Oh, the places your mind will go! (When your surfboard sure as shit ain’t going anywhere…)
(all apologies to Dr. SeusS)
Back in the day when I was a post-doc in Hawai’i, Mr. Boss Man Vandy highly encouraged his minions such as myself to take up surfing. As you can imagine, I was more than happy to oblige.
The one problem? I’m not the most athletically inclined. On top of that, it turned out that I was pretty much illiterate when it came to reading the incoming waves.
The end result of all this being that I would spend a lot of time just floating in the ocean, alone with my thoughts.
Now, when combined with the “Nowhere-to-go, nowhere-else-I-need-to-be” mentality that comes from living on a remote island such as Oahu, I found that I had an abundance of time to just…think.
Turns out, I forgot how much I thoroughly enjoyed just sitting and thinking deeply about something. And it was such a delight rediscovering my long-lost love of philosophizing.
So there I would sit on my board, just pondering the meaning of life and deeply examining my beliefs and values, unwittingly inviting a fate of becoming shark bait.1”Death by shark attack–that’s my final goal!” There, Stephen, I finally got a Grand Buffet reference in. And one of the earliest–and most uncomfortable–conclusions I came to was “most likely, I am wrong.”
Approaching it as a statistician–or if you wanna think of me in a bit sexier light, as an economist–I had to ask myself: “Of all the Big Questions in life, what are the odds I have nailed the answers to any of them?” And the humbling answer is, “Um, statistically speaking, probably not too many of ’em.”
Of course life isn’t that conveniently black and white, and so I should acknowledge that saying that I’m flat-out wrong on a matter might not be completely accurate. I have to allow for the possibility that my understanding is–if I’m lucky–merely incomplete.
Now, this isn’t exactly groundbreaking, or even the most original thought.
Heck, just recently when I was investigating the source of a loved latest one’s conspiracy theory,2Oh, I have thoughts on those too–just wait a few days and I should be writing on that topic as well. Michael Tellinger,3After reading his Wikipedia page, I feel, uh…”conflicted.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Tellinger I came across this quote in his intriguingly entitled book Slave Species of the Gods: The Secret History of the Anunnaki and Their Mission on Earth:4Tellinger, M. (2012). Slave Species of the Gods: The Secret History of the Anunnaki and Their Mission on Earth. Inner Traditions/Bear. ISBN: 978-1-59143-807-6.
Ugh. I haven’t had such an awkward moment of self-realization since that time Alex Jones proclaimed he was prepared to “eat [his] neighbor’s ass”5https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfZcKCIcug8 if all societal hell broke loose, and all I could think was “way ahead of you, buddy.”6I had planned on writing a post or two on similar unorthodox thoughts that I independently had at the being of COVID quarantine; my apologies for not striking while the iron was hot.
Digression and complete lack of originality notwithstanding, it was still very much my own thought. And perhaps that is why it has had such a deep impact on my values and worldview–so much so that I would say it is a key pillar of who I am today.
So, as you often find yourself listen to this humble surfer-wannabe wax long about the various philosophies of life–from the mundane to the incredibly profound–it might be helpful to understand this critical detail. I don’t have the answers. I’m fumbling around in the dark just like the rest of us. And maybe even more clumisily than most!
I ain’t gonna lie: it’s not easy being much less certain about the true nature of reality. But I have discovered that, almost paradoxically, there is profound freedom in the midst of so much self-doubt.
Such a mindset can’t help but impart a deep sense of humility and a refreshing sense of wonder. In the end, the only “truth” I have full confidence in is that no matter what the truth is, it is well beyond my wildest imagination.
If we’re lucky we may catch glimpses of The Profound here and there, but there always be More.
As for all other matters pertaining to the human experience and beyond, I probably should always lead with this caveat I once heard uttered by some wise guy in a wetsuit:
“Oh, I am most indubitably incorrect, Good Sir!”
Suck-at-Surfing Socrates
Oh, and believe it or not, the point of the story is: if you believe that you’re probably right, well then, my friend, you’re probably at least half full of shit. And that’s being optimistic about it…
Content created on: 16/17/18/19 July 2020 (Thurs/Fri/Sat/Sun)
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