Thinking of writing a mini-Credo
Oct. 4th, 2008 06:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
capri0mniI first zeroed in on my belief in Joy in college, when I was required, for 50% of my grade of a "World Religions" course, to write a formal credo, outlining my believes, and reasons for them, regarding the origins, nature, and destiny of:
in no more than than 15 pages.
This was relatively easy for 90% of my classmates, who were members of mainstream, Abrahamic, religions. All they had to do was cite the chapter an verse of Scripture to find the source of their beliefs, and then relate that to their individual lives.
I, on the other hand, made the decision to come out of the "Broom Closet," and write about my polytheistic, neo-Pagan theology. I didn't have a single source I could cite.
When it came to the question of Life's "Destiny" (ie: the reason for being), I looked, first, to my own life, and why the hell I bothered to get out of bed in the morning, and put up with all the frustration and headaches that dealing with the world-at-large entails. I sat down (or maybe I was already sitting down -- on the floor, getting dressed in the morning), and thought it through. Again, I started with the small and the specific: What makes a single good day for me?
And I realized -- it was the little things: seeing an incredibly beautiful sunset, hearing birdsong at dusk, laughing at a stupid joke with a friend, tasting a perfectly sweet apple -- all small moments when I experience Joy. Then, I did what I was taught to do when checking my math homework: perform the opposite function, and see if the two halves match up. So I asked myself: when I'm having a particularly bad day, and contemplate suicide, when does that notion seem most enticing? And the answer did match up: I contemplate suicide in those moments when I've lost all hope of experiencing future Joy.
I asked myself if it was reasonable to believe that what was true for me was universal for all humans, and I answered myself that it was. And then I asked if I could reasonably assume that this was also true for all sentient life. And I remembered seeing horses, and dogs, and cats, and wild birds, and (on tv) dolphins and whales at play, and the answer was, again: Yes.
So I wrote something like this into my credo: "The reason for life, from the ameoba to the great grey whale, is to experience Joy."
...
When I got the paper back, the teacher had written in the margin, in red pencil: "Who said this?!" assuming that everything I believed I had learned from someone else (Since I was limited to 15 pages, I didn't have room to spell out thought process).
The only version of An die Freude I knew was Beethoven's symphonic setting, so I didn't have any idea that Schiller had written that:
If I had, I would have quoted him. But when I found the lines, years after the fact, I was all: Yay! Yes! TruFax!!
I now consider myself an atheist (my beliefs have always continued to grow, in response to my life experience, and self-questioning, and contemplation), but my belief in the importance and power of joy is as deep as ever.
Anyway, on NPR, there's this thing called "This I believe," where they invite you to write a brief essay (three minutes, read aloud) on a core belief, how you came upon it, how it's changed your life, or how your life has challenged it. 350-500 words is very short. But it's more space for that single subject than I was able to devote in my original essay.
And, looking at the list of topics covered in all the essays submitted, I didn't see one entry for either Happiness or Joy.
So I'm thinking of submitting my own belief statement about Joy (a lot more focused and short than this post). But:
Other than working on an academic assignment, 20-something years ago, I can't think of a single, concrete moment I can turn into a story.
So I'm left with a "Hmmm..." rolling around in my head...
How about writing about the pro-fun troll threads on RADW, and how we made inroads of giggles into a culture of bickering? Too trivial?
*Translation from the German by Wilifred Schaum.
- Ultimate Reality (God, or alternatives, if you're atheist)
- Physical Universe
- Life
- Human Culture
- and Religion
- with complete citations and bibliography
in no more than than 15 pages.
This was relatively easy for 90% of my classmates, who were members of mainstream, Abrahamic, religions. All they had to do was cite the chapter an verse of Scripture to find the source of their beliefs, and then relate that to their individual lives.
I, on the other hand, made the decision to come out of the "Broom Closet," and write about my polytheistic, neo-Pagan theology. I didn't have a single source I could cite.
When it came to the question of Life's "Destiny" (ie: the reason for being), I looked, first, to my own life, and why the hell I bothered to get out of bed in the morning, and put up with all the frustration and headaches that dealing with the world-at-large entails. I sat down (or maybe I was already sitting down -- on the floor, getting dressed in the morning), and thought it through. Again, I started with the small and the specific: What makes a single good day for me?
And I realized -- it was the little things: seeing an incredibly beautiful sunset, hearing birdsong at dusk, laughing at a stupid joke with a friend, tasting a perfectly sweet apple -- all small moments when I experience Joy. Then, I did what I was taught to do when checking my math homework: perform the opposite function, and see if the two halves match up. So I asked myself: when I'm having a particularly bad day, and contemplate suicide, when does that notion seem most enticing? And the answer did match up: I contemplate suicide in those moments when I've lost all hope of experiencing future Joy.
I asked myself if it was reasonable to believe that what was true for me was universal for all humans, and I answered myself that it was. And then I asked if I could reasonably assume that this was also true for all sentient life. And I remembered seeing horses, and dogs, and cats, and wild birds, and (on tv) dolphins and whales at play, and the answer was, again: Yes.
So I wrote something like this into my credo: "The reason for life, from the ameoba to the great grey whale, is to experience Joy."
...
When I got the paper back, the teacher had written in the margin, in red pencil: "Who said this?!" assuming that everything I believed I had learned from someone else (Since I was limited to 15 pages, I didn't have room to spell out thought process).
The only version of An die Freude I knew was Beethoven's symphonic setting, so I didn't have any idea that Schiller had written that:
Flowers [Joy] entices out of buds,
Suns out of firmament,
Spheres she rolls around in spaces
Unknown to the onlooker's telescope*
If I had, I would have quoted him. But when I found the lines, years after the fact, I was all: Yay! Yes! TruFax!!
I now consider myself an atheist (my beliefs have always continued to grow, in response to my life experience, and self-questioning, and contemplation), but my belief in the importance and power of joy is as deep as ever.
Anyway, on NPR, there's this thing called "This I believe," where they invite you to write a brief essay (three minutes, read aloud) on a core belief, how you came upon it, how it's changed your life, or how your life has challenged it. 350-500 words is very short. But it's more space for that single subject than I was able to devote in my original essay.
And, looking at the list of topics covered in all the essays submitted, I didn't see one entry for either Happiness or Joy.
So I'm thinking of submitting my own belief statement about Joy (a lot more focused and short than this post). But:
Other than working on an academic assignment, 20-something years ago, I can't think of a single, concrete moment I can turn into a story.
So I'm left with a "Hmmm..." rolling around in my head...
How about writing about the pro-fun troll threads on RADW, and how we made inroads of giggles into a culture of bickering? Too trivial?
*Translation from the German by Wilifred Schaum.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2008-10-05 01:37 am (UTC)Not too trivial.
(I might or might not, however, make any explicit allusions to Doctor Who.)
no subject
Date: 2008-10-05 02:15 am (UTC)(Also, I'm now thinking that maybe writing about the academic paper might be okay, too... only, better than I did, here).
no subject
Date: 2008-10-05 06:35 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-10-05 06:59 am (UTC)Glad I could offer something you needed, when you needed it.