You Will Always Be Wrong

Seriously, think about it,

You will always be wrong.

Not just sometimes, not just most of the time, every single time. Every. Single. Time. No exceptions. (Kinda makes you questions everything you do doesn’t it?)

I’m not particularly affected about my being wrong to myself (hell, I revel in it), but when you realize that thousands of people listen to and heed your words, and combine this with always being wrong, you definitely question whether you’re doing more harm than good. (The rule of thumb is that you’re most likely contributing to the death of the known world than not, good job you.)

If you can’t speak the truth and nothing but the truth, why speak at all right?

This is one of the reasons I stopped writing here a while back. But I came back. Why?

Because I realized that, despite always being wrong, we all have a reason to keep doing this fantastically horrible thing we call art/work/stuff.

Why To Keep Going Anyways

Are you Dog?

Listening obediently to some tall figure that feeds you? Trusting? For the tall figure knows all. Unquestioning of the words it speaks? For it’s always right, never wrong. Loyal? Coming to it’s side the moment it calls, sitting when it tells you to sit, and occasionally receiving the one or two orgasmic belly rubs? Are you happily satisfied with what you have? Is your future taken care of? For you handed it to the tall figure, knowing that you’d never experience hardship ever again as long as you didn’t disobey it. Are you man’s best friend? Forever walking the path he walks alongside him, never straying?

Or…

Are you Cat?

Have you ever looked at a paradoxical sentence? Have you ever really stared at it? Consumed it with your entire being and let it hang within your soul, stirring around, making all this ruckus within you that makes you shift unevenly in your seat from time to time without knowing why?

Being abnormal is normal. Being normal is abnormal.

Truths are found in paradoxes. That’s what I believe. Not truth as in knowledge, but as in the truth that’s rarely acquired; wisdom.

If I told a computer program that it had to hold the notion “You are unique like no one else,” and the notion “You are the same, like everyone else,” as both being right and equal it’d exploded faster than you could say discombobulated. But if I told you that, and you actually thought about it for a second or two, you’d realize “Hey, maybe Arsene’s on to something!” And yes, there are many types of paradoxes, but for brevity’s sake I’m only talking about philosophical paradoxes (the one’s that relate to living a better life).

First, you’ve got to tell yourself you’re going to eat this damn elephant.

Then, before you even attempt eating the elephant, make sure you have the right utensils. Go to the kitchen, grab a fork, a knife, and a plate. Bring these to the table. Bring your whole self to the table.

Sit down and look at the elephant before you, it’s pretty big.

Take a deep breath. Close your eyes. When you open them again only look at the elephant’s feet. The hardest part to eat. For you, right now, that’s all that exists. And it’s not as big a challenge as eating the whole thing at once.

Open your eyes. See, no elephant – only a leg.

Take your knife, cut a piece off the leg, and with the fork bring it up to your lips, into your mouth, and chew. Pretty tough meat isn’t it? Don’t worry, remember what your mom told you as a kid , “20 chews then swallow.” 18… 19… 20, swallow. Now take your knife again, yes… we’re going to do it again.

Now the legs done. Close your eyes again. Open them. What do you know – another foot to eat. Pick up your knife and fork, get to work.

How’d those four legs taste? Like hard work right? Close your eyes. Open them. Ahhh, the torso. The meatiest part of all.

I know what you’re thinking, “There’s so much!” But hey, it’s not a tough as the legs you just ate. Take your knife, cut a piece off, then use the fork to bring it up to your parting lips, into your mouth, pull the fork away – meat still in your mouth, and chew. Chew, chew, chew. This is why you’re here, to chew.

“You are a victim of the rules you live by.” ~ Anonymous

Remember the first time you crossed the empty street when the do not walk sign was still flashing red?

I do. And I’ll never forget that feeling I got from doing so that first time. That feeling as exhilarating as stepping on the moon, of going where no man has gone before (I thought so at the time). That euphoric feeling in which I realized that the constraints I once thought physical and unbreakable were in fact mental and fragile.

Sometimes the simplest of childhood moments changes your life forever. For some it’s seeing someone on television receiving bewildering amounts of praise from girls of all kinds (John Lennon seeing Elvis Presley), and for others it’s hearing classical or jazz music. For me, this was it – crossing the street illegally at age 7.

My views on rules, authority, and society were forever changed! It was as if I had taken the red pill and finally seen the world for what it truly was. The world was not as almighty and unchangeable as I once thought it was.

Rules didn’t have to be followed!

With those few illegal steps I had unknowingly altered my own future drastically.

I had unknowingly uncovered something about the world that the majority of people never do. At that moment I realized that we all live by a set of rules.

A while back I ran across a post by Frank Chimero in which he described how he kept a text playlist:

“[O]ne made of the best writing on the web I come across. I take this list and revisit and reread it every 4 to 8 weeks. You could almost consider it a playlist of text: it’s very select (I artificially limit it to 10-15 articles), I typically read them all in one sitting, and the order and pacing is very purposeful. Most revolve around what it’s like to be making things in 2010, and a lot of the people that I respect the most have pieces in it. It’s almost a pep talk in text form. I visit it when I’m down, when I’m lazy, when I’m feeling the inertia take over.”

Wow, I was at a lose for words. A pep talk in text form – so brilliantly simple!

Not one to stand still when something catches my interest, I feverishly spent the next couple of hours rounding up all of my favorite writings, talks, poems, and speeches, etc.. And from that I picked my top 5 (which was most difficult to do) in order to make it a list that I could review in full once a month quickly (in an hour or less) without loosing any of the ‘pep talk’ effect.

I should have talked about this earlier, but I didn’t want to talk about my “Good Life Playlist” until I had spent at least two months finding out for myself how well it worked. And boy, does it work.

This short playlist consisting of poetry, talks, writing, and photography has for the past two months helped me in ways I couldn’t begin to describe. It’s helped me remember over and over why I chose to be different, why I chose to make my own future rather than hand it to someone else, and why I am on this path even when the easiest (conforming to the status quo) was the most pleasant path in most situations. My playlist reminds me of why I do what I do; in order to lead a good life.

My “Good Life Playlist” currently consists of: