There are those that fight the system against extreme odds of winning. They waste their precious creative energy in trying to gain accountability -natural justice in a institutional system which does not care in its own self-interest. What should these motivated but misguided warriors do in the midst of this societal decay? Keep faith in your self and your own integrity-suffer the fools with quite indifference . Live your life on your(higher) terms and not the lowest debased standards of your desensitized institutionalized adversaries who really do not care.
Snatching Serenity From the Jaws of Chaos
Some time ago I read a fascinating interview (I don’t recall where) with a former Soviet dissident. Over a long period of years, he had been engaging in illegal activities, such as attending clandestine meetings and hiding samizdat publications in his home. Somehow, while going head-to-head with the Socialist monster, he managed to carry on a “normal” life: raising a family, working as an engineer, going out to an occasional concert.
The question was put to him: How could you maintain this double existence, knowing full well that at any moment, you might be arrested and jailed, even executed or tortured, your life utterly destroyed in the wink of an eye?
Responded the ex-dissident: The most fundamental form of resistance to tyranny is to live as if you had freedom.
These poignant words became lodged forever in my consciousness. So basic, so courageous. You don’t cower, you don’t despair of reality. You rather create your own, internal reality.
This vision has helped me overcome the temptation to anger, frustration, and despair, all of which could easily result from over-analysis of the manifold threats to liberty that are closing in on us from all sides.
Just the other day, after an overdose of blog reading, I was seized by these emotions. Then I recalled the words of our brave dissident. I thought: What would he do right now? Perhaps he would pick up a great work of literature, put on some Mozart, sit in an armchair, and read. This is what I did.
I was creating a little pocket of culture in the midst of decay, snatching serenity from the jaws of chaos. The menaces of the Brave New World swirl around us, but the great traditions of the West, our spectacular creations of beauty and intelligence, flourish in the space that each of us creates.
How simple, yet how profound, is this form of resistance to totalitarianism. It is good training for the trials and tribulations that surely await us.
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