I believe we are all born equal onto this earth. We may all die equal as well but that is something we are not privileged to know. I believe that if we do not die as equals, that inequality has nothing to with material things or power, it has to do with our hearts and our souls and whether we have attempted to live with compassion or not.
We are all born as equals. We share certain minerals and biological connections. We share compassion. That does not mean we are all dealt equal opportunities. I would like to think that we all have the opportunity to see to those to whom the world has been cruel as equals, as the people we might have been had our own fortunes been less kind.
We are all born as equals. How we chose to deal with the blows and opportunities life gives us is our choice. Whether we chose to see others as equals or not is a choice. Whether we chose to be bitter or happy is a choice. We all make choices. We all make mistakes. The best we can do is to try not to hurt other people either purposefully or inadvertently. The best we can do is to care. But it is not our job to judge because there is so much we are not privileged to know.
Thank you all, the many of you with your kind words. They meant a lot to me. Childhood rhymes to the contrary, words do hurt. But hopefully we have resilience to overcome them. I had a cup of cocoa and curled up with my cats for a bit, but only for a bit as my step-daughter and her family were coming for dinner, really just an impromptu simple repast of sausage and collards, food to soothe the soul, after which I ran off to the symphony. It was a perfect concert to lift people's spirits in a dreary January: The Overture to Die Fledermaus, a Mozart Piano Concerto, Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty Suite, Strauss's Emperor Waltzes. The music provided the perfect respite for me as well, despite my normal inclinations; it was not a night I would have embraced Bartok.
I can see that I only give a partial portrait here, and therefore much can easily be interpreted in ways I do not intend. But that is another way all people are equal, we all show ourselves only in shadows and angles and half-formed images. Most of the time we do not bare our souls to any but a treasured few. I am only human, with all the faults and failings that being human entails. I know I like pretty things and some may consider this a weakness. I suppose happy was not the best choice of words, because although I am happy it is not because of things.
Those of us in industrial nations, and I assume most of us who read blogs hail from similar lands, live in a world surrounded by things, a world in which one needs things. It does not seem much to ask that those things, while filling a need, also bring a small amount of beauty or joy or contentment, fleeting though that may be. But if the cost and name and value of a thing mean more than the joy of using the thing itself, then one is a slave. One can be enslaved to the sense of not having, to the coveting, just as surely as to the having.
I am very lucky in many ways. One of the things that makes me lucky is that I know I could start over, and that I would still be happy. I've lost everything before. I've even lost everything that mattered, and no I am not referring to things. But I've been extraordinarily lucky because I've never lost my resilience, and I've always known that I could get help if I needed it. And that is what really matters.
We are all born equal onto this earth. It is only in how we live our lives that we distinguish ourselves.
Comments
6 responses to “We are all born equal onto this earth.”
Thank you. And, FWIW, even in this partial picture you don’t come off the way that commenter indicated. So there:).
What a very beautiful post, Mardel…thank you for writing it.
This is a beautiful post, beautifully written. Thank you for writing it and for being the person you are.
Yes. What a beautiful post.
It sounds to me that “Indred” has only read one or two of your posts. I have read with interest all of your posts as I also had dementia visit my life (my mother) for 20 years. Being a caregive of someone with dementia changes you. I was an old person at 47. Ibegan the long process of finding myself after it was over. It is still ongoing. The things we have and hold on to are not who we are, but they are artifacts…they tell our story, our history,our hopes our dreams, our past needs and present, if only to us.
“Indred” speaks with the voice of bitterness. We don’t know why, but we do know that bitterness is poisonous. Sadly, it is like drinking poison in the hope that someone else is harmed.
Don’t give it another thought. It is her problem, not yours. Let the rest of us enjoy what you have to say.
When someone catches one of our angles, as you put it, that person can make all kinds of assumptions, projections and attributions.
Though my first reflexive response is to defend myself from charges of negative qualities (often what I hope most desperately •not• to be), I have lately been struck by something Gabrielle Roth said in a video clip I posted, about letting go of defending: what if we could get up in the morning and accept that “yes, I am that, as well as so many other qualities”.
I am always interested and inspired by what you have to say, Mardel, and thank you for it.