Still knackered, still pissed off, but determined to produce at least one mid week post so here we go in the form of another minor addition to a previous idea. I've written before about the occasional pearls of wisdom that can be found within the vicious and ugly oysters of religion. (How's THAT for a mental picture? ;) )

Just finished Philip K Dick's, 'The Man in the High Castle'. Yet again I was blown away by yet another work of genius. Casting a lay eye over my 'books read' list => you'll notice I've been on a bit of a PKD kick recently.

There are VERY few authors whom I can continually read in this fashion, but PKD is an exception. Sci-fi is too hideously limiting and misleading a label for his work, in fact, fuck this post, go read some PKD right now! Anything I've got to say he's probably already written, and better too.

Back? Good isn't he? Anyway, one aspect of 'The Man in the High Castle' deals with a contrast between eastern and western cultures. At one point the concepts of Original Sin and Reincarnation are briefly compared. the parallel aspect of these two, historically isolated ideas, is that both portray life as inevitably painful.

Both doctrines teach that, once born, there is no escaping suffering and that, in fact, some degree of misery is inherent to life itself. Of course both go on to explain why this must be the case in their own, what I would consider delusional, way.

Now I have it in my head that some philosopher, (I want to say a German one though I'm not sure why, help me out here if you know who this was,) once declared that 'life without pain has no meaning'. I'd noted this seemingly recurrent theme but only recently put it together with some pop (read as spurious) science I saw on BBCN24.

Apparently scientists have discovered (or decided, often the same thing,) that a major factor in our evolution was that anxiety is hardwired into our brains. A compulsion to worry about things in our lives is what drove us to change them and subsequently develop.

Now tying these three together, religion, (what I believe to be) non-religious abstract thought and science we find those cryptically aforementioned pearls. As human beings we're at our best when in trouble. Having evolved to adapt we, ultimately, thrive in flux and chaos.

Now, looking around us, here in the bloated and affluent west, many of life's challenges have been met and dismissed. Most of us, (ie. those considered 'real' people by society,) can live in physical safety and comfort with an uninterrupted and easily accessible food supply. In fact, as a culture, we've put an immense amount of effort into satisfying every single urge we can think of with convenience and luxury.

How many of us, however, feel somehow unfulfilled by these advances. Guiltily perhaps, how many of us harbour a secret ache, an irritating feeling that despite the wealth of riches all around us, something else is missing. Could it be that an easy life is not necessarily a happy one?

So where does this leave the idea of happiness as an achievable ideal? Looks pretty grim doesn't it? Are we all just destined to be torn between progressive misery or stagnant peace? Well, luckily for me and my tired, tired brain, I can fall back on something else I've written about in the past to offer some kind of response to this question.

It would appear that we, as a race, need to be challenged, faced with difficulty and hardship in order to make the best and most satisfying use of our individual potentials. The nature of such challenges however are where we find ourselves with some degree of control.

Challenges, difficulties and hardships do not have to be misery making. I've written before that I feel the way to get the most out of society is to create systems that allow people to pursue careers in things they enjoy and/or (usually and) are good at.

We need to be frustrated, we need to struggle and to yearn but, if given the choice of specifics, these experiences can actually be some of the most wonderful in our lives and, more importantly, might just be able to lead us to REAL happiness.

I don't believe we're inherently bad from birth: I don't believe we're falling blindly through a cyclical procession of lives; I don't believe that suffering is the only route to meaning and I'm certainly not convinced that human evolution can be explained by the tardy appearance of executive stress balls.

What I do believe is that we are thoroughly amazing creatures; that if we understand our nature and apply that understanding to our lives we can achieve amazing things, that achieving such amazing things is indeed a route to happiness. Above all these however I believe that we are just not built to tread water, especially not in the name of someone else's wet dream. In short it comes down to this:

we are people, not slaves