Artistic Footprint

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Even a humble witness of the world can say that good is stark. From the beginning of conscious memory we are indoctrinated to believe that all is good and that if evil prevails, our innocence at stake. It’s easy to concentrate on either side, but what does the world look like if it were placed on a spectrum of good and bad? Where would we sit? would the trends shift over variables like gender? nation? wealth? species? Who is the best of us all, and who is the worst? how do we set that standard? Who is responsible for altruism, and who for evil?

The childhood innocence is a false vile toxin. To grow up with the expectations of prosperity and unlimited resource, only to realise one day that it has costs – makes one feel undefined by the standards of true human nature. How do you break it to a child that nuclear weapons exist? How that the environment is exploited? or that people are tortured? Do you break it all at once over the dinner table? or do you slowly let him realise it on his own?

But how do we gauge the bad against altruistic progress? Is the world getting better? Are we advancing towards bliss?

Unfortunately we have all been force-fed the concept of super-sized all-inclusive bliss, and while we were enjoying the ample supply of life-multiplying resources, nobody stopped to wonder where it all came from. How were we able to leave the quest for food water and shelter, only to enter the rat-race of taxes, vanity,groceries, and dividends?

The advancement of privatized investigation, the growth of information technology, and people seeking truth, has brought the truth of human existence out of news-networked fear gimicks to our doorsteps to help us understand those costs. Over the past few years those of us willing have been bombarded with the truth – where our comforts, wealth, health, and happiness comes from – and at who’s expense.

A part of me forces myself to sit through gruesome, horrifying documentaries. Perhaps because I was born into the grouping of humanity, and I feel responsible for the actions of this species as a member. Perhaps because of my addiction to truth and my hatred for ignorance. I quickly felt my vision of a perfect world diminish in my dreams. The eden of good was never worth the cost of atrocity. I want to fight for the vision that was falsely placed in my dreams.

But I cannot live in fear of doom and hatred. I need to have a cause in my fight. So I listen and I watch, and I feel for all that is good to me. I understand where my happiness comes from and I seek it with whole-hearted appreciation. From the filling of my lungs and stomach to the beauty captured by my eyes and the excitement of life, I seek preservation of this overall sensation. I seek homeostasis, harmony, and sustainability. Eden can grow from there.

More than anything, I have begun to understand that the definition of humanity is wavering at best, dynamic in optimism, but likely more questionable and critical. If you are like me, and you seek truth through this new and overwhelming form of revealing information, you may find yourself scared into action, but helpless in your situation/ Remember this, because this is what helps me sleep at night:

1. You are not alone

2. Seek like-minded individuals

3. Relate your mindset with your environment

4. Make your beliefs part of yourself

5. Stand up for your beliefs

6. Take action at every opportunity

7. Expose the truth

8. Remember what you’re fighting for, sometimes which is worth dying for because to you, the cause is greater than yourself.

9. Seek new ways to overcome obstacles, and share them with the world.

We are at a turning point in humanity. We have reached our lowest point without even knowing it. You may say it’s not your fault that you were born into the world this way, but those same events are what made the world an acceptable place for you to be born into. It doesn’t mean volunteering for a food bank, or travelling to the far corners of the globe to save a whale – these are either for the die-hards or the miss-americas. Your debt for the right to live is to fulfill the definition of how you call yourself human. Thats as simple as believing in the air that you breathe, the food that you eat, and the laughter you share. This is your opportunity to fill your life with all these amazing things that make you you.