The 25 Most Important People In My LIfe:
One day shuffling along some nature path I thought about the most important people in my life. But ranking them is another story. I could easily rank the person who was #1, but after that it gets a bit silly. I am a product of everyone I met along the way. It is my unique input which makes me a unique 'person'. Nobody else had my input. Maybe there are really two unique persons----my physical uniqueness and my unique persona. My physical uniqueness just is, an inherited trait. I suppose a good portion of my basic personality may well be inherited, but the full blown persona known as me is really a product of all those I have met along the way.
Different people were of differing importance depending on the period of my life and the circumstances of my life. Add to this the realization that there really is no accurate way to measure the influence of differing people on the formation of your own persona---a persona which changes with your age, your environment, your changing experiences, and your health. I learned early on in my professional career as a physiologist that a person, deprived of all sensory input, goes crazy in a short period of time. Most likely, all of us, given our particular sensory input in life, are a bit crazy or unstable somewheres in the dark depths of our cerebral circuits. We also should not discredit our own mental input. That is, our own thoughts affect our mental development. I think reading a lot of nonfiction and coming in meaningful contact with all sorts of diverse people is of immeasurable value in achieving a mental state which supports contentment. Therein may lie the danger of too much occupation with cell phones and the internet. This is more just data input than any real conceptualization for your mental development. When I was young we had plenty of time to be bored, thus were forced to think, forced to engage in meaningful conversation about a lot of things. I ride the train into and from Chicago a lot and you can't help but hear a lot of these cell phone conversations. I can't say I have ever heard one that might remotely qualify as in depth intellectual stimulation on an important issue or topic. It is almost all social babble. Social babble is important too---but 24 hr social babble mixed with mountains of data from the internet, mixed with some sleep, does not constitute great intellectual stimulation or generate any profound thoughts about life. The human mind is more than some sort of storage dump and social file retrieval.
Then again, just what are the benefits from higher intellectual stimulation on important issues? There just might be some truth that he/she who knows little, and expects little, may reach a degree of contentedness that matches the contentedness which comes from higher intellectual pursuit. One need remember that mental activity includes our emotional state. What counts, to no small degree, is what emotional state is achieved with any particular sensory input. Some people thrive on danger while others are an emotional wreck in times of danger. Most are in between. Some seek excitement, some seek calm. Some seek adventure, some seek a dependable routine.
Thus, logically, it can be deduced that the influence of others on our own persona is both emotional and intellectual. You may not have gained much of an intellectual deposit from certain people in your life, but their impact on your emotional state may well be of no small importance. I have given up any ranking of the 25 most important people in my life. My life, as with the life of others, has not been stationary. I am not a single 'person'; my persona changes from moment to moment and with one age to another. Gains are balanced by losses, and with age, the losses begin to outnumber the gains. How we learn to handle the emotions of all the gains and losses determines just how content we ever are at any time in our lives. I, for example, measured by certain standards, had more reason to be content when younger than I do now. BUT, youth---at least in my case---demanded challenges, excitement, risks, involvement, social acceptance, professional stature, financial security, and other assorted mandates. Were those good times? Yes, measured by the standards of youth. Were these contented times? In a roller coaster way I suppose yes. But I am more content now than ever, and I think only because all those objectives of youth are out of the way. I no longer feel any real need for challenges, excitement, risks, social involvement, acceptance, professional stature, etc. The only carry over is financial security, and for now, I have that. I have no expensive habits, travel seems in theory a good idea, but in reality it seems to interfere with my daily routine, a routine which, though simple, generates a relaxed contented state. One of the nicest things about the terminational years is that if you won't get out of the way, others will see to it that you do. That, though seemingly sad, is really the way it should be. Only a fool would battle on as though they were still in their productive years. Only a fool, in their terminational years, depends on others and all those things that mattered in your formative and productive years, to bring them contentedness. If one goes through life using his/her mind as a data dump/social file retrieval, the terminational years can be rough. Understanding yourself, the world around you, important issues of life, politics, and human interactions, are complicated issues which challenge your mind at the highest level. From birth onward you begin to find pieces of life's puzzle. If you are lucky enough to reach your terminational years with your mind reasonably intact, you will have accumulated enough pieces of life's puzzle to start putting them together. That is my hobby. It is challenging enough, it doesn't require the participation of others, it brings a feeling of relaxed contentment as I fit the pieces together. "What is the purpose of such an effort", one might ask. Will any conclusions change the world? Of course not. The laws of evolution in God's created world, will change the world. Evolution has been going on for many millions of years. I suppose it will lead wherever it will lead and I can't will it to lead anywhere. Religions always try to create the delusion that there is some sort of important "I" in the process, with some sort of God taking us by the hand and walking us through the mine field of life---BUT only IF we hold certain inherited beliefs and rituals firmly in our minds. This kind of delusion doesn't bring contentment or increase our ability to deal with reality. The proof is in the behavior of the religious right in any religion. Whatever else these people are, they are never happy campers. One can always tell the others trapped in their midst---these others have this hunted look with targets on their back---and if the moment is ever right, the religious right will persecute them unmercifully, of course in the name of God. I don't think any real contentment ever comes from this desperate attempt to make yourself more important in the evolutionary process than you really are. In the end such people often exclaim, "God, why have you forsaken me?".
The question is inane. The major cause of death in this world is birth. Once born you are destined to die. Yep. But even though we as a person die, life itself moves on, Time stays, we go, life goes on. He/she who goes through the terminational stages of life with the most independence from others, and truly understands the nature of evolution, will be content to go gently down the stream, appreciating the many blessing of life and all those who contributed to the formation of his/her own particular persona. We are indeed a part of all of those we have met, and if we can manage to control our own dying process, to escape the intrusions of government or religious laws, we will be able to enjoy life on our own terms, for as long as we can, and then when enough is enough, enough is enough. No one else, but our own psyche, can determine when enough it enough. If freedom means anything, it means we should be free to control our own dying process. Let us live and let live, which includes not forcing anyone to live past their own wishes. The Golden Rule applies to the end. As I would not have anyone else tell me how I should die, and when, I would not not tell them how they should die and when. GOOD LIFE and GOOD DEATH is about the all of it. This calls for an AMEN.
