The Mind At Odds

Hapless burdens rest on the shoulders of every person…and as a result, aspirations are often withheld…duties go unfulfilled; as duty itself is a burden, and one cannot carry such a load while harboring other encumbrances. Why are we constructed in such a way that the uniqueness of our strengths is only surpassed by the uniqueness of our weaknesses? Is it nature that grants some the freedom from one burden to another? I know for certain that mens' and womens' weaknesses and strengths differ…but who has it worse? There has to be a disparity…and naturally, the degree of that disparity is determined by society. One of the greatest strengths I see in man is this incredible ability to destroy everything…and then to conjure up clever and new ways to demolish what remains. Perhaps women just haven’t been given the chance to mess up like men have. All I know is that my tendencies are sometimes disturbing and strikingly contradictory to my regular disposition…can I attribute this flux to nature…to being a man? Is there even such a thing as “nature”? Wouldn’t the existence of “nature” denote the presence of “destiny”? Do I believe in destiny? I look at this world and its history and I hate what some men are and what some became…and I hate the notion that this same monstrosity could mount itself within me.

“The law is good, then. The trouble is not with the law but with me, because I am sold into slavery, with sin as my master. I don't understand myself at all, for I really want to do what is right, but I don't do it. Instead, I do the very thing I hate. I know perfectly well that what I am doing is wrong…” – Paul (Romans 7:14-16 NLT)

How many voices reside within our minds? Why do we enact the wishes of some voices and not of others? And I know…the presence of a multitude of voices doesn't typically constitute as a sane notion, per se…but I propose that we all have voices, and perhaps that we’re all insane…because we’re all capable of the same things…as scary and as frustrating as that is. We’d like to think that we’re so different from each other…that the murderer, the cheater, the thief, and the liar all suffer from some mental defect that caused them to “malfunction”…to disgrace and sully the good name of mankind. I think the anomaly is just how well behaved we all seem to be…and how well we as humans fight those urges and tendencies that make us monsters most of the time. We seem to constantly do the things we hate…we are contradictory creatures…not by choice, but by nature…by being slaves to a particular human condition…one that lets us think one thing and then do another...that lets us completely neglect our duty to do what's right. I just wonder how much of this I can afford to deal with in myself before I simply stop doing anything; as there appears to be only one guaranteed remedy for a contradiction between mind and action – utter apathy.

On the brink,
BR80