Deep Down, We Are All The Same
“Those who have not sinned shall cast the first stone.”
- Word of the Master
It is a well-known observation that we live in a dualistic universe. Just by observing, we can see, especially with varying belief systems, that many people have the tendency of pairing things. If we decide to enumerate some of these things, a very common list may look like: God versus the devil, good versus bad, wealth versus poverty, happiness versus sadness and life versus death. To some extent these factors or aspects of our life can be grouped together, but there is one thing I’ve been having trouble understanding and categorizing. That is “perfect versus imperfect”. Who decides what needs to be perfect? Who came up with different metric systems or criteria to put one person in the perfect group and another in the imperfect group? How do we even know for sure that things, situations, or people that are labeled as perfect are really such? This truly baffles me.
The more I explore these questions, the more I find it hard to understand how or why the word “perfect” even exists. How can we humans categorize things we do, as perfect? I can grasp if it’s a self-imposed standard or we’re trying to do better than yesterday. Hence, assuming that today is ‘more perfect’ than yesterday. But still, something seems “off”, and I don’t know if it’s just me that feels this way. For some reason, I feel like whenever we mentionperfection or doing better, oftentimes it’s driven by selfish motives. If we’re really honest with ourselves, I think in many instances, we want to be or do better just to impress the next person. Yes, we do want better for ourselves but are we sure that’s really the only reason?
All of us have an internal ego. The irony with this internalbattle is that when we reach a certain level and see other people struggling, we somehow “forget” where we came from. We assume or have the audacity to think that we are better than them. We forget that while we no longer struggle with the same issue it doesn’t make us better. We are so quick to judge, we hardly recognize there are other issues we may have faced or are facing that are worse. So how long are we going to keep pretending? What will it take for us to start living truly purposeful lives? All of us still have plenty of work to do and there is nothing to be ashamed of. The most important work starts from within.
Life should not be about seeking or chasing perfection or constantly competing with the next person. Life is about being truly happy and authentic. Life is about trying our best to spend every single second being the reflection of God in this world, in all we do.