DEEP IN THE FORGE
Life just seems to get grittier all the time. The economy is in the toilet, the Middle East is either in the midst of a democratic revolution or an extremist uprising, and people have personal demons emerging like Krakatoa from the serene seas of their minds. For me, this tumult has drawn out an unexpected response. I am strangely hopeful that everything will be alright.
By alright, I don't mean that we won't continue to struggle through the consequences of our collective actions, but that those consequences will harness the power of change to move us in the right direction. It's tough for me, because I still can't decide how romantically I view the world relative to how it really is. I want to believe that in moments like this our faith in what matters is paramount - not religious faith, but faith that the virtues that epitomize and define what it means to be human really have intrinsic value. I'm talking about virtues like love and integrity, which I confess I do not exhibit with regular consistency but strongly believe are vital to our continued survival as a species.
As a student of history, I'm loathe to concede there may be only one way to do this properly; only through the forge do we ever exhibit the capacity to become pure. It's a strange condition, because conflict and destruction have just as much power to damn as to redeem. I think the key is to move through this process with both the eyes of an adult and a child, the adult to carefully consider the brutal reality and truth about life and about oneself and the child to believe that good will triumph despite those perceived realities.