truths

I found a list of life truths. There are some missing because I didn't feel they were entirely true or necessary. But here is the list of life truths as I see it

1. You can’t change other people, and it’s rude to try.

3. If you’re talking to someone you don’t know well, you may be talking to someone who knows way more about whatever you’re talking about than you do.

5. Everyone likes somebody who gets to the point quickly.

6. Bad moods will come and go your whole life, and trying to force them away makes them run deeper and last longer.

7. Children are remarkably honest creatures until we teach them not to be.

8. If everyone in the TV show you’re watching is good-looking, it’s not worth watching.

9. Yelling always makes things worse.

10. Whenever you’re worried about what others will think of you, you’re really just worried about what you’ll think of you.

11. Every problem you have is your responsibility, regardless of who caused it.

12. You never have to deal with more than one moment at a time.

13. If you never doubt your beliefs, then you’re wrong a lot.

16. Cynicism is far too easy to be useful.

17. Every passing face on the street represents a story every bit as compelling and complicated as yours.

18. Whenever you hate something, it hates you back: people, situations and inanimate objects alike.

21. Anger reveals weakness of character, violence even more so.

22. Humans cannot destroy the planet, but we can destroy its capacity to keep us alive. And we are.

25. Putting something off makes it instantly harder and scarier.

27. Nobody knows more than a minuscule fraction of what’s going on in the world. It’s just way too big for any one person to know it well.

28. Most of what we see is only what we think about what we see.

30. The most common addiction in the world is the draw of comfort. It wrecks dreams and breaks people.

31. If what you’re doing feels perfectly safe, there is probably a better course of action.

32. The greatest innovation in the history of humankind is language.

33. Blame is the favorite pastime of those who dislike responsibility.

34. Everyone you meet is better than you at something.

35. Proof is nothing but a collection of opinions that match your own.

36. Knowledge is belief, nothing more.

37. Indulging your desires is not self-love.

39. Self-examination is the only path out of misery.

41. Revenge is for the petty and irresponsible.

42. Getting truly organized can vastly improve anyone’s life.

43. Almost every cliché contains a truth so profound that people have been compelled to repeat it until it makes you roll your eyes. But the wisdom is still in there.

44. People cause suffering when they are suffering themselves. Alleviating their suffering will help them not hurt others.

45. High quality is worth any quantity, in possessions, friends and experiences.

46. The world would be a better place if everyone read National Geographic.

47. If you aren’t happy single, you won’t be happy in a relationship.

56. If anything is worth splurging on, it’s a high-quality mattress. You’ll spend a third of your life using it.

57. There is nothing worse than having no friends.

58. To write a person off as worthless is an act of great violence.

59. Try as we might to be otherwise, we are all hypocrites.

63. Casual swearing makes people sound dumb.

64. Words are immensely powerful. One cruel remark can wound someone for life.

65. It’s easy to make someone’s day just by being uncommonly pleasant to them.

66. Most of what children learn from their parents isn’t taught on purpose.

67. The secret ingredient is usually butter, in obscene amounts.

68. It is worth re-trying foods that you didn’t like at first.

69. Problems, when they arise, are rarely as painful as the experience of fearing them.

70. Nothing — ever — happens exactly like you pictured it.

73. When you break promises to yourself, you feel terrible. When you make a habit of it, you begin to hate yourself.

74. A good nine out of ten bad things I’ve worried about never happened. A good nine out of ten bad things that did happen never occurred to me to worry about.

76. Sometimes you have to remove certain people from your life, even if they’re family.

78. There is no point finishing a book you aren’t enjoying. Life is too short for that. Swallow your pride and put it down for good, unfinished.

80. Breaking new ground only takes a small amount more effort than you’re used to giving.

81. Life is a solo trip, but you’ll have lots of visitors. Some of them are long-term, most aren’t.

82. One of the best things you can do for your kids is take them on road trips. I’m not a parent, but I was a kid once.

83. The fewer possessions you have, the more they do for you.

86. Wishing things were different is a great way to torture yourself.

87. The ability to be happy is nothing other than the ability to come to terms with how things change.

88. Killing time is an atrocity. It’s priceless, and it never grows back.

i wonder

why are we alive if we eventually stop living?
i'm not asking the meaning of life, really.
why fight so hard to stay alive when everyone will die.
why is death such a negative thing when it is the one certain thing we posses?
but maybe that's like asking "why drive a car if you eventually stop driving?"
the answer is obvious, to get somewhere.
maybe we are just getting somewhere.
except we have no idea where as it is hidden behind the black veil of death.
would we spend out lives differently if we knew what was behind that veil?
but i mean, what's the point of being human if, at some point, every person will stop being human.
i am not saying we should live like animals but i just wonder what being a human is for.
in this book i am reading, "The Zen Commandments" by Dean Sluyter, it says that to sacrifice your life for someone you love is to give up every food you've ever eaten, every sunset you've seen, every breath you've taken, all the knowledge you have worked to acquire.
which made me think, why do we think? why do we do anything?
to what purpose does it serve to want to know more. why is the search for answers and knowledge so innate within us when the knowledge we gain does nothing for us after death.
why do we experience emotions, why do we test our emotionally capacity through human relationships? who do we see sunsets? how does any of this help us when we die?
in the afterlife, in Heaven, it won't matter what bands we enjoyed, what books we read, what relations we had. is life just to be enjoyed, explored and then ended. everything we've gained, fought for, and experienced, coming to an end, never to come to use again.
don't get me wrong, i LOVE being alive and being humans. i find it extremely enjoyable.
but i feel like there most be a greater purpose to life than to just be enjoyed?
but from everything i've said, maybe that is the only purpose.
i'm not implying that life is meaningless, i am just curious.
why be curious when whatever you are curious about doesn't matter when you die?
it sounds morbid but i don't mean it to be.
i don't find death to be as morbid as most people, i don't know it well enough.
i guess i just see it was that veil.
i sometimes wonder if eternity is real.
i mean, i believe in Heaven and Hell, but i'm not sure if I believe in eternity in Heaven or Hell, because what's the point in that, really?
maybe God doesn't keep creating new souls, maybe he only creates new bodies.
that probably sounds bad, but i think there are so many things that are so beyond us.
and the Bible only tells us of our existence. maybe there was an earth before this one.
maybe there will be one after this. i always hear about the Rapture and i believe it, but then i wonder, after it's all over, "then what?".
maybe there's different universes or realms or realities, co-existing with ours, and they have their own Bible, telling them of their existence. and maybe Jesus went there too and died for their sins too. and maybe their brains were created different and they developed in entirely different ways that we can't even comprehend, just as they can't comprehend our 3Gs and ever changing technology. maybe they can use magic and talk to animals. and i bet you think i just have a huge imagination. but maybe these things only exist in our imaginations because we are, on some cosmic level, connected to those other beings, in ways we may never notice, or that we pass off as dreams.
and maybe when we die, we do go to heaven and hell. and we wait.
wait to be put into a new body and live a new live on a new Earth or realm.
i wonder how many times i've lived before.
none of that explains the purpose of being human to begin with so it was just pointless ramblings.
but still, i wonder.

free footed author of all

[just a story that's been stuck in my head. this is just a really bad introduction. i am not good at writing prose. i am anxious to get to any part involving dialogue. i am terrible at it and it frightens me! [i know sometimes it's in past tense and others in present but i'm too lazy to fix it at the moment, plus, i can't decide.]

Monte didn't love Tessla Azul because she was extremely beautiful. She had plain brown hair, freckles despite her tanned skin, and had a lopsided grin. He didn't love her because she was extremely smart or exceptionally talented. Except writing, she was a world acclaimed author. According to Tessla, she had written every book and piece of literature ever known to man. This was due to the fact that she would simply scratch out any author's name and replace it with her's. She had a problem reading anything she didn't write herself.
That was one reason Monte loved Tessla. She made absolutely no sense all the time which just made so much sense to him. She never wore shoes. Not even to school. Her mother had to ask the principal for a special exception. Not that it mattered, Tessla would have gone barefoot with or without any special exception. "Our feet are our soles, Monte. And they are also our souls.", she would say, giggling at her own joke. It didn't make sense to Monte, but it didn't not make sense either.
That's what was so great about Tessla, He thought a lot about her but he never knew what to think. Sometimes he thought about what forever would be like with Tessla, what kind of mother she would be. But he knew they were not soul mates. No one would ever be Tessla's soul mate. Because her spirit was far to massive to fit inside the arms of any man [or woman, Tessla didn't judge those kind of things.]
But her body fit perfectly inside his arms as he sat behind her on the blanket they laid out by the river, watching the sun set. They did this every Friday, to celebrate the weekend. Every Sunday they would watch a zombie movie, to lament the start of the school week. Her hair always smelled like something different. Today it smelled like lavender and he was glad. Sometimes it smelled like things it shouldn't, like pickle juice or car oil.

Tessla Azul was by all definitions weird. And Monte Martin was not. He wrote bad poetry, collected stolen street signs, and wanted to be a weatherman. All his stolen streets signs were from Tessla. She liked to steal things. Not products in stores or people's personal items, just things, in public, that she thought were free enough. Monte had said that he felt bad for these items. They were free and could be themselves and not have to please anybody and she forced them into his possession against their will. So, to make up for it, she would set one item of her own free when she stole something. Monte didn't understand it, but he kind of did.

People did not get why Tessla and Monte were together. Tessla's parents were both writers and they thought Monte was a character and they seemed to think that everything Monte said was funny. Monte thought they were weird. Monte's mother was an elementary school teacher and his father was a photographer. Not the artistic kind that travels or works with models. He mostly did yearbook pictures and family portraits. Both his parents thought Tessla was sweet and interesting and a bit off.

Tessla and Monte had been together for 2 years, except for a three month period where Tessla was convinced that Monte was an alien. They were still friends though. She just had personal issues with dating an alien and asked if Monte could please not take offense. Monte didn't really get it at all. But he liked it.

One time they had sex. Spiritually it was magical, physically it was just okay. They both agreed it wasn't their forte and they should probably just leave it up to the professionals, but they were glad it happened. They didn't kiss much either, only when they were especially filled with love for each other at that moment. They didn't want the meanings of things to become obsolete or worn from use. They didn't say "I love you", but they said "I appreciate you." Monte got that.

They didn't talk a lot when they watched the sun set. Sometimes Monte would make up bad poems on the spot and whisper them in Tessla's ear. Sometimes she would spout off random "Tessla-isms", certain proverbs and facts of life she was prone to create. Monte kept a list of them. He didn't tell Tesla this. He didn't know if she would get it or appreciate it.

He didn't know how long she intended to grace him with her presence. She claimed forever, because he was good. But Tessla's forever and an average person's forever are a lot different. Monte was glad he got that, otherwise he would certainly be heartbroken when she leaves on some great adventure, free footed and filled with joyful memories. He often thought of what it would be like when she leaves. Will he still be happy when his life is significantly more mundane? Monte thinks he will be alright. He hoped she'd send him postcards.