Thoughts of Life, by Asif Chowdhury

I’ve been thinking a lot about what is the purpose of life. Why are we all here at this very moment? My parents told me as growing up that you will be a great engineer and be successful. So they sent me to college. After I get my degree, I am going to find a job in my field. Then I am going to get married and have kids. Then I am going to send my kids to college like I went and possibly retire when I am unable to function properly. Death will soon come and the cycle will continue with my kids and then their kids. Is this what we are meant to do from the very beginning of mankind?

The answer is absolutely no. As I sat in my spot today, I looked at the various plants around me. Although they were beautiful, I couldn’t tell what each plant was and their names. A couple weeks ago, I saw a big bird and didn’t know what it was, until recently I found out it was a Blue Heron. We have forgotten our ancestral skills. We don’t know how to hunt for food when we are hungry, use herbs as medicines, and how to survive. These skills were common in the old days because it was passed down from each generation. But now people work in a small region making money and pay someone to provide the food to us. Its like we are handicapped and cannot do things ourselves.

We claim that we are intelligent than ever before and our ancestors were brainless. But what good is the intelligence we have today when it’s destroying the world. There are far more natural disasters now than ever before. Weapons are being created for extinction of a whole country. Everything natural is being faded and its being replaced with scientifically modified objects.

Mary Oliver wrote in her poem, “I don’t know what death’s ultimate purpose is, but I think this: whoever dreams of holding his life in his fist year after year into the hundreds of years has never considered the owl–how he comes, exhausted, through the snow, through the icy trees, past snags and vines, wheeling out of barns and church steeples, turning this way and that way through the mesh of every obstacle–undeterred by anything –filling himself with a red and digestible joy sickled up from the lonely, white fields–“. Mary Oliver has a remarkable way of seeing at how life is. The owl goes through all the obstacles put forth without fearing death. But in the midst of all this snow, the owl is filled with happiness at the end of its journey.

We were meant to enjoy the nature like the way it was given to us. Instead of taking in Tylenol, which has side effects to relieve fever, using herbal medicine is a lot more effective because the body naturally recognizes the herb. Hunting for your own food is more satisfying than getting your meat from somewhere else since you know the animal you killed and the meat will be fresh. Though people might not like the wild because of the fear of death from wolves or other animals.

Life is like being on the edge of the waterfall. You try not to let the water take you down so you keep going the other direction. Although it is a battle to fight the current, in the end you will make it through.

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