The world that we live in

1. Grey hair; blue, watery eyes; warm, crushed hands and perhaps soul too … I was looking at my
grandfather, feeling warmth, benevolence and simply love. I felt hope as I saw his saddened
look that so beautifully blended with the strength of his that was terrifyingly contagious. Define
goodness and it will most probably be the description of him. His life, overflowing with the
goose-bumps on his skin, sometimes out of happiness other times out of fear, disappointment;
we are all born so clean, hopeful in the face of this absolute perfection that we call world but
just after the first few breaths that we gasp, something inside us cracks and this fracture
continues until we disappear at least in this reality that we know of. As if, when we were born,
we were slipped away from an alternate universe where breaths were getting lighter and it was
easier to float as moments were transitioning; maybe, we only knew unconditional, supreme
harmony in that universe and maybe that’s why our soul shatters when we start to grasp the
differences between the purity that we knew of and the cruel realism of ours. Maybe that is
why my grandfather’s soul was crushed; maybe that is why his eyes were blue but watery. It is
the disappointment of what this world of ours should be that we cannot overcome and that is
what finally makes us fade away.
Every morning the sun rises and the earth does not stop moving; we call this time and we take
it for granted as it has been our certainty since we know the world around us. Us, humans, we
live our lives day by day; we believe that we make choices, that we strive towards some
unexplained, abstract zone of contentment. There is no real, absolute definition of this place or
perhaps there is and maybe we even knew about it before being born in this universe… but we
forgot the meaning and decided to create our own zones of happiness. For some, it is to change

2. the humanity for the better, for some it is to rule the world, for some it is to give hope to the
sobbing child, for some it is to have a big, healthy family and for others it is to simply be loved.
The story of my grandfather is uniquely touching for me; his heart is incomparably kind for me;
his transparent eyes recite the purity of a human essence. Soul, or whatever we call that part of
human that I so vividly see every time I look into my grandfather’s eyes, is created by the same
unexplainable colossal energy that gave life to those water lilies, effortlessly floating across the
water; the same magical force that so flawlessly draw the sunset in Kilimanjaro, slowly melting
the orange colors on the background of animal silhouettes. The architect of such splendor
would never create officers walking Jewish people through the crematories, would never let the
heart to pump blood through the bodies of ferocious dictators only to show us how viciousness
and hatred can surpass the innocence of child’s tears. The absurdity of this leads us to question
the fundamental nature of ours which is supposed to be as transparently pure and free as every
other thing prearranged for us in this life. Are we, humans one of the beautiful pieces in this
enchanting enigma around us? But then again, if we were created as eloquently as everything
else around us, then where did it go wrong? Why does every bit of pain that the parts of
universe experience is caused by only us, humans? Who transformed the original clarity of ours
into the atrocious creatures that have the audacity to decide whether or not and who or what
has to suffer through pain inexpressible by any word. Maybe we just forgot the true essence of
ours, maybe we just make wrong choices, but can we even make choices or are we just victims
of the completely absurd sequence which leads one single action or shift in universe to
another... then another and then to… us one day left with no choice but to rip down beautiful,
hopeful, sheer visions of a child daubed on a piece of paper which seems so real, so possible, so

3. absolute for them. Is it possible that universe just trapped us in an atmosphere full of nitrogen
and oxygen, which is just enough to breathe perfectly, but at the same time did it doom us
there without any alternatives? Is every particular “choice” that we make consequential of all
the actions of universe before the actual point when we have to make a decision? But, if this is
true, it means that if we rewind our lives by infinite number of times and do not change a single
thing in that existence of universe, our choices would be the same for every other time that we
wind back. This also means that if we lived the exact same life or if we experienced the
precisely same surroundings as Hitler did, we would also make a choice to exterminate 6 million
people. But is this the possible reason or logical explanation that can serve to justify all the
unfairness that happens during every moment of the indefinite continued progress of existence
that we call time? Do we really not have any freedom of choice? Were we only created in order
to just observe the path and the role that was chosen for us in the play which is bigger than us,
which goes beyond our reality and which has a purpose completely unimaginable, unknown for
us? Thinking about this prearranged set of events where our choice is already determined by
the chain of every minor shift in universe, makes it easier for me to feel compassionate for the
most brutal individuals or even for the people who are indifferent towards those brutalities.
Compassion’s literal definition is “to suffer together” which is easy to do for the wounded ones,
even though not lot of people choose or are chosen to do so. However, the hard part is to feel
empathy for the ones who create those wounds. It is hard to feel solicitude and tenderness
towards them because we believe that they themselves made the decision for the other person
to undergo pain. If we believed that they in fact didn’t have any choice, that they are sufferers
too, but of the actions of universe that progressed before their ‘wrong-doing’, it would have

4. been easier to identify with them. But it would have been harder to understand the essence of
this life that we so passionately try to succeed at, it would have been harder to understand why
would the benign force that created the tropical paradises or the varying colors within the
arctic sky, would also create Us with the given quality of doing wrongness, why would it set the
events in a way for us to make world wars and crusades happen. It wouldn’t, it couldn’t… Our
life is undoubtedly a condition of misery where we search for unknown answers infinitely; we
suffer in this process, we suffer always, perpetually and in that split second when we try to look
at this world from a different, nicer angle - is only the consequence of the society telling us that
it is normal, that we are all right, that we are all going through torments and that our world is
making headway towards something better. Sometimes, we believe them or simply lie to
ourselves and try to feel okay. Maybe, it would have been better if we found the explanations
to our miseries; it wouldn’t change the pain, it wouldn’t cure us but it is somehow easier to
suffer when we know the reason, then to suffer so blindly, so vaguely, without knowing the
purpose.