The Great and Terrible

The Great and The Terrible

Samuel Bird

My age was under a dark shadow. As my mind was scarred from the sheerness of my life, so was the larger psyche of the world I lived in. Was it the extent of the suffering? There were cases in history that were worse for a given person. No, what damaged the mind so, was a two fold stealing away of meaning from applying to this suffering and a realization that modern man was still comprised of all the follies of the previous men. With any massive outcome, I find it responsible to infer many different causes. For this age of technological violence, I can’t narrow it down to one single factor. Art attempted to make sense of this horror, but it forgot its beauty. Where then was the cause for this? As far as it was willed and deliberate, it was conceived in a mind. Who’s mind then? Certainly each member of the societies at fault played their role that accumulated in its end horrors. However, that is not where the ideas began. There are three minds I have in mine, that were the architects of these great humanist horrors. Each of them responded to the vacuum left by modernity, materialism, and the godless, by making a new god. As I have said before, with heaven crashing to earth, each man made hismelf god and his neighbor the demons. Each of these men did just that. Their philosophies, which I hate to call them so, are based around the idea that someone else was to blame for their life's woes. Whether the wealthy, the elite, or some particular race of people, they found their villain. However, this contra-philosophy is no idea to itself and when that idea comes to its close, it commits the same violence on the heads of those that perpetrated it. These three men are thus: Mao, Stalin, and Hitler.

It is hard to look up from your age, to see times passed, and not look past these monoliths. Their effect on the human race is extreme. These men are who I call the terrible. They made their mistakes in penalizing all ways of thinking they were not imaginative enough to understand. Their closing off to ideas around them became the cage they died in. And yet, these men were something. Their abilities, effects, and implications are widespread and leave few lives untouched. My psyche continually is trying to understand how my kind could vary so far from that which maximizes value. I am sure there is so much I do not know and understand, but what seems to be the case is that these men, if I think they are worthy to be called so, left a scar on the mind. In their power, they cursed all power. In their control, they showed its limits. Once again, it was inevitable that to some degree, their violence turned back on their ideas. Now, when someone hears a vibrant speaker in public, a leader with aggressive plans, or even a character that seeks to be powerful, they can’t see them for their own value or otherwise. It is in the shadow of these dark men. For this reason, I have found that my age curses greatness. It sees all degrees to which one could raise themselves above averageness as a sin in and of itself. This effort to fit the median moves the aim of society in increasingly random directions as there are no great souls to step in front of the crowd and point to a direction in the distance. Crisis on every front, and low-level beaurocrats tell us to keep the status quo while not doing the bravery that is required to perpetuate a social system in a world that has no reverence for what we term order. I have seen time and time again as decent ideas are propelled to horrors by legislating the ideas application. I am not calling for authority, but for greatness. While the world has had too many of the terrible, it will never have enough of the greats. 

Let your values, Esse Maxim, and Deity tell you the direction you must go. Then, let your grit, power, resolve and engagement be the propulsion to make this happen. Greatness is then only the energy toward the objective. These failed men had the energies, but as a lover of the human soul, I can say with grounding that they were misdirected. Curse not greatness within yourself, but steer that direction by which you go. As you find Esse Maxim as it meets the world and yourself, make it clear that you are in fact moving forward. Greatness, engagement, and conviction are tools to your aim, so choose well. This magnamity of spirit will never be invited, but the great never seek permission. The institutions and avenues to bring about the great change you seek in the world will likely not be in place, but with your great excess energies, make them. And then, go about bringing about your goal. I know enough people that believe enough things, but pretty words on a plaque don’t change how you apply them in the small moments, without willpower. Build greatness in yourself proportional to your directing in. Recognize the limits of that greatness and where it may betray you, such that you will need to call on something more than yourself. Outside of that, doubting yourself for its own sake will not serve your ends. I have tried and found the limits of what self-criticism can offer. Feel your outstretched hand. Feel the energy running through your palm. As your body houses the soul, build its architecture. In any way you can conceive that it is better to be than otherwise, do that thing. That portion within you that is the breaking of the tie between lower and higher values, let it become robust. In those moments that choice comes to be of great effect on the world, let your choice aline with what you wish you will have done. 

This cursing, hating, and belittling of the greatness and extremity of humanity hurts the core of what I am. This is because I see it as the pinnacle of expression of what I am. At birth I stand with possibilities limited by a series of genetic facts, and social facts. However, that leaves much room for engagement and realizing and exacting value. With each passing day, the possible becomes more and more actual, until I stand before my God to realize the chasm between what I could have been and what I will be. I mind not the distance placed there by circumstance, but I dread the one placed by my weakness. My inability to execute on my values in such a way that it carved out who I was, will be a regret to the degree that I do so. Early mornings, brutal exertions, and a strained mind accompany my days to stay off this regret. I can’t expect you to maximize all things you could possibly value in one life. However, I can say that this degree of aestecism approximates the degree to which you can sincerely value your life. Rise up. Be more than what you were given permission to be. Grovel no more, and when you slip and tumble, begin again this new life. Let excuses by your little secret and a love for labor and perhaps pain itself go with you. There are enough people trying to be good. I seldom use that word for a reason. They attempt to aline with the values that they were told to. However, I have noticed to the degree that I have built greatness in myself, people have flocked to me in need. The greatest advice I could give to a leader is to build a canopy above those you seek to lead of greatness. They will bask in the security it gives them. The secret is, no one has any idea what they are doing. When one person is aware of this, but goes off full speed, people follow. For this reason, I am often told that I am very compassionate. I stop to help someone who is stranded. I do manual labor to minimize their desperation. I share words and ideas that could be of benefit. However, I am selfish. I do this because of the self-serving nature of loving consciousness. My reward is in its earning. What seems like altruism to you, is egotism of the highest variety, as well as an overflow of the greatness that I have built. I can stop to help people, because I have the tools and know how. I can labor for them, because I have built my body up to do so. I have ideas to share, because of countless hours spent reading and thinking. My greatness spills out from my small vessel to affect the world around me. This is not the concern of weakness seen in years past. This same magnamity can burst forward from me as a roaring lion in defense of those that have none. It can stand for an idea that has none to stand for it. It can wander alone through ideas that no other soul joins me on. I have realized my overcorrection and am beginning to value the company and perception of others. However, I am also aware that I have benefited by knowing that nothing I could do could win someone over, so I best do that which I valued most. 

May I mention three more men? These men stand in stark contrast to the three mentioned prior. As I have said before, characters live on in my mind. Rather than just learning an idea, it helps to learn the character attached to that idea. When I think of idealism and realism, I think of Plato and Aristotle with their vivacious and vivid personalities. This is why I share stories from my life, as I can think of no better way to share Esse Maxim, than to tell you the life that built it. As mentioned before, the three terrible characters live in my mind as an obsession of what the human soul could become. However, there is another end of the spectrum. These characters also are far down the axis of power and magnamity, if not more so. However, they are on the opposite side on the axis in another aspect. In a way that infers the series of Esse Maxims that are preferable over not, something within my soul values their direction infinitely more than the previous men. Something about this infers that not every possible Esse Maxim is even in quality to all others, seeing that the variables of world and self are given. These characters that live on in my head as characters I value and I prefer their company are as follows. Siddhartha Gautama, Socrates, and Jesus Christ. Even now an utterance of them wells up great honor within me. There is one lazy and simple metric I use to evaluate a thought leader. Does their system call them to a life outside of what their organism desires, and did they follow through on it? Hitler’s values led him to take revenge on his perceived enemies. Stalin’s ideas allowed for him to have more power and influence. Mao was able to receive sexual and material gain from his efforts. Siddhartha Gautama starved himself and faced his woes. Socrates' principles led him to death over their subsiding. Jesus Christ walked with the poor, denied his flesh, and sacrificed it to what He valued. These men have residence in the palace of my mind in a way that I will never be the same for. Their magnamity, energies, abilities, and influence were every bit as extreme. However, their direction was toward values that called them from within themselves and to do something more. I have never met any of these extreme men. However, I have met a man that killed many others in what he claimed was because the world was unfair. This man had his excuses for those that would listen, but he knew that what he had done was a lazy giving into his desires. I have also met a great man before. What I remark as objectively different between the two, is that the great man was able to value what he had done, right up until the end. At least his value system was consistent enough to value its outcome. This is where I implore you. Please, do not curse magnamity for its own sake. Rather, consider it the violent force of the soul to bring about values. I invite you to build power over the world around you within yourself. What you can be, be of great consequence. I then ask you to consider the plight and direction of the great, and the terrible.