Artistic Footprint

When I was growing up I would often eavesdrop on the question: are people good?

I always thought… why wouldn’t they? Why would people bother with not being good? how would that help us?

But good is not faith. It’s not love, heroism or fame, it’s not a deed or a duty, and it’s not a fantasy

Then I learned that a criminal can be right, or that people need to protect themselves. That everything you do for someone else, you are actually doing for yourself, and every time you fail at being good, you sink deeper into a hole of self wallowing. Its the times when you do something truly altruistic and pure, that benefits anyone but yourself, you are actually good.

The biggest lesson I learned from asking this question is… Am I good? The answer is quite simply, “I don’t know.” First of all, I can’t answer that, it’s up to my friends. But in a world where everyone is born genetically selfish in order to maintain self preservation, how can one find the time to be good? If your life is spent making ends meet and living on a dime, your acts of good will are unconventional, and aren’t understood by the materialistic. Everyone wants good things for themselves. Peace, love, happiness, a bit of adventure… modest goals for one person to make themselves happy. But other things can make us feel happy too. Gratitude. When someone thanks you, it gives you a feeling of worth and importance. Love. When someone loves you, it makes you feel necessary and capable. Attentiveness. When someone listens to you, you feel intelligent and informative.

Humans have a lot of differences with our fellow neighbours. Many animals have tear glands, but only humans cry. We can look at a picture of an injured dog and sympathize with it. We embrace things like music and art. We run into burning buildings for each other and cure diseases that we aren’t diagnosed with. Perhaps the characteristics of a colonized species? or do we possess a very rare trait?