The Deception of Reception

The concept of a paradox is one in which I have been fascinated with since I first learned its definition. To examine a paradox is to ideologically suggest that something's only purpose for existence is to contradict itself and only within that contradiction is the suggestion that it may exist. Could anything be more beautifully poetic?

There are times in this life where some of us beg for change. Some of us wish for it beyond any hope of it ever substantiating. Some of us fall to our knees in prayer to a grand architect and ask for divine intervention to deliver it to us. Even fewer still possess the fortitude to stand and will that change into existence.

For the ones lucky enough or able enough to make gains on that change, why do we ultimately fear that change? We've begged, wished, prayed or fought for it and then it stands before us and stares us right in the face. All the work, chasing, focus... all of it brought us to the point where we can reach out and grasp with our bare hands what it was we longed for so dear. Yet, we tremble as we reach out and then in the moment of truth a majority of us retreat, empty-handed.

I am learning that within the context of the human spirit our hopes, wants and desires are truly paradoxical. We wish for what we have yet to obtain and nothing we have obtained satisfies us. We are ultimately the spiritually bi-polar and we lie victim to existential over-consumption.

For me, this same concept bleeds into how I relate to women, how I occasionally view these changes that I am in the middle of and how I lose focus throughout the day. Am I chasing what is best for me? For someone who does not know himself very well I find this question painstakingly difficult to determine. 

At the same time, day after day, I am able to confidently hold the idea of 'yes, I am' in answer to that question for longer periods of time before dashed by second guessing. As I push the limits of what I can physically accomplish, as I unwind confounded thought into words and finally as I reconcile with what I think of 'me', I begin to find pieces of myself. These were ends that were tattered in someone else's name and these are shards that were broken off in the name of character compromise. I will stitch and I will melt down every last lost piece and the whole will be greater than the sum of the parts. After all of the patchwork is in place and all of the smelted material has cooled, somehow I have a funny feeling that I'll be smiling in the mirror at an incredibly familiar face that which I will feel that I never lost in the first place.