Acceleration. It feels good to be moving. Hitting the pace. Autumn sunlight caresses the skyline and the bright yellows and subtle browns of my window view begin to blur as the train picks up speed. Swiftly approaching 120 miles per hour. Positioning my mind to have a good day, I stare out as the fields gradually give way to houses on the edge of the sprawling metropolis where I work.
Every time I take the train into London, I marvel at the numerous tower blocks which have sprung up between Reading and Paddington in recent years. They are solid cuboid points. Reaching upwards, in small clusters. Like the metallic fingers of some giant Transformer emerging from beneath the ground. Aren’t they eyesores? Not at all. In my humble opinion, these mundane artefacts are testaments to human collective ability.
Construction times
The train journey also passes by large areas of building sites. I compare the tall gleaming glass boxes with the absolute mess of those construction sites in their initial stages. That first phase, when all the materials are scattered about. The raw earth is churned up and pipes lie scattered. Construction vehicles and moveable porter cabins surround the rubble, and the occasional crane lingers over the mess. An indication of the direction the building work will take. Upwards.
It seems to me a marvel how we get from that field of building debris to the 40 story square block structures in a space of months. Like, how is it being done? I ponder it some more. The reality is that it is being accomplished by a process of atomisation of the whole task of building structures. The large scale is broken down into tiny little details which humans are capable of doing.
Every truckload of material delivered. Every girder laid, and every bolt rivetted as the structure grows. It is all accomplished by human beings working with machinery along prescribed routes, doing things (usually, hopefully) within their skillset. Each acting to a plan laid out by a greater vision, which provides guidance. In this case, it is the architect’s designs and project manager’s schedules.
Building people
I want to compare the building of a structure to the rising up of a person. Not talking about raising children here, although that’s obviously a key part of what makes a person who they are. I mean that each person starts as a mess. Physically, and figuratively. We all come into this world as goo-covered crying bundles of limbs, unable to support the weight of our own heads.
Twenty years later the baby is a full-grown person. A change agent. Capable of making ripples in the fate of other’s lives. A further ten or twenty years and that same human can impact the livelihoods (for better or worse) of millions. Over the course of an entire life each person can have a phenomenal effect on the world around them. Clearly not everyone leads a highly influential life. Yet I want to focus on the potential every person has.
Just like those towering monuments to human collective ability, human beings are the product of the atomisation of inputs. We are built up over years, following our genetic path and the social guidance from our own life world. Think of our parents as the project planners and our genes as the architects.
The profound thing is the potential for change. As soon as you are aware, on whatever level, of your own agency, you can act on it. We are like self-designing tower blocks. Each aiding in our own maintenance and repair, building up new parts of our personas when we choose to.
Where am I going with this?
Everything begins in a mess. But it’s less that things are a mess and more that they are in transition. The building site was once something else. Each newborn comes from the actions of previous humans. Take a step backwards, and maybe everything looks like a mess because we are at the initial stages of some gargantuan project.
I dabble in the world of Bitcoin, and the people who are involved with the field love saying, “we’re so early”. They are referring to widespread societal take up of Bitcoin which may or may not happen. However, I like this, as it’s so optimistic. If you’re an early adopter, you’ve got an advantage. If you’re early with a project, you’ve got time. If you’re early in life, you’ve got years ahead of you.
I’m not religious but I think the concept of faith is important. I think we need to have faith in our own abilities, and faith that the larger populace is building towards a better future. I don’t believe for one minute that we are simply brains in skull-vats attached to meat-bags of bodies that must constantly consume food and respire.
My guess is we are part of a pattern. Perhaps a spiritual pattern somehow. Who knows? I like to think we could all be a part of an existence that is endlessly evolving towards a higher plane.
The main point
I challenge you to look upon a bad day and find some good in it. Look at how you are building yourself or other people are building you up. Keep things in perspective and remember, we can all build, we can all change. And most importantly, if you find yourself in a mess, consider it a transition. Have faith in a new beginning.