the button

I keep telling myself: "at least I don't have to fight in a war I didn't start. at least I don't have to watch my loved ones die. at least I don't have to live under the weight of hereditary trauma. at least I'm not enslaved, in the extreme way, in the way that deprives you of belief. at least I don't have to walk outside today and fear for my life. at least I know someone, if just one person, but likely many, will try to save me if I'm in trouble." And I say, internally... "I think I should act, fake my way into happiness, to prove I like this life that isn't as bad as it could be. as bad as I keep seeing."

That's never stopped me from feeling, from trying to imagine the desperation of the millions who can't say: "at least..."

All they can ask is: "why me?"

And all I can say: "why don’t we stop it."

At this point, if someone gave me a button, and it said: ‘die to save a child in Gaza,’ I'd probably press it. But I continue my stupid little life, and complain about insignificant things, and get angry at people I love, and isolate, hide inside my emotions. Maybe I wish to die for someone, so that my desire to die would mean something. Surely, they will find more gratitude than me. Maybe their lust for life could be stronger than mine, as I feel weaker every day watching, helpless. Knowing my stupid little life can't save them, so maybe my death can.

But I have to stop that thinking, because the American savior complex never saved anyone. It created this. It made us into the demon that the world bows to.

I guess, at some point, you have to hide your compassion. Before it kills you. And look back for numbness; look back on how long suffering has been for some of these nations, people who feel the need to leave home. They love their home. There is a growing group of us, living in prosperity, that can't say the same. We look to leave for novelty, or adventure, or a clever way to increase our pile of blood stained coins. We look to escape our daily complaints, of traffic, pollution, a lack of community. We look to escape our own family, just because they watch a different media channel. We drink our escape—or find a fancy way to get it faster—into our hearts. How can you live with your cold response to a world on fire? Without seeking for your essence to be smothered by a substance. No human, aware of their sins of omission, could love the person in the mirror.

So… we turn to worship.

I see a lot of buttons that claim to change my life. I click on them every day. They say: 'the next best diet, or the secret to a happy marriage.' Some of them claim to know depression, but I know they don't understand, so those buttons stay unclicked. Some buttons teach me things, about the promise of the future: technology, medicine, universal exploration. Some buttons even remind me of my soul, and how it needs inspiration, or I may die before my death, putrid.

Despite my mind telling me: "inspiration is delusion, another avenue of the complacent."

Much of my buttons get clicked for relief from being sensitive. Sensation is weakness, pleasure taught me this. I click a great many to train my mind—scientific—-to believe I don't need faith in anything. Many buttons tell me: I can do this, I have autonomy of my bones, I can train these muscles. I can even train my mind, the buttons say. They say that it is all mine to create, that I am free, unlike many of my fellow humans. Humans I will never meet. It's easy to ignore their suffering, when I don't have to think how similar their face seems. When I don't have to hear their screams. I wouldn't understand their pain, even if I could hear it, a life translated. I tried to read the subtitles perfect. But then I found another button.

I don't have a button to fix even the tiniest of our problems. I don't have the power or the courage to even think about it. Because, if I did, I'd press that sacrifice button, just so I wouldn't have to face this feeling. Just so I could be saved from looking at myself, to avoid having to ask: "how can you do nothing? then enjoy the next moment."

And even if we had a bigger button, that sent all the power and courage to all the right places…

Even if that button was an expansive, global, understanding. The heartbreaking thing is... I'm not sure we would all choose to press it. Of the unbearable realities of our shared experience: none of us can trust each other to press the button to save us all. Yet we are all convinced of the likely possibility that someone would press the button to end it.

It is no wonder we are depressed, and anxious, and distracted. We can't find a life worth living, can't find others worth fighting for.

But we have our buttons.

And for many, that's enough.

I wish knowing that was enough to change.

Until it is, I'll pray to, and for,

beings I can't believe in.