All I long for, all I have longed for for years is to retire (prior to wanting to retire, my ambition was to play). Given a chance not to work, I would take it. However, this is not because of laziness or some inherent trait of sloth. Rather it is because I want to pursue my own interests and ideas; I want to do my own thing. One of the saddest things I find in talking with people about not working (aside from obvious disapproval) is that they like working, they would get bored not working, after all, there is only so much TV one can watch. Hmmm ... a pretty sad comment I think. I have a mind full of ideas. There are lots of things which grab my interest, which distract me as I journey through life. Finding what I want to do is hard., because every week I can have a new thing I want to pursue. Some might argue that I am not disciplined. Definitely, I am a poor finisher - great starter, but lousy finisher. I believe I have found what my ideal job would be: owning and running an incubato
Comments
cavalock: we should always be doing, especially when we are in danger of having fallen into the trap of complacency.
MOI: agreed, but people, being what they are, tend to be lazy and prefer to do minimal thinking, instead preferring to ensure they are more or less like everyone else.
I know you are like that, Richard! You stick to your own thoughts and are not swayed in the least by the crowd...and your thoughts are well researched. I admire all that.
Of course, there is also the case of people who seemingly reject the mainstream and choose an alternative stream (say punk). However, from the way I see the picture, while they are associating with a different social class of people who do not reflect the majority, they are still adapting to the majority view within that class. This goes for any social organization or clustering - people have a tendency to congregate with like people. Again, there is nothing necessarily wrong with this.
This then brings me to the question of free will and whether or not we have any. Do I behave the way I do because I have no more choice in the matter than someone who conforms? I.e., am I just wired differently?
True majorities are rare things, people continually refine into narrower and narrower groups, based on finer distinctions (this is one reason I don't believe school uniforms work, to an outsider there is uniformity, but to an insider, there are distinctions). I think the following is illustrative:
A man was walking across a bridge one day, and saw a man standing on the edge, about to jump. He ran over and said: "Stop. Don't do it."
"Why shouldn't I?" he asked.
"Well, there's so much to live for!"
"Like what?"
"Are you religious?"
"Yes."
"Me too. Are you Christian or Buddhist?"
"Christian."
"Me too. Are you Catholic or Protestant?"
"Protestant."
"Me too. Are you Episcopalian or Baptist?"
"Baptist."
"Wow. Me too. Are you Baptist Church of God or Baptist Church of the Lord?"
"Baptist Church of God."
"Me too. Are you original Baptist Church of God, or are you Reformed Baptist Church of God?"
"Reformed Baptist Church of God."
"Me too. Are you Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1879, or Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1915?"
He said: "Reformed Baptist Church of God, Reformation of 1915."
"Jump you heretic."
(and, yeah, as usual, I am pulling together disparate topics because I think they are really all related)
To kep my blog from being inactive, I decided to post a quote. It was not directly inspired by your posts, but it may have been influenced.