Why vs How

      It is essential to my being to write this down. But where do I start? Where or who? Maybe a place is more efficient… then I can worry about the rest. But the rest is so important, so crucial! I may drown in the possibilities before I even take but one step! The first step… why has the first step always been the hardest for me? This is dying to be written, and a part of me may die with it if it does not breathe soon. So, I cannot deny it anymore, I must start now… or else I may lose it forever… but what is “it?”

       Indecision! That is what it is. How beautifully simple, yet perpetually complex. How can anything in my world, your world, THIS world ever exist if one had never made it so? Are you not to blame as much as anyone for the pain in this world? Are you, am not I, responsible for the greatness in it, too? Try entertaining this idea, this notion that I will try ever so hardly to put into words for you: nothing exists, nor can be created, unless something or someone… an entity of some form, made it possible. Please soak in this concept, or theory, of mine for a few moments. Take as much time as you need. I will be right below waiting patiently.

      Ready for more? If there is genuine suffering on this planet then, according to my theory, something made it, or allowed it, to occur. There was some conscious decision made somewhere down the line. The hunger has been allowed to happen, the sadness that war and suicide brings is nothing more than the aftermath of a decision gone awry. The peace has flourished at times, because people allowed for it. Likewise, the best of the human race has shown itself time and time again. So, in conclusion to my little concept, (that is, if you agree with me) NOTHING can be born from indecision. If not a single solitary motion is made towards a goal, plan, idea, or problem then no achievement, blueprint, evidence, or solution can ever be made or found.

      What is the point of all this? This has to be leading somewhere; after all, I decided to write this down. Think of the grass and the trees. The air and water. The cells and atoms that make up the very fabric of your body… did something or someone not DECIDE to put it there, to make it happen in that very precise way? Think, even, of how your mind works and reacts, say, to the things you read. Did you just decide one day upon your awakening to think and feel a certain way about the things that writers have presented to you? Some of you may like to believe that… but search deep into yourself for just a moment. Your mind is calibrated in a certain way, but why? Ah, your parents and childhood environment are to blame, no? Then who calibrated your parents, and their parents, and their parents, and so forth? Do you see where this is going?

      The Earth is calibrated as well, and this I believe you may be more inclined to accept. You cannot deny that if you’re having a bad day that the Earth continues to spin without your approval. It simply does what it does. However, the more you ask “how” this occurs, the further down the spiral you shall spin. How does the earth move? The rotation, the gravity, atmosphere, magnetism, outer space, inner earth, chemical reactions, cellular functions, molecular movements, it just gets tinier and tinier. Now think of your own mind as a spinning planet and try to figure out just “how” it works: your internal monologue, perceptions and judgments, memory and desires and so forth. After awhile you would have to let the scientists and experts take over for you, and after awhile they, too, will become stumped. It is simply too much for the human mind to comprehend how everything in this world works. It all will just keep breaking down until no microscope can zoom in any further. Not to be a defeatist, but ask yourself this: is it worth diving deeper past a certain point? If you know an abyss is endless, why jump into it?

      Maybe the answers lay behind a different question. Now let’s ask ourselves “why” the earth is the way it is, or “why” our minds are so complex, instead of asking “how” it became to be that way. The answer, of course, in no more simple than the latter, but science can dance with the “how” all day long without ever glancing at the “why.” In all honesty, my audience, which would you rather hear answered? Do you want to hear the honest to goodness answer to how, step by step by every maddening step just “HOW” this world came to be, or would you rather know why is has played out this way after all of this time? Of course, this all boils down to a matter of opinion and value systems, but if a genie in a lamp were to manifest itself to you right now at this very instant, which would you choose? Do you think your mind could handle the “how?” Is there enough room in your consciousness and sub-consciousness for all of that information? Okay, let’s say there is. First of all, that is really impressive. But second, is that information satisfying?

      Are the cold hard facts more appealing? Perhaps, but to ask “why” and have it answered could expand your mind past its threshold. Instead of cramming fact after fact into your brain’s set limitations and never being fulfilled, isn’t searching for a “why” a much more time worthy cause? What can outer space do to tell me why we are on this Earth, or how can a zooming deeper and deeper into what lay underneath the glass of your microscope? I must admit, some of this knowledge is beneficial and has made living more comfortable and livable for most of us. Vaccines have been created, entertainment has diversified, communication has expanded, and the hometown had become industrialized. But what is the point of living comfortably with no true knowledge as to why you’re even sitting there in the first place? At that point, you may as well be a mannequin in a store display, for they know no more than we do, and do no more, either.

      Imagine knowing the “why.” Would that not make all of our earthly knowledge suddenly meaningless? To know why Mother Earth is here, or why anything is the way it is, would truly be blissful. How could evidence or proof even matter at that point? Every single answer you’ve ever dreamed of knowing would yours for the taking.  If everyone on the planet could ask “why” instead of “how,” then morals would never escape us because the truth would prevail above all other things… but, alas, most of our human race does not seek such answers. They would rather go on knowing nothing at all or learning what is not worth learning. There is a certain “worth” to all of our sciences, but on a spiritual and celestial scale it means zilch. The journey to transcend past the trivial knowledge of this life can show you pathways you never thought possible. To be justly satisfied one must quest for the knowledge of “why,” because “when” is merely a time, “who” is but a person, “what” is but an object, “where” is but a place, and “how” is but an infinite spiral with no start and no ending.

      This is a philosophical excursion. I believe that only one question needs to be answered and that is “why.” Until you find the answer you must have faith that the answer will come. You must look beyond the world and find the meaning underneath it all. Doing this on your own is impossible. Doing this with a thousand men and women all working together is impossible. Have faith that something out there has a predetermined plan for all of this. If you can stop being distracted by the never-ending commotion of this world then you may actually learn something that resonates into your core, maybe your soul even. To believe that there is no answer to “why” leaves you shackled to ignorance. Break the chains of your perception and break free from the monotony of “how.” You may find that you’ve been searching in all the wrong places your entire life.


//Photo by Me//