To Die with Harmony of Word and Action

They see the barriers and corrals, and they follow. They assume and see what others have told them to see. They do what others have told them to do. They feel what others have told them to feel. They do not see the man-made creations. They are simply the creations of others, and they are accept without thought. Each passing moment the “why” is lost to time. Criticism gives way to habituation.

I am not the skilled who comes to some profound understanding, I am nothing but the naturally novice.  I am he who strives to be what I never will. I know enough to know what I do not know. I dwell upon each and every discrepancy between words and actions, both mine and others. 

They say Socrates could not refrain from asking why. He asked “why” about every facet of life. He saw what so few ever do, the nuances that are life. He saw not concrete answers but the complex series of circumstances and reactions that is our existence. He must have been exhausted. He must have been exhausted as he expended his energy explaining himself, trying to open the eyes of others, to shatter the illusions of naive confidence, and to bestow upon others the honest skepticism–to be different.

To know so much is to know so little. He must have been exhausted in his endless pursuit of how little one knows, I know I am.  

He gave his life for his beliefs. He chose to die upon his principles rather than survive in hypocrisy. He chose harmony between words and actions. He chose to die for that harmony. I hope I might die with such harmony. 

Image: Adobe Shutterstock

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Jake Smith is a law enforcement officer and former Army Ranger with four deployments to Afghanistan.

As the Voice of the Veteran Community, The Havok Journal seeks to publish a variety of perspectives on a number of sensitive subjects. Unless specifically noted otherwise, nothing we publish is an official point of view of The Havok Journal or any part of the U.S. government.