We are made by the boundaries we keep. Often, satisfaction arises not so much in knowing what definitions others expect us to have, but in discovering which fences we ourselves are willing to cross. Reminded by Bolt's Thomas More, life and death are symbiotically bound. More's humanity-More's soul-is defined by a set of principles. To stay alive, he is asked to renounce those principles. Yet, without those principles, More has no definition. He cannot live without them. To live or not to live. That is his question.
I recently spent months worrying about how to keep a balance between Thing 1 and Thing 2 in a foolish desire to keep all possibilities open. That may be a trait to how human brains function, but it is not the purpose for which human brains are made. Humanity means shaping the raw materials of thought, feeling and physicality into an existence-a being distinctly, and, simultaneously, indistinguishably human. That happens by defining the set of principles which will bind or release.
What I mean is that choosing matters more than the choice. Choosing has to do with testing my own principles. I like to say "drawing a line in the sand." It is how I know how far I will go, and from what I am willing to turn aside. If we are honest, the fate of humanity rarely rests on any one set of shoulders. A "wrong" choice is as informative as a "right" choice. It brings me face to face with a principle or characteristic of my humanity which I have failed to uphold or respect. It brings me face to face with the principle or characteristic of humanity which I must, at some level, revere and value. The next choice will be closer to that ideal or farther away from it.
Like More, it may take me to a place where my very life is in the choice, but it is much more likely death will find me on its own. That being the case, I would rather it find me crawling through fences and checking the gate latches, than sitting on the verge of the roadway waiting for some local to come along and give me a lift.
Thing 1 and Thing 2? They are pretty much the same. I am is the only difference.
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