Life as a standing wave

[from a comment I left for furfairy: discuss]

If you persist in framing everything that happens with a negative script, life hardly seems worth living.

It helps me to think this way: I am an organized pattern of thoughts embodied in a chemical/electrical matrix which is constantly decaying and being renewed through its strength of pattern. Most of the atoms in my body are different than the ones of my body ten years ago, and similarly my thoughts and memories are more copies of what was than originals. I am only a cousin of the man and boy I once was. I am constantly losing, and constantly gaining; and if I think if what was and what I have lost and don't think of what will be and what I am gaining, I will miss the glory that is life, and cower from the action that is needed to renew myself.

Learning to enjoy the present -- and acting to realize a better future instead of dwelling on the losses of the past -- helps a lot.

Eric S Raymond comments

[for political types only]

Eric Raymond (famed open source iconoclast) has written a nice commentary on Left2Right, a new blog aiming to bridge some gaps.