Picking Sides - Black & White

Life is easier together than it is apart. We feel protected from lonesome by association. As humans are a tribal species, we are quick to find an agenda to follow. Religion is popular due to common philosophy; politics are popular due to common belief; sports are popular due to common loyalty. Humans construct categories to make themselves feel unique, but also united.

The profuse power of human love is conceived within the foundation of our beliefs. The support we are given goes straight into the support we give. It is a beautiful thing to witness, and it happens every day. From the quick but loud relief of a smile given to a stranger as you cross paths for the first - and maybe last - time ever, to an individual that donates their time and money to a cause for they carry faith in its potential, yet expect nothing in individual return. The strength we receive from the body we connect with is rooted in selflessness. This is how us humans validate war. We don’t fight cause we hate them that much, we fight cause we love us that much more.

Love and hate conjure many of the same emotions, just are expressed with different intentions. Love and hate are driven by passion; the three are closely related. With a passion of love for one subject, results a passion of hate following its invalidation. Though hate may be an exaggeration, a disagreeance of passion is capable of hateful action. The opportunity to love is balanced out with the burden of hate. And as we know, life is a balancing act.

Loyalty to a movement will certainly face another movement holding loyalty to their own. We wear our differences as others wear theirs - like a jersey, with pride. We tie our identities and souls to these movements, and when they are attacked, so are we. It feels personal. It feels malicious. With a sense of ownership in the company we share as well as human’s competitive nature, we guard our values against opposition. And this is the foundation of every argument, fight, murder, and war.

But… though love and hate occur naturally in human life, they are controllable. We cannot control how we feel about certain subjects, people, movements, etc. For our subconscious mind is in charge of labeling these entities with emotions. Spontaneous action led by the subconscious - although can be beautiful in certain circumstances - lacks thought. This action is emotional, and in waves of hate, can be very dangerous. The destruction following a hateful subconscious mind conceived the term: think before you act. In contrary, the comfort following a loving subconscious mind conceived the term: follow your heart.

So should we think before we act or follow our heart?

No one knows. Life would be bland if we did. Though there would no grands acts of violence, there would be no grand acts of love, either.

Life throws us in equations that expect different solutions - it is never a bad idea to take a moment to think about what the right answer may be. Just as you would stop to think about a math equation. As life continues and our experiences turn into wisdom, we realize that what we once thought was right, is actually wrong, and will most likely change again in the future. We live, and we learn.

An attempt to validate our past errors only irritates the wound of regret more. Perhaps human kind’s biggest downfall is our obsession with perfection: something so intangible and an impossibility. Yet, we’ll chase it - it’s kinda beautiful in its own way.

An answer is a perfection, a fulfillment, a complete satisfaction. If we all knew the answers to the vastness of life, then we would all just be hanging out - happy and content. Yet we fight, and love, and kill, and hug - confused and contradicted. We may be satisfied with the company we share politically, religiously, socially, or intimately, but we are never satisfied with the uncertainty surrounding it. Feelings of judgement and critique are unpleasant, and given humans’ pursuit of comfort and truth, we push to convince those surrounding us of our truth. Convinced our truth is THE truth - two very different things. A matter of opinions versus facts.

Every human is guilty of pushing their opinions as if they were facts. It’s powerful to be prideful, but destructive to be intransigent. Life is too complex to be 100% right about anything - there will always be an exception. Adjusting perspective, adds detail to your answer, which encourages progression.

Every death given to a person by another starts as an argument. And every argument starts as a discussion - if we touched it once, we can touch it again. Communication requires the ability to not only talk, but listen.

Wanna Be Loved - Red Clay Strays