Ataraxia

ataraxia - "peace of mind: freedom from worry or any other preoccupation" MSN Encarta World English Dictionary

When I found this somewhat obscure word, I immediately thought of a character from a play. In Tennessee Williams' play, The Glass Menagerie, Laura Wingfield is a cripplingly shy girl who prefers to stay home and take care of her glass animals, instead of going out into the wide world for any reason at all. For Laura, the glass animals are a way to get at peace of mind.

But how can Laura Wingfield obtain ataraxia? She has no skills of survival, no money, no comfort in life, and no nerves to deal with any situation outside of her glass menagerie. She stays at home while her mother and brother work in a department store and factory, respectively: she lives at the cost of her mother's pride and her brother's freedom. She's living as someone's burden. There's no financial stability, no peace in her home due to her mother and brother arguing, and no emotional rest from the toils of the depression. How can Laura Wingfield find peace?

Perhaps it's an instinct. Perhaps humans are endowed with the ability to be at peace in all situations, as a means of survival. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn survived 8 years in a labour camp and lived sanely enough to tell the tale.

New Year Resolutions - On this face of Janus

Resolution number 1: post blog entries at least once a week
Resolution number 2: remember resolution number 1 at least once a week

It's the most basic problem with resolutions. In the midst of fire works, overly-enthusiatic tv announcers, and the final lingerings of Christmas music, you decide to scribble down a few resolutions on a brand-new, fresh piece of paper, to be carried out in the brand-new year, untainted by previous failed attempts and other disappointments. Then, that piece of paper gets pinned to a wall, a mirror, or a fridge, where it becomes crinkled and creased, just like any old piece of paper you might find in the recycling bin. Eventually, and also inevitably, it gets discarded, along with the promises written upon, to wait to be reincarnated in the next new year, on the next brand-new piece of paper.

But, do people really think that the turning of the year, the shifting of focus to Janus' other, really constitutes a new year? New Year's Day is, afterall, somewhat arbitrary in its selection. In the passing of time in the universe, January 1st is alike any other day, but by different names. For the Romans, the year started in March and March 1st was New Year's Day, because March is the month that's just warm enough, in darling ancient Rome, to go to war. But, perhaps because we call it a new year, does that hit some chord inside us that makes us assume a new beginning and try to start afresh? Perhaps because we assume it to be a new year, it really would be so. It really is a new year and all the misfortunes and iniquitous blows of fate and the period of drudgery that slows productivity can truly be left behind and forgotten.

But, is it ever possible to start afresh? There was once a Greek philosopher who believed that there is no such thing as change and that any change would bring contradictions. This is to be understood in the way that, if something becomes different in its state of natures, it always had the potential and the expectation to make that altercation and its present state is merely a result of what it already was. So, in other word, when people appear to change, it's not real change because they cannot change who they are, but only how they present themselves to the world. The object cannot change its essence, but can change how it expresses its essence. Wood cannot help being wood, whether it is in the form of a sapling, a giant tree, or a nice rocking chair.

Then, since you cannot change yourself as a person, how significant is "starting afresh"? One's only materials for building one's character are already deemed to be unchanging, so how significant is it to change the expression of that unchanging character?

In the spirit of Greek notions of change, cheers for New Year's resolutions and the brand-new year.