"Would we have the Mona Lisa if Leo’s iPhone were there to notify him that Michelangelo was making pancakes?"
If we come to terms with the fact that the human will really isn’t all that strong, without the proper daily attention paid, than we will come to realize just how dangerous toxic influences like a McDonalds on every corner can be to our wellbeing.
We are sponges that soak up that which is presented to us. Whether you like to admit it or not, the things you see and the things you do on a daily basis affect the person you are and your proceeding behavior.
We can say that we are strong willed, (and, yes, we can actually become strong willed people) but without a plan and a continual conscious effort made, without the opportunity given to ourselves to pay attention, and with business/career consuming most of most days, we will inevitably (at least partly) become a product of our environment.
Let me ask, on how many days of your life have you stopped to ask yourself “who are you,” or what actions will you take today to define yourself as a person, the person you want to be? There are many people on the planet who do this very thing, and it is commendable. In western environments it is too all the more a feat of which to be proud.
It is not often that I hear people talking about connecting to this kind of thinking, never mind prioritizing it, never mine deeming it a necessary to a happy lifestyle. I think many people (of the western world in particular, myself included) simply react more than initiate an action sourced from some deep place within themselves.
There is so much external stimulation around us, and so many offerings of a routine lifestyle presented to us, that initiating our actions from our deepest and truest desires is often overshadowed (if not obliterated) by the distraction of “the daily grind.”
And I call it a distraction because no matter what the daily grind means to you, it’s often represented by a person going to work five out of seven days a week, to a place in which they may never have planned to be, (if you have a career created out of a childhood dream than I commend you), and then they come home to a house that they are still paying for and, at the end of the month, to bills that they MUST pay, while rarely connecting or paying attention to themselves…or their health, or their mental well being.
To be human is to be frail and we are all human. We are not perfectly driven and fully conscious beings. We often get lost and side tracked. We often forget and make decisions before we’ve given ourselves the necessary time to really decide if we should say “yes” or if we should say “no.” Time is of the essence; time is money.
Ask yourself, what do you base your decision making process on? Do you know the answer to that question? Or do you have to think about it? I know I had to think about it, and this is something of which I think we should already be aware. Are you?
Do I ask my heart what it really wants first? Do I ask god or a higher power? Do I weigh the pros and cons, make a list? Do I go with my gut? Or do I allow some semi-conscious process to take place in my mind for those few seconds before I’ve spoken the words that will decide for me? Because in this western world you will be held to your word; you will be held accountable, and you will face adversity if you later decide to change your mind.
We’re not perfect, we’re not impenetrable. So when we look around and see that people seem to be getting fat and children’s’ attention spans are shortening, can we really say, “Oh well, we all make our own decisions, it’s their own fault?” Yes, we all do make our own decisions, but the question is: based on what?
And if you are raised in an environment that:
Shows you unhealthy food options at every corner of every street,
Offers you machines that will do it for you,
Presents you with entertaining video games for your leisure time,
Gives you the opportunity to escape the stresses of the world through an internet portal,
Shows you “easier” ways to communicate with your friends through facebook and twitter,
Sells you devices that beep and blink whenever something else is happening,
And gives you a plethora of reasons and justifications to fill every second of every day with some kind of doing -
- is it fair to say that it is much more difficult than ever for today’s people and today’s youth to truly and honestly connect with their own self derived thoughts, decisions and desires? Is that fair to say?
Would we have the Mona Lisa if Leo’s iPhone were there to notify him that Michelangelo was making pancakes? E= MC2 if Einstein was hooked on Facebook and just happened to sign in at the time? The Shakespeare Canon if Will grew up on a steady diet of Sonic and Mario?
Who knows, but more importantly, who today is avoiding their brilliance through their involvement in such activities? Who today, if only born a hundred years earlier, would rock the world with their talent? Who today will be distracted when on the verge… not taking the time and space for their ability to percolate and emerge?
We are not stones! We are not impervious to temptation or to the desire to want that which people deem as desirable. Today we are surrounded by distraction after distraction, notification after notification, and substance after substance. All which are designed to appeal to our desires, addictions, wants, and even our needs, (our need to eat, or even worse, our need to consume).
So if generations from today this planet is overrun by a race of human beings feeling lost and spiritless, useless and dull, will it be their own faults…or the fault of those who allowed the surrounding stimuli to evolve to such a point of domonance?
So with all the adversity that genuine thought, spirit, and originality encounter today, surrounded by all the mediums and venues of entertainment, and saturated by all the unhealthy influences in our daily lives, let it be that we each take a moment once a day to focus on ourselves, our fleshy, biological, natural human selves, and to connect to that which we truly and deliberately deem as important.
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