Humans are very much fixated on starts and finishes, beginnings and endings, and nothing much for the in-betweens. We mourn the dead, we celebrate births (which of course aren’t bad things), and anything that reminds us of it such as birthdays and memorials. We’re psyched at sunrises and sunsets, about admissions and graduations. The list quite frankly goes on.
What happens to the things that happen in the middle and determines the end? Most times, our beginnings determine the middle of our lives and somewhat how the end might be. Some times, they all form a chiasm. However, as most things in life, there are always exceptions to the rule. But if the majority falls on this, then why are we so neglectful of the major part of our lives that takes on the 99% of the whole life? Why not enjoy every single point in our lives and appreciate it?
As we’ve formed rituals around beginnings and endings, I think it is important to form rituals for the middle and the whole long nine yards of it. I have a theory for this; a bit quite unconventional, but scientific in its approach.
(1) Appreciate the uncommon things. As humans, we usually sign off unpopular and uncommon things, we tend to give them less value and attention. This leaves us with little spike-ful moments in our lives. If you haven’t noticed, we have a relatively short live span and if we live for the common, we won’t have lived to our fullest. I have a suggestion for this.
A way to go about it could be to randomly select a day in your calendar. To avoid unforeseen biases, you could ask a colleague to help you choose; the trick to that is, the individual might be biased in choosing a date, but hopefully it won’t affect yours, because you might have different biases. Now should your biases cross path, pick random individuals on the street and create a whole year’s list of random days and strike off any that seem most packed with biases. Say you’re a Muslim, that means, Fridays are out, Eids, Ramadan, Month of Hajj or the day of Arafat and the list goes on, you get the gist. And begin planning. Plan for absolutely everything that encompasses the middle, say you’d decide to notice on a specific day of your choosing, how the sun is at 11am, or 2pm or whatever time, but definitely not when its rising or setting. Document what you notice about it. Imagine the beauty of that, behind the adverse heat of course, how that has made a lot of inventions to come up, how they say there’s pain in beauty, and think about how that fits in perfectly. Appreciating the uncommon things might give you a new look on life.
(2) Create spontaneous rituals. Our lives are built on rituals and they mostly gives us the memories we have. Birthdays and burials/memorials tend to leave us with photographs of events and how they might have played out. Avoid being happy on only specific days, try to be happy in the in-betweens. On days when memories aren’t expected to happen. Create memories as much as you can. I also have a suggestion for this. It also depends on selecting random days with random individuals, because memories are supposed to happen with individuals we know. Juxtapose that concept. Jump on a bus and start a poetry slam; make people engage in it; set out a simple price, but make the memory more important. Let people destress because of you, I promise you that it would be worth it. Those are the rituals you’ll be happy to tell at the end of your short-lived life.
Understand your insignificance. As an innate human character, we are subconsciously subverted into thinking we are highly significant, and that makes us spend most of lives trying to establish that significance. That being said, we need to simultaneously take a step back into the past as well as look into the future to understand how to appreciate the in-betweens of not mattering as we think we deserve to be. As always, this depends on being random. If you live in a society where there’s a home for the old, an orphanage or a hospital for the newly born, I suggest you visit on the day you feel most significant, which I suppose would be random. Whilst with the old {sitting, conversing or just merely observing), there’s a couple of things one ought to take account of; they’ll speak of times they were once significant or thought they were, and how it doesn’t really matter as much as they had thought it would be. Or how they can’t really help themselves now, and how there’s a lot more to life than overly trying to be significant. That gives a perspective on what really matters, being significant to what matters and causes that matters. As you’ll also find out that they are in the in-between life events. Whilst with the children, you take into cognizance how all that’s happening in life doesn’t matter to them but the present. You will notice how their curiosity shapes their world and how forgiving they are. At the end of the day, you’ll realize how important we spend the most part of our lives doing things that aren’t so much important, and the adverse effect it has at the end we so much cherish. To enjoy the in-betweens, we must understand that the world would thrive with or without us, and quite frankly, maybe a bit better without us.
Seek thought challenging perspectives. This might be the hardest to undergo, as we all like our comfort zones and challenging what you already know can get really uncomfortable. This also means we need to read a lot and meet some of our greatest critics with an open mind. It isn’t enough to live a life without having a purpose, or at the very least trying to find out what that purpose is.
And finally, love. We like to believe that we are a somewhat complicated specie, above human connections and how all that matters is riches and fame. While not everyone falls into this spiral delusion, most are victims of this ever-capitalistic driven world. Again, don’t get me wrong, we need money to survive and not to survive because of money. Most people confuse the two. Fall in love, hopelessly, as much as you can. Tell people you love them, and don’t expect much from them. Because truth is, not everyone will love you back, and its absolutely okay, you need to understand this. However, don’t hoard feelings in your heart, meet exquisite strangers, fall in love countless times, and of course, don’t be unfaithful. Because, a guiding principle of the world is, karma will find you, and karma will make a lesson out of you.
You’d notice these things don’t happen at the extremes (ends) of life, they happen at the core of life, the center, the major chunk of what we keep neglecting or the part we overlook for our little sought out momentary victories. I hope this becomes your redefining moment, where you live for those little things. So maybe on your next tea break, ask a random colleague you’ve never really cared to speak to about stars and galaxies, if they know about supernovas, or how you anticipate the next family you’ll meet at the market who share your struggles. Sometimes, all you really need is an honest deep conversation with a random stranger, who haven’t set up parameters to judge you yet. Do remember to live, there’s so much sadness out there that could consume you. Stay happy, stay safe.
ABOUT WRITER:
Bello Abdullahi is a Nigerian writer. He participated in the 2021 Crater Remote Internship for Creative Non-Fiction Writers.
