Chatterbox: Down to Earth

What if...

*Disclaimer, I am about to go full philosophical mode on you all*

What if our lives were like a road? It is often compared in this way, but here is something most people do not think about.

Left and right. When you hear that, most people favor the right side of a path more. In malls, most go on the right side, in the streets, most walk on the right side, most turn right instead of left. Cars have to drive on the right side. So forth. Yet, if everything focuses going right, then they are being more of lemmings, or sheep, who will follow the crowd everywhere. Without knowing, the right side is actually the "wrong" side of life. It is the side that everyone else takes.

In comparison, the left side is seldom traveled. It is for people who go against the odds and stand out, not try to blend in.

So take this analogy I have created to describe good and bad actions (or sins vs good f you are religious):

Every single person will make hundreds, if not thousands, of choices or thoughts in a single day. Some of these are good and some are sinful, or bad, even if we didn't realize it at first. That means with each action you turn left or right. Left if it was positive, right if it was sinful. This way it would be physically impossible to become a box of pure good or pure evil, which leads into my next topic.

A box. If you continuously made good actions, theoretically you would be living in a left-turning box. A good, pure, box. If you are religious, this is God. Or however, your religion views it. If you aren't then this is, just say, nothing that a human can be. No one is perfect, therefore no one is a left-turning box.

So what about evil? A right-turning box? No one can be this, either. Now if you wish to put this in a religious perspective, would that mean Satan (if you are Christian) is a right-sided box since God is a left-sided box? It depends. If Satan was an angel originally, then he would have been good at one point, right? Which means left turns, then all of a sudden you are becoming a right-turning box. So that depends on what you feel. But even without religion in view, no one can be purely evil. Not even Hitler, because he still loved his family, his life, etc.

Now that I discussed the left-turning and right-turning box, let us return to the pathway that humans take. If we cannot metaphorically create a box out of our lives, whether purely good or purely evil, then we must end somewhere. There is yet a road that crosses over the entire world, oceans and all. There may never be. So, for now, we will use a road as an example: they all start and end somewhere. You start, hopefully with a good action, when you are born. That means you turn left, or maybe you turned right. Depends. So as you grow, you make close to boxes, but it is never complete, and is always a twisting, turning path. When you reach your last few days, you near the end of the road. By this time I hope most of your actions are positive, as you have grown to be a mature and better person. Regardless, you still will not form a box. But that means since boxes are infinite and perfect, then a road is finite, not endless, showing the whole course of your life.

And since this road instantly turns left and right, there is no straight path. Which leaves this an extremely compact road to show every single course of action from the moment you were born to the day you died.

Finally, imagine when your parents (or you) drive on a road with lots of hills, bumps, and turns. It is uncomfortable, no? Well, usually it leads to a good destination. But even if it doesn't, the ride itself often makes people sick. Which leads to consequences and following events in life.

If you made a mistake, no matter how small or big, you turned right. Let's say you stole some cookies from the cookie jar. A classic thing, but a lot of kids have done this. The consequences are not severe, I hope, but they do affect you. You will feel guilty for lying and therefore might admit it. You will be punished, grounded, or whatever. You may then feel inclined to not do it again. Or maybe this makes you angry and you go to steal more things. Like money and jewelry from your parents. So a single turn can help set a course, whether good or bad, for your entire life.

Or imagine you helped an old woman carry her groceries across the street to her car. You are not only affecting your road but hers as well. This kind of relates to a different post I made about bettering yourself. You made a left turn, and I believe in doing that, you are opening up new doors for the older woman to make more left turns or positive choices.

Corners. These are corners, regardless good or bad. Not only do they change and impact your life and those around you, but even left turns will lead to hardship. In fact, positive actions often lead to more pain, because it is the harder yet better way of doing things. Go back to the old lady situation. You might then wake up sore, or even worse, be grounded by your parents because helping her meant you were ten minutes late past curfew. A good action will often lead to some hardships, but trust me, good is always worth it.

Consider the cookie situation again. Stealing the cookie is full of hardships, the choice alone is a corner. Yet let us say you asked either God (again, depends on what you believe), and/or your parents to forgive you, and they do. Well, that could be a left turn all in itself. With that left turn, a hardship is guaranteed. In this case, trust. Even if your parents forgave you, they might still have lost some trust and faith in you as their daughter or son. They might not trust you to walk around town or trust that you are telling the truth, etc. This is something you have to rebuild, all for stealing a single cookie.

So in the simplest turns, no one can be a perfect square. No one is purely good or purely evil, although we all try our best to be good. If you are religious, God is the only one who can be a left-turning square. Satan can or cannot be an only right-turning square depending on how you view it. If you aren't religious or don't believe in that kind of thing, then just know that no human can ever be a square. And since roads have turned, you will face hardships regardless what path you take. Sometimes taking the right path is more of a hardship. But I hope that through this systematic view, that maybe you took the world in a new light.

I thought of all this yesterday while doing yard work, which then led into a self-evaluation which is in my other post. I tend to not be a philosophical thinker, but when I do, the ideas don't stop coming. And if you are to ask about "what if I make four consecutive good actions or thoughts? I'd be a square then." No, you would not because unconsciously your mind will wander to bad ideas, jealousy, a grudge you might be holding, disgust, etc. And you cannot make all bad turns either, because you would, at the same time, be thinking about, or doing, something good.

So I thank you for sticking by this VERY long thread. I hope you have learned something as I have, and I would love to see how you analyze this idea.