Beauty will save the world

Love, people and beauty

My dearest reader, it is in the smallest of conversations. The moments in which the mind might fight preoccupation with a moment that lies elsewhere. It is in the cold morning air, and the songs of birds which fill the sky. It is in the tall grass and the shallow ponds. It is beauty, my dearest reader, and it is this beauty that shall save the world.

Many a person has approached this topic - the one of beauty, or of true beauty - and, I must confess, that each and every time I believe them to have it wrong. The pursuit of finding what beauty might be can, and often does, unfortunately, present us with the pursuer’s own biases. A work of art, almost divine, might be disregarded for its lack of acknowledgement of social commentary, and likewise, a song, painstakingly crafted to breeze over each note, heightening each and every sense upon listening, might be cast aside for being two minutes in length instead of four. No, my dearest reader, they have got it all wrong! How might one find beauty in the subjective? Furthermore, how might one find beauty in the craft of those who do not understand it either? A fool’s game!

I ask my reader now to turn their head towards the window and gaze out at what you see. I wish for you to acknowledge not the vehicles, nor the buildings, and not the commotion of crowds, but the people, the birds, the cats and the dogs, the trees, the breeze, and how the light radiates on it all. I wish for the reader to look, listen, and whilst doing so, acknowledge that they too are part of this infinite expanse - constantly turning, in motion, and always changing - and feel that the pull of beauty is not to be found within the subjective, but in the connection with that which we share this moment with.

I feel that many a person feels disconnected from the natural world, and to that I offer my sympathy. It is not an easy task when offered, at nearly every corner, with additions and subtractions to our own identity, more and more boxes and labels to adopt and bestow. It is how we find ourselves in the present moment: one cannot be certain that the individual across from us is not an enemy, and so the person across from us becomes a blank space: A void of doubt and, for the most part, defined through our boxes and labels, even contempt. No names are shared, no stories are told, and we depart having witnessed nothing. How I pity them! I wish to grab hold of them, tightly, and shake them until the noise falls from their ears! You fools, you see it is not these boxes and labels which have been crafted to unite us in shared belief, but instead they have been crafted to deflect from the beauty that humanity and the natural world brings! One can dedicate one’s life to accumulating wealth, status, social awareness point scoring, and I shall both devour it all and spit it out to show you that such things are arbitrary; nothing but a means to sway us from seeing how beautiful this world can be. My dearest reader, it is this, this beauty, this love for love’s sake, that will bring us joy. It is this that shall bring us peace. It is this that shall bring us to the aid of what is in need of aid, without a second thought. It is this beauty, my love, that shall save the world.

With love, as always

Aaron