Sunset Boulevard

     “Do you believe heaven to be a state of mind?”

     I most certainly did. I don’t speak of my intuitiveness often, for it gives one what I believe, an aura of arrogance, that remains with others for far too long after they have gone. A lasting impression is something everyone aspires too, and I have as yet to discover why.

    Everything in my opinion is better, more mystical, authentic, artistic, when imagined than when observed in its physical form. There is something about the visualization of an object or idea that allows for a creativity that is not limited by the possibility of materials or the constraints of social order. Possibility has limits in the physical world, they need not adhere to in an imagined world.

    I’ve spoken with many about the concept of heaven, nirvana, or Mount Olympus, the impetus for millennium of speculation about the afterlife. 

    Each entity has its advantages as far as conjecture is concerned, which is all we really have to define our vision. There are no dedicated facts to verify the beliefs of a final destiny, let alone whether we will be found worthy of participating in it.

    But is it our final destiny? If we are allowed to envision heavens and galaxies yet to be discovered, why can’t we allow ourselves to explore an alternative reward to compensate us for the challenges of life and our adherence to what we believe to be, adherence to the rules of a God.

    We bestow all manner of exemplary beatitudes on our vision of a final resting place. Streets of gold, a place of no need or want, an environment where the sun never sets. We imply with confessions of our dreams, that light is not only preferable to darkness, but where light exemplifies goodness, darkness represents a state of evil.

    Our conceptualization of our final destination is defined by the evolution of teachings that have been passed down over the ages from Mount Olympus, the home of the Greek Gods, to the present array of religions that adhere to the similar demands of their deities. Our differences are defined mainly by semantics and mans fallibility in accepting the variety of teachings as having the same message delivered by different individuals claiming to be Gods representatives.

    The age-old battles over Gods words, which prophet is His legitimate ambassador, and the ultimate reward for adhering to the dictates of our chosen God, have defined the parameters of our final destination. If we were to leave the confines of what we have believed to be our only examples of the here and after, and search for alternate visions of our final experience, what would we invent to provide us with a goal that encompasses our humanity on earth, and provides for a reward somewhere in our perceived universe, or beyond.

    Our visions as well as the attached beliefs depend upon our acceptance that “there has to be more than this,” which alleviates the need for meaning, for ours, or anyone’s existence. When we accept the limitations of knowledge we loose the potential to discover the possibility of the unknown. We cease to search the recesses of the unimagined as we have been lulled into believing that “this is all there is.”

    The evolution of Gods came from the uncertainty that accompanies fact. It allows for conjecture to mold the observable into facts and truths, that given the freedom to explore would render new truths, new facts, as knowledge is the exponential growth of exploration and the resolve to not accept knowledge as a finite entity, that has a beginning and an end.

    As the human spirit wanders into the unknown it will one day dismiss the absolutes as heresy. Poseidon’s imagined destructive power will be reduced to a submarine, with a nuclear war head encased in its metal self-contained shell. Earth’s table top replicas of Columbus’s time have been replaced by an astronauts birds eye view, of not only our watery planet, but the inconceivable expanse of space.

    Our vision allows us to triumph over false assumptions and misconceived idealisms by refusing to accept the inevitability, that there is a beginning and an end to our story. Beliefs are replaced by fact, fact is changed by knowledge, and knowledge becomes the ultimate resource for dreams to emerge as reality. Our failure to accept the inevitable is what has brought us to the junction of eternal optimism and certainty. 

    Change is constant because it has to be. With each escaping dream from decades of dreamers comes new visions of what could be, despite what we’ve been led to believe. History records our efforts to overcome our conceit and arrogance in hopes of absolving the future of the repetition of mistakes, but it is to no avail. Our frail attempts to achieve a nirvana on earth are always delayed by the madness of power and those that wield it, believing only in an ultimate end.

   From Time Square to Sunset Boulevard, from Miami to Seattle, we are reminded of where we have been and where we are presently, by change; some good, some ill-conceived. But the inevitability of change is evident in the landscape, architecture, life style, and people, that wander in search of a better life. 

     We tend to invent concepts to erase the mistakes we have endured, and yet take our advances for granted, as they are not as blatantly spectacular as our failures, war, genocide, and poverty in a world of plenty. To date we have not forsaken the future because of a past, but we have also not endorsed our ability to alleviate the repetitive mistakes of arrogant power that consumes the very souls who refuse to believe in our own creativity, allowing us all to benefit. 

    I walk down Sunset Boulevard and recognize no one, yet feel a sense of kinship with everyone I pass. We unknowingly trade secrets as easily as we exchange the air we breathe, sharing a humanity that overshadows the selfishness lining the gutters.

    If we hope to believe, or believe to hope, we must consider the fact that knowledge is responsible for change, and only we can decide whether change belongs to all of us, or to those who insist if there is a beginning, there must be an end. We can share a place where the sun always shines somewhere, or allow the curtain to come down, allowing darkness to prevail.