Serendipity

Doug grew up, he arrived at his final destination in life: "I'm so fortunate", he thought. "Look where I am; look at this house: this comfortable room, this dining table, this 60 inch TV" - he liked to pride himself on his reflections upon things like this: "my entire life, all my sufferings, all my fears, my worries, anxieties - how I felt then felt so real, but now? Now all is well. All is well now, but back then I would never have believed I could be where I was now. It's as if I were deserted on another planet, spent years there, forgot my home planet. I knew it existed, but my memories of it grew so dim that I almost questioned it's existence.". Doug waxed poetically on such existential questions every night before bed. He was constantly aware of the juxtaposition between his earlier life and his present life; while he was aware of the now, and appreciated it on it's own merits, he never lost sight of the whole process he called "life". Life presented itself to him in the memories and experiences of his past: what defined him and made him, and opened up into a future emblazoned by his own rumination on his troubled past. The very evil of his struggles, provided the oomph of his present appreciation. But he never grew tired of it. How could he? How could that wellspring of experience, which lives on him, in a coexistent realm, not exert it's power on every moment? How could he lose awareness of it? True, at times, Doug grew indolent and aloof. He allowed himself to frolic a little too lightly, without regard to consequences. Perhaps he needed such departures from his insight? From his inner relationship, his sanctum, with a self which imparted the brilliant wisdom of gratitude.

What Doug experienced was a simple matter of cause and effect. He suffered, he overcame, he's grown and prospered; How could he not live this way?? Doug often thought about this. But he wasn't fazed at all about this thought. He reasoned "but there's the experience itself". The experience titilated his curiosity. The experience was different from the cold hard fact. The fact was important, he thought, since it provided some factual mooring. Life isa built that way, he noticed. "things tend to be involved in an eternal dichotomy". We are encompassed by contradictions; yet I feel something unifying myself with something greater than either myself or the whole. What a paradox! he would think. For example, he would note the contradiction between darwins theory of evolution, based on the concept of "natural selection", and mankind's own bizarre proclivity to commiserate with the weakest members of his species. "This contradicts the natural flux of nature! The weakest members of all species are destroyed leaving the more favourable creatures to be "naturally selected". But we? We do the exact opposite! Not only do we stand out like a sore thumb in the economy of nature, but we also oppose it's most basic dynamic". This thought led him to the theory that humans, nature and all other things crystallize some metaphysical meaning which only human beings can understand. Human Beings are the unique being, surrounded by it's antithesis. Nature, despite its natural majesty, was it's opposite. Natures creatures, from the octopus in the sea to mans best friend, the dog, each would not only cohere to natural laws, composed of specific and particular organic properties, all of which could be analyzed scientifically (impersonally), but at the same time, he reasoned, there was a symbolic element to it all. This contradiction, this opposition, was not meaningless to him. It didn't render science superfluous or treat the symbolic as all important. Rather, they are two coexistent elements: a quantitative (science) and a qualitative (spirituality). The qualitative/quantitative dichotomy furthermore was subsumed by a more refined category: love. "Perhaps not love", he thought, "but a slight edge to the personal, since it's more intimate and immediate".

The person was important, to Doug. The person could never be subject to anything less. It's the most immediate. The personal was contrasted by the impersonal. The impersonal belonged to the monotony of natural law, to endless cycles, and so forth; whereas the personal was the intimate, feeling, knowing being. All things take on existential meaning from the personal. My urges, my thoughts, the structures of all things, all emanate profound meaning! He could not but feel enthralled by this insight. Why was there a sun and a moon? Why not different? Why again does the concept and primacy of two, of dichotomy, always appear? Male and Female. Another favourite subject for Doug "Women are more emotional, more feeling and empathetic", after reading a recent book on the subject which documented how women prefer careers that suit their biologically dictated psychological needs, he felt reinforced his belief that women indeed are more emotional, since nature "understood" that the more emotionally responsive female human was more likely to raise children who in turn would be equally or more responsive: such responsivity optimizes survivability in creatures. "Amazing", the connections he thought. Men, conversely, were not nearly as biologically important as women were. "one man can sire hundreds of children, while one only one women can bear so many children: this means women are more vital to the survivability of the species". Again, he thought. Nature always seemed to be opposing the weakest. Always concerned about optimizing survivability. This basic flux and raison d'être of nature struck Doug as significant. Its a metaphysical principle. Necessity, Survivability. He remembered how Darwins "Origins of the Species" has key words like "natural election" etc, capitalized, to highlight the godly importance of this principle. But again, it occurred to him, but why is man treated like an aberration? Why this bias against man? Why isn't man seen as an intrinsic principle of nature? The plus + sign to natures - negative? The foreground to natures backdrop? Why couldn't man be an equal principle, treated in an equal manner? Why such a bias against man? he would wonder.

Man, additionally, had this pesky habit of "imposing" things upon natures backdrop. His cities, his buildings, his roads, covered the terrain; metal objects circulated around the planet. "man has left his mark". Ineluctably, man has and always will leave his mark. He affects nature. Nature is passive to his active influence. "If man will always have this basic relationship with nature, than how can man ever be demoted from his participation as a metaphysical countervail in God's great plan? ". These were all good questions, Doug thought. They beckoned an answer from man. To doug, Existence was calling out to man to reflect upon his condition, upon the situation he finds himself with: "reality will bear the facts", he thought. And in this, he found peace.