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What Do You Do After 'Perfect?'

In the last post, I was quite serious about appreciating the perfection of camping with the trailer door facing east, in order to expose yourself to cold air and warm sun in the morning.  But I had a funny reaction to that perfection.  How do you top it?  What is the next project?  Is perfection interesting forever? 

One thing you could do is to look for other examples of perfection.  For instance, when I take a pseudo-nap after a good mountain bike ride, the relaxation is perfect, in part because I am conscious of it when it is happening.  It has always been a favorite thing to do.  So looking for more examples of outdoor-experience-perfection is a worthwhile project.

But more examples don't really answer the question about the permanence of perfection.  This issue comes up in another situation: stick-and-brick people will typically ask a full-time RVer if they have found their Shangi-La -- the perfect, undiscovered mountain or beach boutique town where they will live for the rest of their lives.  (The italics are important.)  They are taking the idea of Eternal Bliss from religions, and making an earthly form of it.

I answer "no" to their question, if I can't evade it.  It is hard to answer their question without getting preachy.  And 'no' isn't the answer they want to hear.

What if Eternal Bliss in any form is a silly idea, because it just doesn't fit human nature?  Religions would go out of business.  Real estate agents in places like St. George UT or Boise ID would be laid off.

Dogs seem better than humans at enthusiastically and sustainably enjoying good situations.  The achievability of a good situation does not ruin its appeal to a dog.  Maybe that is one of the reason why philosophical Cynics (aka, 'dog-like') in ancient Greece acquired their name.

For my part, I left this experience determined to accept the temporary nature of perfection for human beings, and to accept change and struggle as an integral part of perfection.  Fluttering one's eyelashes over static eternal perfection is really just romantic escapism.  Achieve any of this Bliss and Perfection, and it immediately evaporates.



Comments

At age 76 I am chasing the next part of my wonderful life but not having any luck at finding it yet. My guess is I passed through your time situation about 15 years ago and now find myself in a different phase. However I do not forget that the the precursors to this life now have actually been very nice and worth living. Having tooooo much fun is my blog motto.
Barney, I guess you are saying that the 'perfect' changes over time, as a person ages. That certainly must be true.
I had not thought of it that way but it sounds very likely to be correct. Hmmmm.