Friday, April 23, 2010

My stone

When a realistic view of the world ceases to be useful, when it prevents you from making the world a better place or from pursuing happiness, then the only sane decision is to reject it. What sanity can lie in giving up? It is the only sure failure.

So then, when the sound mind is outmatched, outnumbered, and hopeless, it must cling to the fantasy of a world where the odds are better.

Some would call this pathetic naiveté. A childish desire to see the darkness as sunshine and rainbows. "It's easy to believe the best," they say, "but the hard truth is that the world is very dark."

False. There is nothing easy about being positive.

Hopelessness is, in fact, the champion of the lazy. The defeated don't have much work ahead of them, and no expectations for their performance. It is easy to believe the worst. When there's nothing to be done, there's nothing that needs doing.

But for those who see everything as a problem to be solved, those who proceed forward as though the world is the way it should be, much work is in store. Slings must be checked for wear. Small stones must be gathered, hefted, and carefully selected.

And we could use a hand.

1 comment:

Potamy said...

I really liked this post, Samwise! I'm glad someone else recognizes that retreating into pessimism and cynicism is taking the easy way out.

I think, though, that there's a difference between false optimism and hope. False optimism looks at everything going on in the world and either refuses to acknowledge the bad or fools itself into believing that nothing bad is actually happening. Either way, it's just a form of escape.

Hope, on the other hand, looks at the world, sees what is wrong with it AND what is right about it, and decides to work to end all that is wrong while having faith that, in the end, all wrongs will be righted.

It's a difficult path to walk, but as Samwise Gamgee himself said, "There's some good in this world, Mr. Frodo, and it's worth fighting for."