Meaninglessness vs. dumb luck

This is something I'm constantly at war with myself about. Life is meaningless, but I yearn for meaning. There is no "justice" (and, for me, that's probably a good thing), but I find myself wishing for it anyway. Some people believe in fate, but I think life is greatly composed of dumb luck. Part of me embraces the randomness and part of me wants to reject it. There is, in many things for me, great tension at the line between wanting and not wanting. Especially on these topics.

In Family Therapy class, we engaged one night in a lengthy discussion about whether there is any purpose in asking "why" something happened or "why" someone is engaging in a particular behavior. As a journalist, this was always an interesting question to ask because people come up with some really unexpected answers to it. As a therapist, though, it's not the most effective of questions. It can start to a wild goose chase. In part, it's because the simple act of a question presumes there's an answer to it. One answer, anyway. A curative. Something that makes everything else make sense.

But "why" is a spider's web. Sticky and easy to get tangled up in. And there are a lot of paths that seem to head toward some point of convergence that doesn't exist. There are thousands of answers to why. I'd hate to try to explain, for instance, why I'm writing a blog. There's no one reason.

This is, in part, how the concepts of "fate" or an intrinsic "meaning" to life collapse for me. There's no singular truth about anything. And without some kind of singular truth, you cannot have "justice;" there is no ojective place from which to make that determination. Subjectivity of experience, individual perceptions and relative reality simply do not allow such a vantage point.

So people create something external, some notion of "right" and "wrong" and ethics and virtue and morality -- they create god myths and bogeymen and, perhaps, even the "laws" of physics -- to anchor them in what is an otherwise stormy sea. A smart friend described such an anchor as "the luxury of dogma." I would also say it's the laziness of dogma. When you don't have to think for yourself, when you don't have to face the ambiguity of life because you have "the answer" (and jesus loves you for it), it's a bit easy to become smug or, worse, complacent to the point that you give away all the incredible choices you could make in your life.

Perhaps one thing that unites humans is the problem, the joy, the pain and the freedom of "not knowing." Consider that, of all the "stories" we experience in this life, the one ending we're assured of not knowing is our own. Some people regard this as a cosmic slap in the face -- and, well, it probably is -- but it can also be embraced as something that lets us off the hook a little, allows us to stop sitting in such harsh judgment of ourselves and others. We don't know what's going to happen next. We don't know if we'll rise above our own shortcomings or find brand new shortcomings that suprisingly rise above us. We can't even be assured that some day, we won't be boiling our shoe in a pot of water just for the sake of its flavor. (Horrifying, true. But then what happens?)

"All knowledge is an arch wherethrough gleams that untraveled world whose margins fade forever and forever when I move." That's Tennyson for you. Frankly, I like a world that doesn't have all the answers worked out. If I thought there was "fate," what motivation would I have to make considered choices? And if I really thought there was "justice," it would curb the enthusiasm of the part of me that enjoys misbehaving. I prefer a life where I don't get to know the ending. I don't need "meaning" when I've have the gift of curiosity. Please, life, keep me guessing. But I'll take some dumb (good) luck if you've got it.

(Probably should note I saw Woody Allen's latest, "Matchpoint," tonight. There is a genesis for this little rant.)