On Cooking a Frog

I love to use little metaphors to make a point, and there is a story these days that creates a very obvious image. To wit: If you toss a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will hop out immediately. On the other hand, if you toss a frog into a pot of cool water and turn on the fire, it will slowly get used to the increasing temperature and eventually let itself boil to death. Grim story, but it makes an unmistakable point. It illustrates serious inattention. In fact if I wanted to give this essay a different title, I would call it “On Not Paying Attention.” Our lives can move along, seemingly in a particular direction, and then end up where we had never meant to go. We can be asking ourselves the question, “How did I get here?”, and then search for the answer. Often we will find a series of unnoticed choices…or non choices…that brought us where we are.

the unexamined life

It is Socrates who said that “the unexamined life is not worth living.” While I would hardly go that far, I would say that an unexamined life can cause us to be caught in a drift we hadn’t noticed. I could also call this essay, “On Thinking Ahead,” so that we might be able to avoid some of the hot water into which we get ourselves.

the original heart's desire

It is true that some of us plan our lives down to the last detail, almost ad nauseum sometimes. Nice work if you can get it and not be interrupted by wars, pestilences, family trauma or simply, the unexpected. Many things can interrupt the most thoughtful plan, but a heartfelt way to go can still carry a vision when the smoke clears enough for clarity to emerge. Some of us end up in quite different places than we had imagined, but the original heart’s desire does not necessarily go astray. Can we not also do what we had in mind in another venue?

A general guiding principle

I believe there is a general guiding principle that runs through all and this is to express life fully. We can do this in a gazillion different ways, but we will need to pay attention to it. Nature finds ways to express itself because it knows nothing else. The creeper blocked off by a wall will go through a crack or extend its tendrils around the wall. You and I can sigh and forget the whole thing. Not important enough, I guess…or maybe it is, but we simply stop seeking other ways to be fulfilled. We don’t have to handle everything that comes along. Maybe it really is not that important, but we don’t have to be casual about it either. There are always choices in front of us, and the mind is always thinking because, unless insanity clouds it permanently, it can’t do otherwise. Barring the inability to think clearly, we will need to keep noticing and deciding. We can be directive or give our lives over to fate, and that would truly be the tragedy.