Ingredient 20 - "Failing"

Twenty ingredients in, and we have "failing."  It's gotta come up somewhere on The List.  No way around it.

Failing is an interesting plot line, and by "interesting" I mean: a totally necessary ass-rape...until we step out of our own prison and can feel free to drop the soap anywhere we please, without consequence.

We are pretty much taught from infancy that failure should feel bad, but at the same time we are taught that failure is meant to do good things for our character.  Supposedly, it makes us stronger, smarter, more compassionate... YET, if this is true, I have to say, the world is filled beyond its firmament with successful people.  Not much failure here on Earth!  No sir.  Not based on those guidelines.

Forgive my pessimism (or not...whatever), but I just don't see a whole lot of people actually learning from their mistakes.  On the contrary, what I see (mostly) is a planet over-run with two-legged egocentric monstrosities so hell-bent on NOT failing that they are pretty much dropping the proverbial ball all over the place and blaming every one else when they inevitably trip over it.  We are a sad, hot mess.  And, I blame the concept of "failure" (I also blame "blame," but that's another blog-post).


I've done a lot of thinking about this, and while there are many trinkets I could pull out of my toy box and share, this is a blog, not a novel; so I will pull out only the toys with the most alluring shape, size, and battery power: Let's play with prehistoric tendencies and...GOD.  Didn't someone say "ass-rape?"

Yep, God and failure = toMAYtoe/toMOToe. 

I am pretty sure that our cycle of ridiculously passive-aggressive self-obliteration MIGHT (ironically) have something to do with the religions of the world.  I mean, shit: if god and his angels are going to smite me for not living up to whatever "plan" happens to be laid out before me, it's likely that I am going to suffer some severe acid reflux - at the very least - when failure looms as a constant "maybe" to Life's never-ending challenges.  That's the kind of thing that will make you run from yourself...in circles.



I understand that there was a time when people did not have the science and technology to explain seemingly wrathful acts of nature, so they did the figuring and could only come up with punishment as a plausible answer.  What else could they do but start going over all the ways that they - as individuals and/or communities - had FAILED the entities controlling such magnificent things as lightening and tornadoes and tidal waves and fire.  It makes perfect sense, really.


But C'MON!  We have meteorologists and iphones now.  We are only a couple of centuries away from putting God on speed-dial.  So, why does the concept of failure still have us so shamelessly corralled? 

Systematically (and again: ironically), fear resulting from a lack of basic comprehension lead to the inevitable human contemplation of failure, which created a whole lineage of god-concepts.  Yet when understanding began to abound, religion remained a source of power-lust, and so the use of fear resulting from the threat of failure's disciplinary tactics is what built "organized god-wrath," which turned out to be quite the efficient fencing of "the herd."  And, it was such an easy thing to do because...

CONCEPTUAL FAILURE IS A HUMAN CONDITION. 
There isn't much we can do about what is inherently built into our DNA.  We either kill the gazelle or die of hunger.  We either rule the food chain or become the food.  If we fail, we die.  Our very chromosomes DEMAND success.  Right?   Maybe.


Maybe not...


MAYBE, we learn to rise above the terms of the "human condition." MAYBE, "the terms" exist just to be denied. MAYBE, we choose will over primal instinct.


And MAYBE, we reconcile OurSelves with our opinion of what is and is not Divine.