s make it more “official”. According to that famous collection of ridiculous stories and conflicting accounts of ice age-less history a.k.a. the bible, God allows suffering in order to:
- discipline or to prevent sin (Hebrews 12:7, 11; 2 Corinthians 12:7)
- develop perseverance, character and spiritual maturity (Romans 5:3-5; James 1:2-4)
- prepare us to comfort others (2 Corinthians 1:3-4)
- provide opportunities to share our faith and spread the news about Jesus (Philippians 1:12)
- follow Jesus’ example and thus bring honor to him (1 Peter 4:12-14)
- show genuine faith and thus bring honor to God (1 Peter 1:6-7)
Okay, bunch of crap.
So basically, this “supreme being” allows catastrophic natural disasters to kill hundreds of thousands each year, allows continual wars destroying and ending the lives of innocent people, allows fatal epidemics to kill millions in the poorest of countries, allows rape, incest, physical abuse on young children, and even allows people to kill in his name, just because he wants us to achieve the things listed above? That is so screwed up.
Tell that to the six million Jews who were killed during the Holocaust. See if any of those "justifications" would make sense.
But obviously we’re supposed to respect other people’s beliefs. I only refuse to be part of a system that justifies evil and suffering by attributing every fucking tragedy to the so-called “will” of a certain “authority”.
Breaking Bad: The Heisenberg Concept
I’ve been watching a lot of Breaking Bad lately and although I’ve only been through 1 and a half seasons, it made me do a lot of thinking. This guy, Heisenberg, found out that he was dying of lung cancer, and decided to “break bad” by cooking meth and saving enough money to secure his family’s future.
But do we have to be cancer-stricken before we could act on making our lives more useful?
We’re bound by so many rules and shackles that our desperate desires take a back seat to social scrutiny and persecution. We have religious doctrines to follow. We have earthly rules to observe. We have domestic cultures, social mores and peer pressure, all pulling against different directions in our conscience.
Why can’t we do want we ought to do to survive? I mean, we don’t have to be drug lords or fugitives in order to fulfill our existence, but we could at least shatter the invisible glass shell that keeps us from maximizing our potential to make a change in our own lives, if not of others’. Not breaking bad” but “breaking free”.
Not a fan of "the afterlife"
I’ve always believed that there’s really nothing out there for us once our flesh starts to decompose. This life we have right now, this is it. This is the main show. There is no encore.
And even if there is, say, a place called “heaven” where there is no pain or sorrow, I’m not really excited about it. Pain and sorrow is the very core of being human, and without them, what’s the point? I don’t want to spend eternity hanging out with angels amongst the clouds while singing joyful songs and playing harps with no other emotion aside from bliss.
I want to live. I want to experience pain. And love. And torment. And depression. And romance. And getting high. And gaining wisdom from stupid mistakes. I wish everyone would stop worrying about the afterlife for a minute and make the most of what they have right now.
If this life is indeed the only one we’ll ever have, so be it, and I plan to enjoy every bloody second of it.
