People Are Good

I can tell you, with complete belief in the statement I am making, that people are good.  Perhaps you will see this instinctively, or perhaps you will come around to this way of seeing things with some fine tuning of your perception.  Either way, people are good.

People are good for myriad reasons, but perhaps chief among them is that people want to belong, to relate to others.  This desire may be more buried in some than in others, but in the beyond-overwhelming-majority of human beings, this is going to be the case.  And maybe this is really what I mean: if you're looking for it, you'll find that folks are offering you all kinds of points of commonality through their different behaviors, and if you recognize those overtures, and respond with respect, you will be amazed at the connections that can result.  At base, we're all fumbling in the darkness, hoping that others will find our hand and take it.  In that regard, you're no different than your mom or I, or any stranger, no matter how different they might otherwise appear.

And so maybe I'm conflating the concept of "vulnerable" with the concept of "good," but I think there's some value in blurring those two notions.  Because I think we perceive goodness in a lot of ways, but at bottom we perceive it as some combination of the ability to confer benefit on us, as individuals, and the absence of threat.  And in a lot of ways, when a person makes themselves vulnerable to you, those two elements fall into place. 

Now, I don't tell you this so that you'll use the information for self-serving, manipulative purposes.  Chances are, if someone makes themselves vulnerable to you, it's because you've done the same for them.  The great thing about connecting with another human being is that, when done properly, you've given as good as you've gotten.  One of you has found a way in, offered the same to the other person, been accepted and then the two of you achieve some reciprocal emotional benefit (and experience some reciprocal emotional loss).  All of that stuff happens in the blink of an eye, mind you, but it happens.  What follows next is the free interaction that comes when people have let down (or partially let down) their respective guard.

I realize that this is a lot of wind up for the thesis of this post (that people are good, just in case you've forgotten), but I promise it addresses the point.  Few people are completely selfless, and fewer still got out of bed this morning with the express purpose of subordinating themselves to your will and your needs.  But people want to connect, and people want to feel valued and feel respected and feel loved (to a greater or lesser degree, mind you, but you can still accept this as a universal truth).  The goodness comes from this: if you give that to them -- by reaching out and finding those places to connect with them, emotionally -- you will be astounded by the ways in which they reciprocate.  For that matter, you'll also find that there are folks out there who meet you and who know, instinctively, what your projected points of commonality are, and what your needs are.  They'll connect with you and all of a sudden you'll find yourself opening up, showing a side of yourself you never do, to a stranger (or maybe just to someone who knows how to play you like a fiddle), and you'll find that you wish this person well, that you want good, good things to happen for them, or at the very least, you will find that you are willing to extend yourself in a way that you normally don't for a stranger.

We want to relate to others, is what I'm driving at.  Maybe not every "other," but a lot more than we let on.  And the longer you go through life (provided you keep yourself attuned to the world around you) the more you'll find that your ability to connect with people expands.  This is largely a function of the fact that your perspective will widen as your experience mounts.

Why does this make people good, you ask?  Fair point.  Good is a malleable concept here, and as I said before, I'm blurring the line between good and vulnerable.  But my philosophy evolved around conflating those two ideas.  I've met people who are otherwise bad, who do bad things to good people (or why not..to bad people), but who also had vulnerabilities that they put out into the world, and if you knew what to look for, and accepted and respected what it was that you found, they would treat you with respect and with deference.  You also, it is imperative to say, cannot expect every person to be as good as the next.  Some of the folks I just mentioned...forget about asking them to spend 99% of their time being anything but cripplingly antisocial.  But that 1% of the time that you could connect, you will be surprised at how much it can mean.

So people are good, and some people are better than others.  I feel like I've skimped on specifics, here, but maybe that's what's best.  You will have a lens through which you view the world, and you will likely find a lot of fault with what I've just laid out, but I want to try and shape the perimeter of your worldview on this issue.  I'll let you fill in the details, but at least consider my premise.  I didn't come out of the womb with this idea or anything.  I didn't consciously try and adopt it, either.  It fell into my lap, through repeated years of trial and error.  I walked away from it, only to walk back to it.  I believe in it, and I hope that in some way it might guide you.

A final thought: whatever view you have on others, you are good.  You don't have to explain or contemplate why or how or to what extent.  You are good.  No one else and nothing else has any bearing on that fact, and really, that's all you need to know about that.

Happiness

Happiness can take shape in many different ways, and it comes from many different sources, but to start at the beginning let's just say this: Happiness is feeling happy.

Feeling happy is something that's very personal, because it's defined by what you feel.  Sometimes, feeling happy comes from feeling satsified.  You like the way your day turned out, or you're proud of the way you did something.  Over the course of your life, I hope, a lot of things will leave you happy in this way. 

Sometimes, feeling happy is just a plain old feeling that washes over you.  You smile or you think you want to tap your feet or even dance or you do tap your feet or even dance; you feel like your body wants to jump out of its skin because what's inside you is bigger than you are.  In moments like this, there's not a whole lot of thinking involved.  In those cases, you just feel what you feel and you go with it. 

Happiness is something that can spread from person to person, too.  If you smile, if you feel good down to the depths of your heart, then it's quite likely that you can share this feeling with others and they, too, will feel like you.  There are notable exceptions, of course.  Sometimes, the thing that made you happy is the exact same thing that made another person sad (unfortunately, this can and will happen in life;  and you should know that you'll find yourself on both sides of that equation).  Then, it's usually not a good idea to try and spread the happiness.  It might end in cross words or even a restraining order, particularly if the source of the happiness/sorrow involves a sporting event, or a divorce decree.

Sometimes, happiness occurs even when the event that triggers it seem very sad, on its face.  Some things are pretty self-explanatory.  Having a gloomy outlook or a bunch of macabre interests doesn't preclude being happy, it just means that things that other people might not immediately associate with happiness do, in fact, give you joy.  Rainy days are a kind of featherweight example, so also consider things like being fascinated with werewolves, shark attacks, natural disasters, the works of William S. Burroughs, Berlioz, or Edward Gorey or, if that's not dark enough for you, people like GG Allin or the Misfits, famous criminals, not-so-famous criminals...the list goes on and on, and I'm sure you'll figure out things well more intense than this during your rebellious teenage years.

But happiness in spite of sadness has a deeper purpose, and no matter your outlook on life, it is an essential concept to wrap your head around.  Hear me out, because this is actually a pretty great kind of happiness.   The way you get to it is by going through something that hurts you, but looking at the entirety of the situation and finding a reason to be happy in spite of the sadness.  Let's use one of the all time most powerful sadnesses in existence for our example: death.

Say someone you know, someone who you love very deeply, dies (more on this later, unfortunately).  The sadness you feel will probably involve things like missing this person, wishing they were still with you, wishing they were able to still enjoy the good things that life has to offer, wishing you could just see them again or you could tell them something that you had meant to but never gotten around to saying. etc.

Now, those are very real, very powerful reasons to feel sad.  However, even accepting all of those things, and accepting the sadness that comes along with them, you can dig in your heels and find happiness in the situation, as well.  The way to do that is, in spite of all of the hurt you feel in the current situation, you start picking out all of the good things that were necessarily involved, as well.  For instance, you feel a sense of loss because you loved this person so much.  There's a start.  You can focus on the fact that you had such a good relationship with this person that you were able to feel love (and to feel loved by that person, too).  You can think about the good, special times you had, and how those moments made your life richer.

At this point, you're probably thinking I'm trying to sell you a bill of goods (more on weird expressions later).  I'm not saying that finding things to be happy about in a sad situation takes away the sadness.  That would be an example of what we in the parenting industry refer to as "lying to your kids."  But, it does make things better.  Because...

In life, you're probably going to want to find lots and lots of happiness.  You're going to want to seek it in the obviously good things (a small example: family, friends, a sense of self-worth, a sense of adventure, a feeling that life has something to offer, watching your favorite team go through a perfect season, trying a delicious food for the first time, trying a delicious food for the second time and realizing that it's just as good, looking back on the moment that you first met the love of your life, hearing a song that moves you, reading a book that moves you, being moved by a movie, being moved in general, the day you get your driver's license, the day you move into your first place on your own, the day when you move into your first place with the love of your life, the day, oh, I don't know, that you find out you're going to be a parent...).

And you want to be able to find it in the not so good things.  A fact of life, and we can debate about whether it's a cruel fact or not, is that bad things are going to happen.  The trick to whether or not this will eat you alive is getting good at finding the reasons to be happy in the face of the setbacks.  I know you can do this.  I also know that you won't always be able to do this.  That's ok.  But, and this is a big one: you've got to do it.  It makes life infinitely better.  Even though sad things happen, goodness triumphs.  It really does. 

And that's a pretty convincing reason to be happy.

Beginning Things

I feel silly trying to tell you anything about starting from scratch. As I'm typing this, you're building yourself cell by cell. Starting a blog is unimpressive compared to growing a hand or a pair of eyes. But, that's sort of the purpose of this exercise. I want to try and lecture you about all of the stuff I've done, and all of my perspectives, without paying much attention to what you might be going through our what your opinions on things might be. There's a reason for this: I'm going to be your dad, and this is what dads do.

It's what dads have always done, as a matter of fact. Since the beginning of cellular life, organisms have been forced to listen about what their dads' childhoods were like, on what constitutes a suitable sport to play, on what real music is, on why the utility bills are so damned high...Probably, the first fish to crawl out of the ocean did so at the insistence of its dad that it go outside instead of waste the day in front of the tv.

That last paragraph also introduces you to another facet of dads: bad jokes. More on this later, but for now I'm just saying that you might as well strap in. It's going to be a long ride.

So, beginnings. Honestly, I've begun a lot of things in my life. I've finished very few of them. I'm a big believer in trying stuff, in throwing things against the wall in hopes that they stick. It seems like there's a split in perspectives on this, with some people saying that you should only begin what you know you can finish and others saying you should try it all, no matter what. I'm squarely in the latter camp, and it's led to a lot of fun experiences. The down side is that sometimes you begin something special, and other people care about it, and they rely on you to finish it, and it hurts them a great deal when you don't. Sometimes you don't finish it because you can't, but sometimes you don't finish it because you don't want to.

I don't want you to be afraid of trying new things, and I don't want you to be afraid of doing things for yourself, so I still recommend beginning as many things as you possibly can, and worrying about finishing them later. This is a wide, beautiful, exciting world, and there's far more wonderful stuff out there to experience than you'll ever be able to do in one lifetime, so get out there and grab at as much as you can. Don't be discouraged when some things don't pan out. There's still more greatness out there.

But let's go back for a minute, to what happens when other people have expectations. Some things are so special that once you begin them, you really do have to follow through. Mostly, in my experience, this happens when people are involved. Sometimes not. Sometimes an idea or belief is so important that you can't walk away. But right now, let's stick with people. Namely, let's stick with one person: you. Like I said, I've begun a lot of things, and I've finished few of them. It sounds weird for me to say that your mom and I began you, but in the absence of a better word, I guess that's what we did. We got you started (more on that way later) and, even though I don't think we'll be alive for all of your life (more on that later, too), we'll always be with you, we'll never give up on you, we'll never leave.

So maybe what I'm trying to say about the process of beginning things is this: there are some things you just try, and some things you begin. I hope I'm beginning these entries for you, as opposed to just trying to write some stuff for you. I know, however, that I'm beginning my life with you.