Just after world news, but between sport and weather.
Wouldn’t be funny if there was an actual segment in the nightly news called “this week in thoughts”, but judging by the current media landscape I don’t see much demand for it. I’m sure it will be of no surprise to you that I’m a person who has many thoughts on a daily basis, but, and this may come as a surprise, so are you! The average human being has somewhere in the vicinity of 6,000 – 70,000 thoughts per day with the vast majority being repetitive.
The severely fractured and fragmented nature of modern thought and attention has almost induced a societal ADHD-like syndrome. People seem to alternate from one hundred different things in a minute to being fixated on one thing for the next 100 minutes.
So, for this week, there is no one central topic or theme, but I have several I’d like to briefly discuss and maybe these can then elicit further thought on conversation street.
1/
“Just what is control?”, the words of councillor Hamann in Matrix Revolutions in discussion with Neo. Control is a central theme across the entirety of Matrix series, in the back and forth wrestle between humans and machines/AI. To a deeper point, trying to control the uncontrollable has bothered human beings since time immemorial. That’s why the ancient Stoics had the mantra “control what you can control”, not so much a passive concession to life, but an active realisation of what really is within your ability to master. Caring for my physically ailing mother, which I wrote about last month in “caring for others and caring for yourself”, is a daily reminder and test of this.
2/
I had a recent experience, driving down a local suburban street, of a bunch of joyous kids playing in the street. Completely unknown to them, they all seemed genuinely thrilled to see me and waved out shouting numerous pleasant greetings. The pureness of their happiness overwhelmed me in the car, and after I’d passed them I began to weep uncontrollably. Having neither seen nor experienced such pure joy in God knows how long, it completely caught me by surprise. It felt like a throwback to a time where you couldn’t keep kids from playing in the streets, and the time limit was five minutes after sundown. It was also a bit of a stark reminder of my own shortcomings in the “wife & kids” department. The sheer cheerfulness radiating from these children is not an image I’m going to be able to shift any time soon, and I’m glad for it.
3/
“Praise the sun”, not just a Dark Souls meme, but it is nearly summer here in Australia and we are definitely worshipping Apollo right now. I feel sorry for countries which don’t get a lot of sun, and seasonal depression is a real thing especially in the Scandinavian countries. Getting good early sunlight into your eyes has numerous health benefits. The energy and mood boosts from sunny weather cannot be underestimated, and I say this as someone of a somewhat melancholic disposition and fondness for winter. So, not only is it a great time for activities outdoors – sports, leisure, cooking etc. – but we don’t have to worry about getting snowed in for Christmas!
4/
Speaking of Christmas, as December is practically upon us, it’s actually been a pleasant surprise seeing so many people already getting excited for the festive period. Normally, it’s full of cynical haters complaining about Christmas music in shops and how it’s nothing more than a celebration of capitalism. Granted, there is always a lot of pressure on parents to buy the right present/s, which in a cost of living crisis can cause guilt and shame to go through the roof, but I like to think we can celebrate Christmas without a lot of expenditure. All I need is Die Hard on Christmas Eve and I’m good!
“And on that bombshell it’s time to end. Thank you so much for watching, good night!”
As always please let me know what you think, and whether it worked having multiple topics discussed briefly as opposed to one topic for the entire article. Please consider donating at one of the links below, if you are able to do so, I would very much appreciate it.
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