Human Nature

Even creatures immersed in and obsessed by amour-propre, or constitutionally prone to self-deception and the deception of others, to chronic wishful thinking and prolonged states of denial, to bouts of anger and despair, even we need small victories, however episodic and evanescent … along with symbols or portents of change and hope, however ambiguous or fragile; tokens and symbols of possibility and progress, however obscure or tentative; beacons on the horizon, however faint and distant; models of emulation, however contingent or imperfect; dreams and wishes, however surreal and unreal; desires and expectations, however inchoate or presumptuous; all surrounded by and interrupted and suffused with moments of pure silence, with occasional if not assiduous observing and witnessing, with daily chores and tasks, with attentive acts of loving and helping, sharing and caring, with spontaneous acts of performing and playing; all the while striving to think and feel with indissolubly conjoined minds and bodies, heads and hearts, with souls and spirits willing to consciously confront uncertainty or danger, to risk some things or everything.