Daily Archive for March 13th, 2006

Felix on Fate (Read Ashe’s post first)

Theology was never a close friend of mine. Most of my experiences with religion has been a nasty game of “I spit on you, you kick me in the balls” that runs back and forth as I torment followers of organized religion by testing them and watching them fall… only to be karmically punished. Perhaps not the best or most effective means, but I still state that there is method to my madness. My reasoning being: If one never questions what one is told, how can they truly understand what they believe?

Like so many others, I was raised under the Christian faith… following a heritage of southern baptist preachers. So when I came to an age of personal reason and found that I had no faith in Christ and I was inevitably to be cast into the flames of hell for my inability to hold those words true to my self. I tried living the lie for a few years, but it never brought me anything but inner torment and guilt, still dangling the inevitable fate along with the knowledge that I was lying to myself and lying to the power that I still call ‘God.’ Like most Nostics… I don’t assign a name. He’d tell me if he wanted me to know.

Having no book to fall back on or morons to tell me what I should think of all of this, it’s been a 5 year process of gathering what I can believe versus what I can’t. For the most part, Fate is a rather large part of my religion, and probably why Levi is always assigned as my personal entity in game. The conflict of pre-destination versus free will has been an argument for centuries… but it’s really pretty simple (if that’s all you ever think about) A lot of it comes down to how strong your will and how strong your convictions are. Consider the old game, Chrono Trigger. There are multiple endings depending on how you play the game. The endings have already been created, you can’t create your own.. but you only get one. Put this on a huge scale and the picture becomes a little more focused. The tricky part is when you take this away from your own personal views… and look to see how your influence in turn affects others. When somebody we love passes away, some will comfort themselves by claiming ‘a better place’ or ‘a new life to come.’ I see us as worm food post-mortem. But then what’s the point? Why was this person taken away from us?

The Bible teaches us that the wages of sin is death. That’s just silly… people don’t just up and die because they deserve it, otherwise I wouldn’t be writing you today. I sometimes fancy to myself that all of existence and the events there in can be traced down to an equation. Some giant equation similar to math.. but using foreign symbols that can only be described as fragments of the essence of life itself. Even the example of the butterfly effect is a part of this equation. A butterfly flaps its wings and causes a typhoon somewhere across the world. I can’t even imagine the intelligence necessary to create such an equation.. and then to play it out across 6 billion + individuals mixing in nature and the hands of Fate himself.

What I can fathom.. is that there are signs left. Obviously there is an idealism within fate. Everybody has a purpose within the cycle. Those who fail in their purpose or simply choose to walk away from it are given other options while others are raised to shoulder the burden. In the end… be it immediate or a millenia later… the equation must be fulfilled… the event will occur. So while I don’t spread God’s love… I don’t predict the future or try to make the world a better place by healing the sick… I commit myself to completing the equation where I can. Along the way.. I live my life like there’s nothing afterwards… because I refuse to spend a moment of my life thinking about my death. Life’s too short… too precious. Pain is a blessing, obstacles a gift… not at the time, no… but in retrospect. To coin the rather obnoxious saying, “It builds character.” It is… it is what defines us. Not only the shit we go through.. but how we handle ourselves and what we take away from it. Ignorance MAY be bliss… but there’s no glory in stupidity.

So do yourselves a favor.. go out and take that chance that you’ve been holding out on. It might just be a piece of the equation that you’ve been missing in your life.

-Felix Out

Ashe’s Sunday Rant: Fate and the Position of Order.

Fate. Destiny. Providence.

I just finished watching the pilot episode of Dead Like Me, which I was very impressed by. Among the main themes of the story therein are the concepts of fate, destiny, and predestination.

These ideas and concepts have long been a part of my own existence. I’m one of those people, I suppose, who has no choice but to see that things do happen in a progression and with some element of purpose. It’s really pretty obvious when you think about it. It’s not really a question of whether or not, but of why. Aye, there’s the rub, as young Hamlet might say. In point of fact I don’t think I really need to prove the existence of such forces to all of you. Kharma, God’s Plan, the will of Allah, whatever you like. It’s there, and I think we all know it. But whyso? Who plays those changes, daddy? to coin a favorite reference of mine.

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but someday the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightened position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.

If that sounds familiar, it’s because I didn’t write it. I only wish I did. This is the opening paragraph of the Call of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft and if you haven’t read it you should. I think that sums it up there. There was stated in a rather famous piece of text (it was the Bible actually, also a decent read even if you don’t buy into the religion) which stated “he who increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.” The Man in Black in the Gunslinger (the Dark Tower I) has an excellent commentary that also is quite similar to Lovecrafts words about the nature of man’s place in reality. That one’s pretty long so I’ll spare you it, however, read the book.

I run in some pretty intellectual service sometimes, I suppose, living in a town possessed of two institutions of higher learning. Of course, beyond that I have children and I also sometimes entertain wonderful philosophical conversations with high school aged punk rockers and men old enough to be my grandfather. Through all these conversations, particularly in this town, such philosophies as to muse at the nature of existence often arise, be they religious or simple ideologies formed of wondering at why things turn out the way they do. All of these conversations tell much about the individual stating, and often nothing at all. The point is nobody knows, and I think we’re all better off that way. Perhaps there is some beauty in that great mystery that may never be solved. Perhaps it keeps us aware that science will never defeat the greater power of the unknown, that which supports the power of faith, the necessity of it.

I’m an artist, a writer I suppose falls into such a category, but I am also, I suppose, an amateur philosopher. Often I find myself considering the nature of such things as Fate, Destiny, and the nature of why it all goes down. There’s a contradiction there of course. See, I’m a zealot (not a fanatic – there’s a difference folks), a person of extreme faith. So I don’t really worry about it, I generally just go with the flow. However, I love philosophy, I love theology and I love musing about existence. I’m very entertained with considering such things, It’s kind of a hobby of sorts. One that I share with most of humanity to some extent i suppose. I think if there were an incarnation of fate, it or they as the case, would be whimsical and erratic. Of all the gods and incarnations that exist and that could be applied to the Cycle of Existence, I’ve never been able to pin down whatever fate might be. So there we have the one (or two) oddities of the theology. Ana and Levi, the twins. effectively these are the only gods I conjured up, because in point of fact, they don’t matter. They serve fate and are the keepers of it. Fate itself I think is linked to the almighty Will of Existence, and chooses who it pleases to order its affairs. In point of fact, fate is a thing that you and I may never even grasp a fraction of understanding of. But I think in the end it’s better that way.

From Denton, TX 13 March 2006

– Ashe