Updated: Jun 3, 2022
Hello, Listener,
I suppose this is what folks do when unable to use a platform so many choose to ignore and go on living their lives in apparent silence and wealth. Although, what is “wealthy” to me may very well not be enough to afford physical protection as this world was never promised to be permanent, and there are beings whose foul hatred runs so deep, they must choose to be that end for whomever they can. Along with that fact, I’ll also grant that the people whom hold the platform I say I would preach from, if I could, may also very well doing what they can, where they can (hence the phrasing “apparent silence”). I can’t speak for anyone but myself for instances that occur behind closed doors, but, within this section of the web, I will always attempt to grant my assumed perspective on most anyone/anything I speak on.
I should get to the point.
My name is Vash (more on me within a later session) and by no means am I an expert on any of the myriad topics I choose to discuss through my God-given platform. The only thing I truly pride myself on being is brilliant at is writing (—hey, I gotta give credit where it’s due—especially if it’s to myself as that is a feat oft neglected). This isn’t to say I couldn’t get better, of course—however, frankly, the concept to initiate a blog has not suddenly come because I am a proficient and avid writer…
I’m typing today, because (what all that digressive rambling at the start of this entry was truly attempting to get to) it has been a few days since several nearly back-to-back mass shootings have occurred in 3 different US states (and this is simply a tally of shootings in which I’m personally qualifying as “mass” due to the death toll surpassing “ten”).
Gilroy, El Paso, and Dayton.
As noted before, life was never promised to be permanent, but, damn, don’t it hurt as the individuals left alive to sort through and collect the pieces malice has dumped out onto us.
I also noted earlier, I’m not an expert on any topics I speak on. I have no worldly salvation for the disease that is hostility. God is a wonderful source of assistance for keeping me at peace, but if it were all that easy to get people to God keep everyone placid, there’d be no need for Heaven, as we’d already be there. In fact, human beings kill for God all the time, so, in actuality, God cannot (or maybe would not—I don’t ever fall into the pit of error of speaking for God either, by the way) make everybody the “angel” we all aspire for strangers, acquaintances, friends, and family to be.
I hate to burst anyone’s beautiful bubble or muddy your rose-colored glasses, but, Listener, there will never be peace on Earth. It’s, in all honesty, an oxymoron—“peace on Earth.” Of course, this is my opinion, however, this realm may possibly have been created to be peaceful (I don’t know; I wasn’t there), but that sure ain’t what it’s turned out to be. Hurt people hurt people and the cycle is perpetual. We can try and numb that truth with pills, alcohol, weed or myriad other methods of evasion, but truth is just that, and there is no other way out of it.
Fear not, Listener! I am not here to depress! Getting a fact out there may be hard to take sometime; nonetheless, it’s as important as the foundation to any structure—to anything we humans may want to keep together. Framework is vitality.
The only mind in this life we are certainly able to fully control (although it may prove severely difficult) is our own. I do not know what entity possesses beings to mercilessly set out to take as many lives as possible to indulge their own agenda. I may never come to know—but I do know I have my own ways to manage what hurt may come from the actions of these disruptive organisms, and since we are, here, on my platform, I am obliged to grant you, Listener, a few of those ways (as cheesy as they may be):
1. Be Grateful
“Oh! My goodness! Everyone SAYS that!” you may be thinking in whichever variation your cognizance has quite possibly chosen to voice that phrase. You also may have just rolled your eyes. I get it. Platitudes such as these have been explained to me to come off as “pseudo wisdom.” Hey, man, you can take it or leave it—this is truly how I get by as stress-free as I possibly can in this life.
With death being the closest neighbor we have, I choose to spend my time on this Earth genuinely filled with gratitude for the seemingly most mundane of things:
Strangers holding doors for me (male or female)
A friend asking me how my day was
My access to clean water
A roof over my head
My ability to breathe unaided
There’s literally a book I own, 14,000 Things to Be Happy About by Barbara Ann Kipfer, in which notes things to be “happy” about. Now, in the event in which it’s clearly difficult—if not wholly impossible—to actually be “content,” I can still take nearly any one of the items listed in this book to thank God and/or the universe, for allowing me the opportunity to experience or obtain. Thank yourself if you must! But be as appreciative as you can possibly afford; this is a free, effortless step to taking at least some of the stress from off your shoulders, dear Atlas, and granting them back into existence in a quiet, positive way.
2. See/Seek Beauty
Once I find myself appreciating what I have, no matter how shitty my situation is at the moment, I find something beautiful. This sorta-kinda ties in with the manner of appreciation, but it’s a tad more distinct.
In example, it’s remarkably disgusting that these massacres have occurred, yet, I’m grateful that not more people were injured, and it is freaking beautiful how the various communities have banded together to donate blood, food, and water to their societies in need. Good comes from evil, always. That, in and of itself is a gorgeous principal of life.
3. Understand Then Adjust to Inevitability
This may do the opposite of calm some down, but that is why I granted a foundation before listing any of my personal methods to inner serenity in days such as these.
Disclaimer: I am not writing to initiate or grant more severe stress, anxiety, or depression on anyone, so if you know yourself well enough to understand that you are more of an “ignorance is bliss” kind of character, do skip over this last section.
Essentially, while good does indeed tend to come from evil, evil also will come from good. It is the way of the world. Duality is how opposites exist. Balance is everything. Life is like a roller-coaster or an ocean wave always lapping back to shore and then receding—calm one day and tumultuous another.
The first two points were how I, myself, deal with this balance—how I can go from the amiable summer of my life to bitter winters—time and time again yet still remain at a fairly buoyant state of mind. Where there is laughter, there will be tears—where there is blood of death there’s also blood of life (yeah, I’m talking about birth, okay, Listener?). All the same, becomes truly vital to keeping as sane as one can throughout our daily adversities—large or small—is getting the concept of opposition in full, and being malleable. You must enjoy the roller-coaster as it takes you up into the air above the land only to rip you back down towards the abyss. You must! Euphoria does not last forever, yet the great news is neither does misery—especially if you face the worst parts head on and keep getting back up for more. You don’t have to be this world’s bitch. This is your world, after all.
Listener, if you aren’t already well-versed in all or even one of these ways of thinking, they may, as “duly” noted several times over now, seem extensively cheesy or even nearly unfeasible to even begin to manifest. Except…! You’ve gotten this far—yes, through the article—and, yet, through life as well. That means you have more of a chance than you maybe thought plausible.
This world is so very broken, and, yet, it does indeed have just the right amount of beauty in it to still be worth the effort to become/remain content. Yes, death is coming—no one gets out alive—but life is here, now, and we should be living.
#StateofThisUnion #ThisWorld #Balance #Beauty #Appreciation #CurrentEvents #FirstPost