Contentment

I've heard that the best things in life are free. For the life of me, I can't rightly figure how this has been decided; nothing, truly, is free -- monetary cost is only one consideration which, for many Americans, sits at the forefront of all other components of existence, fuelling the need to enrich their lives through a cycle of purchase and consumption, purchase and consumption, purchase and conundrum.

The best things in life are free of direct monetary subsistence; those things which truly mean something to us are much greater than the slips of paper and metal scraps that seem so important by their form and purpose; intent is the only thing which creates a value system around these units of exchange -- the sole bestower of worth is perception, and insofar as we percieve objects or experiences to be valuable, so they are, if only to ourselves. When you take into account the multitude of intent and perception all bent towards believing in the value of a certain anything -- in this instance, money -- then it becomes more valuable in a societal sense than anything else; consentual reality is a self-correcting system, wherein that which the masses deem as most important to the masses becomes most important to individuals seeking to acquire greatness above the masses; the real goal, I think, is to make a name for yourself through establishing greatness by excelling at the things valued by society until you've reached the point where your own preferences -- the things that you, personally, value -- can be brought to the front and inserted into the consensus; that is to say, although society will only recognize those who achieve their definition of value, the definition of value is easy to change once one has established a mastery of the existing infrastructure.

This is why our celebrities are wealthy, and why they proselytize their pet causes. World hunger, global warming, foreign wars; these become the flagship causes of a population enamored with a god-king of the silver screen who speaks to his people and commands respect be shown for these efforts. Most people refuse to create their own sense of worth; they follow the trends, the latest new hot thing being touted by the emergent American Idol champion or whichever female celeb is willing to strip her clothes and let her airbrushed, ever-so-perfect looking flesh advertise a cause; this is the new disease of a nation which denies its own responsibility to itself through vicariously existing as the select few elite, the banner-waving people who were willing to adhere to their own structure of worth -- to a point -- and now champion their endeavors with zeal and gusto, like only a true dreamchaser could do.

We seek to find solace in something. Those who are leaders among us imagined a goal, or saw something which they felt was desirable, and they achieved it; the dejected hordes who have surrendered their thoughts to these avatars of nationalism seek that same fulfillment of desire through accomplishing tasks on behalf of the Ba'alesque beings that straddle the sky from their glass and steel towers; we serve their causes so as to feel that same sense of worth, as if we have done something, and it mattered -- a legacy can be built on nothing more than charity if the spin is right and the cause is popular.

When you chase a dream, are you certain it is your own?

Contentment