Ignoramus

I am not an expert of anything. I do not have access to any gnosis, whether from extradimensional, extraterrestrial, or revelatory sources of any kind other than my own heart and mind. I am an expert, of nothing. I am a dilettante and a dabbler. I admire the other type of expert, to be sure, as many do, although I also harbor a healthy skepticism of those claiming access to knowledge at or beyond the fringes of human experience. I find no reason (or ability) to reach outside the realm of the psyche to grasp at ghosts when already within there is such an astonishing array of mystery. Indeed, the most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious, as Einstein believed, and I see no other choice, if it is a choice, but to behold and bring with me this mystery into each and every day. It beckons for my attention, my devotion, and I cannot escape its strange allure.

I am a living, breathing contradiction because, beyond this mystery, I daily profess (or is it pretend?) to know many things, about a profession, and parenting, and more, when in truth my mind is so empty I am like an idiot, as Lao Tzu confessed. It is not my fault, really. I possess this roughly one kilogram mass of brain, as do you, truly miraculous in its abilities, yet with inherent limits like anything else. And even though I appear to be at the top of the intellectual ladder in the animal kingdom there is so very much I will simply never know. Can the ant crawling outside my door ever hope to comprehend the instruction manual to my microwave? In the same vein, in comparison with the vast and wide and deep expanse of all this, being, here, now, I am an ignoramus. Yes, I think I know certain things, of course, and some of us think this more than others. But who can say for sure? How often does it befall all of us, that providential or accidental discovery, of something more true than what we previously knew, even contrary to what we previously gave our hearts to without hesitation, now upended? Let me be content, then, with my discontents and ignorance. They are not failures. They are the honest reflections of one who is willing to look in the mirror with eyes wide open, puzzled and smiling.