The Most Beautiful Thing

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed. - Albert Einstein

I have a problem with know-it-alls. (Yeah, I know. "Look who's talking" right? I have a point, so bear with me.) The source of this is, of course, my having gone to a few fundamentalist churches as a child. This authority who stands at the altar is supposed to give us all a defined direction, tell us what to think, what to believe, how to behave at all times, what's right, what's wrong. And then, this shiny, clean person inevitably falls from his towering position when it becomes ever so evident that he (or she) not only does not have all the answers, but is just as prone to what they consider to be mistakes. It's a front.

My problem with this is that I don't see the point in knowing "everything", having all the answers. It leaves little to strive for, and less to learn. Why do they need to have all the answers? Why do these people try so hard to be something that they clearly are not capable of being? Sadly, nearly everyone I know that succumbs to the idea of a single truth of the thousand (even million) of others fails to see a bigger picture.

My grandmother (God bless her; she can't work a computer) used to tell me these incredible descriptions of the way Heaven will be when we get there, all solid gold sidewalks, and riches beyond imagination. Will she be disappointed if she gets there and stands (or floats or exists) before God and finds that nothing is as she expects?

I recently discovered that I feel that the mystery is just as (perhaps is even more) important than the "known". There's a whole universe out there of mystery. Looking at the pictures of space, I can't help seeing the infinite beauty of it. I don't need to know why stars are born, where the light goes when it's gone, how the universe came to be to see all of the beauty.

Yes, I would admit that I love a good investigation. There are things that I do want to know for sure. The mystery keeps me looking for them. It keeps us all on our toes.

*Picture is of the Orion Deep Field by Rob Gendler

Only middles.

You're searching, Joe, for things that don't exist; I mean beginnings. Ends and beginnings -- there are no such things. There are only middles. - Robert Frost

You know, I have a bit of a morbid streak. (I think most people do, but they won't admit it.) And I was remembering the day that my beloved Grandpa died some four years ago. My family gathered in the hospital room and we watched him slip away. It wasn't sudden, like you see on TV. It was more of a fading, so much so that we aren't really sure when exactly he was gone. His heartbeat just grew slower and slower, until it was so faint. It was one of the saddest experiences I've ever had, and yet one of the most special. Odd how that works.

So, I thought of him and that day when I first read Robert Frost's wise words, because there really was no defined "death". That moment wasn't clear. But if you think about it, there's so little definition to our beginning. When do we become real? At conception? When we appear human in the ultrasounds? When we're born? When, exactly, is our beginning?

And so I've come to realize that life's definition, its truth isn't defined by birth or death. It's everything in between that's important. Besides birth and death aren't really the beginning and end of anything. Rather, they are continuations, only in different forms. This is comforting, isn't it?

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Kindness, Beauty, Truth

The ideals that have lighted my way time after time and have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth. - Albert Einstein

What gives you the courage to face your day? It is no small thing to accomplish tasks, to finish a job, to help people. There are days that are hard for one reason or another. The anxiety of the current economic crisis has created a level of hostility and indifference for some. For others, it has only furthered their endeavors to be the tools of the universal and divine. Have you asked which one you are?

Entering each day with a sense of the divine, in seeing the importance of kindness, beauty, and truth, is by far more empowering than fear, hate, anger, and despair. The latter are simply not strong enough to overcome the possibilities of the former.

When you think of the volunteers that head to war-torn nations to offer medical care, food, a helping hand, a sympathetic heart, are you inspired to actions of courage? When you see the accomplishments of a visionary, whether that be in medicine, politics, or even film, are you inspired to acts of courage? When you hear stories of people who committed acts against dictators, in search of freedom and truth, are you inspired to acts of courage?

There will always be a turning path, a blind action, uncertain results. But these things can be overcome. And having the tools of kindness, beauty, and truth at your side to give reassurance in the darkest of nights, to guide you in your moments of quiet contemplation, will see you beyond the depths of your own personal hell to a life fulfilled - a life aspiring to greatness.