A reader remarks that it is only the dark that brings the light into relief; evil and good contextualize one another by their opposition.

Matt responds:

I think what we need every day is a big spoon of castor oil and another spoon of honey.  One will get us going, and one will make us feel good.

Life is about the ups and downs.  People who think they float through life footloose and fancy-free are deluding themselves.  I don’t think anyone really floats through life.  We all have our trials and tribulations.

It’s presumptuous for me to stand in somebody’s shoes and try to figure out why they do the things they do.  I think each of us has our unique chemistry of how we react to the stimuli around us.  Some people see a starving person and think, “Thank God I’m fat.”  Other people say, “How can I help them?”  Other people say, “Give them fish.”  Others say, “Teach them to fish.”

I believe that seeing the yin and yang, the right and the left, the good and the bad, the hungry and the prosperous, agitates us in such a way that we have to say to ourselves:  “I can’t do everything, but what can I do?  What is my unique place in this universe?”

For me, in my own life, if I’m standing in a dentist office, and everybody around me has an aching mouth, there’s not a damn thing I can do about it.  But if I’m sitting with some young artists, I can talk to them about how I got to be where I am and how did I get there, what were my mistakes, what were my strengths...  so that people don’t have to make the same mistakes that I did, over and over again (although sometimes maybe it’s better to make your own mistakes).

But all of this really comes down to:  What is my particular role, and do I really care about it?  Do I really want to do anything about it, or do I, as people say, “float through life”?

We don’t have the faintest idea what hidden good and bad things people do in their lives.  We individually know what we’re doing; I don’t think everybody else has the time to give a damn about it, or could possibly know where we’re going, what we’re doing, what we’re thinking.  I think we should live our lives and do the best we can, and that’s all we can do.

Thanks for the comment,
Matt