so give me my life that I may live longest

There was this story I once read in which one of the characters was a man who wished to live as long as possible. His methology stemmed from one understanding - that boredom creates the most excruciating sensation of time's slow passing. Thus he did his utmost to promote boredom in his life and shied away from any activity in which one could derive interest. Any moment spend in profitable activity was considered a stolen moment out of his 'prolonged life'

He seemed quite daft and ridiculous to me at the time, but I have been allowed opportunity to ponder this further - the majority of life inclines towards living to your fullest. And some have searched for eternal life so that they may continue to be doing things. This person has accepted the limitations in life and in his own odd way hopes to prolong the sensation of living through slow time congestion. I would immediately argue that the seconds in life are immediately devalued if one were to do nothing during the while, and then another question arises - perhaps it is rather my addiction to activities that makes boredom seem so unacceptable.

I have read some things that speak of boredom in a different light - that it exists in the mind of man and is amplified by the emptiness one feels in not doing. In a way, I understand it is a weakness not to be able to endure inactivity, to be unable to endure a world in which I have no choice. People like me have long been the face of human grandeur and advancement. For us, incarceration is one of the greatest tortures in itself, for we are allowed no freedom to express ourselves, to make, to ingest and influence. When Rabiya Kadeer spoke of her time in prison, when Ingrid Betancourt spoke of her time as a hostage, I could understand how the suffering for them was increased ten-fold, the despair and anxiety increased ten-fold, due to the sensation of time passing, unused.

I have long held a idea of our activities in this world as continual creation of something better - it of course does not aligne with the image of my 'ideal world', in which we live in harmony with our earth and take not what we cannot return to it - it is an optimistic image of our world, one that has been expounded on by Ayn Rand through her somewhat extreme notions. It is, in short, what the 'American Dream' was based on, and what Hollywood has been selling to the world for decades. We are imbued with a sense of empowerment - but more often than not are frightened by the failures.

If I were inclined to be pessimistic, or for some whom I have recently talked to, realistic, the balance of the world lies truly like sand and stone. We try to build castles, to create beauty out of nature and it's disorders, but whatever we do shifts the balance, and entrophy always inclines our achievements towards chaos. We chop off new pieces of rock to make statues, or to increase 'virgin sand' so that we may make more precious castles, but the result of this is always the creation of more formless sand.

So we stand at a great dam at which our forebears and ourselves have created more chaos, trying to hold that mudslide of sand off.

Governments are like this, education is like this, manufacturing is very much so.

Perhaps I have yet to gain the sort of wisdom that will allow me a life of undoing. Of being at perfect harmony with my world. I shall have to gain that sort of understanding eventually, for it would definitely come in handy. At this stage, however, I'm inclined to live my life to the fullest, in activity rather than passivity. In grandeur if you wish to call it that. On the other hand, however, I'll move more carefully, for every small step I take must be a realization towards this world I wish it were, to have more meaning in my actions.

Are you with me?