Tis better to have loved and lost????
At lunch today I found myself eating with a lady that works in the office. She knows me for being the rather 'interesting' individual that I am and often asks me "so, what is the thought for the day?". Meaning, she is curious as to what stupidly mundane and idiotic turn of events I have been mulling over and over in my head repeatedly to the point that it would drive a normal person insane. Of course, never being one to shy away from questions like that, I quickly pulled one thing out of the air that happened to pop in and we started to discuss it.
"is it better to do something, get to really enjoy it and then face the risk of never doing it again and feel the loss...or is it better not to have done anything and therefore never run the risk of feeling loss about it?"
She thought this through and mulled it over. We then made up the simple example of "is it better NOT to have eaten ice cream ever in your life and therefore you dont miss it when you go somewhere that it never exists, or is it better to have spent the time eating it for those few moments of pleasure?" For, pleasure can last only a second to a few minutes, but regret and loss can last as long as that item you desire is not readily available to you. So, is it worth those few moments of pleasure to risk suffering a life time of loss and regret?
Later she thought she rememebered a quote about regrets but it was eluding her so I supplied my own quote. "My only regret in life is that I have regreted something" She thought this was rather amusing and then carried on by saying that isnt it better to have tried something instead of doing nothing since doing nothing would mean that you would live in a white little box and have had no experiences in your life. Of course, this is easily countered by saying that if you were looking at living in the box now after having been alive in the world for years and years, then yes it would be bad to sit in that box because you know what is out there and what wonders and experiences you are missing. However, if you were born in that box, never experienced life outside that box, how do you know what you are missing to miss?
A real life example of this would be to simply imagine the things that you are missing by being on planet Earth and not out on planet, say, Xerionia that has all these wonderful technological wonders and play toys. There they have mana that falls from the sky that tastes like heaven, toys that can keep you occupied for years on end, a landscape that produces the most beautiful horizons that you could ever imagine that paint the sky with colors beyond our spectrum. Now, don't you feel rather left out and miss those wonderful things? of course not...why? cause you have never set foot on this planet, seen these wonderful things and you can always sit back and say "doesn't exist. that was just my imagination". Same as the person in the box could say. They could imagine a box that would show pictures and sound that they could laugh, cry, get mad, sad, aroused by. Then they can sit back and say "only a dream" and then sit looking at the white walls, just as we sit back and look at the few things that are given to us in this world to keep us occupied and entertained.
Then, of course, we had to end with me just saying "sort of like the saying 'tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all'" and she agreed but then I had to burst her bubble by telling her that our philosophy class on gaming, chaos and society ethics class proved that quote wrong using the ideas of pleasure and pain.
Of course, at the end of all my little talks with people, I always get the usual departure farewell of "you are serious screwed (sometimes even a harsher word there*G*) up!" and they smile, say thanks for a confusing meal and walk away.
Guess when it all comes down to it, the only one who knows if it is better to have 'loved and lost than never to have loved at all' is the person doing the loving and losing, for only they know what means more to them than to anyone else.
"is it better to do something, get to really enjoy it and then face the risk of never doing it again and feel the loss...or is it better not to have done anything and therefore never run the risk of feeling loss about it?"
She thought this through and mulled it over. We then made up the simple example of "is it better NOT to have eaten ice cream ever in your life and therefore you dont miss it when you go somewhere that it never exists, or is it better to have spent the time eating it for those few moments of pleasure?" For, pleasure can last only a second to a few minutes, but regret and loss can last as long as that item you desire is not readily available to you. So, is it worth those few moments of pleasure to risk suffering a life time of loss and regret?
Later she thought she rememebered a quote about regrets but it was eluding her so I supplied my own quote. "My only regret in life is that I have regreted something" She thought this was rather amusing and then carried on by saying that isnt it better to have tried something instead of doing nothing since doing nothing would mean that you would live in a white little box and have had no experiences in your life. Of course, this is easily countered by saying that if you were looking at living in the box now after having been alive in the world for years and years, then yes it would be bad to sit in that box because you know what is out there and what wonders and experiences you are missing. However, if you were born in that box, never experienced life outside that box, how do you know what you are missing to miss?
A real life example of this would be to simply imagine the things that you are missing by being on planet Earth and not out on planet, say, Xerionia that has all these wonderful technological wonders and play toys. There they have mana that falls from the sky that tastes like heaven, toys that can keep you occupied for years on end, a landscape that produces the most beautiful horizons that you could ever imagine that paint the sky with colors beyond our spectrum. Now, don't you feel rather left out and miss those wonderful things? of course not...why? cause you have never set foot on this planet, seen these wonderful things and you can always sit back and say "doesn't exist. that was just my imagination". Same as the person in the box could say. They could imagine a box that would show pictures and sound that they could laugh, cry, get mad, sad, aroused by. Then they can sit back and say "only a dream" and then sit looking at the white walls, just as we sit back and look at the few things that are given to us in this world to keep us occupied and entertained.
Then, of course, we had to end with me just saying "sort of like the saying 'tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all'" and she agreed but then I had to burst her bubble by telling her that our philosophy class on gaming, chaos and society ethics class proved that quote wrong using the ideas of pleasure and pain.
Of course, at the end of all my little talks with people, I always get the usual departure farewell of "you are serious screwed (sometimes even a harsher word there*G*) up!" and they smile, say thanks for a confusing meal and walk away.
Guess when it all comes down to it, the only one who knows if it is better to have 'loved and lost than never to have loved at all' is the person doing the loving and losing, for only they know what means more to them than to anyone else.
posted by Capt_Canuck at 8:19 PM
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