Παν μέτρον άριστον

 Metron. A notion that as excellent we define, is a constant quest, a tendency - never a state.

It's "Ithaca", the vision, the desire of a "perfect" way there.

It can be found as easily as it can be lost, a good thing since it is also through disregarding it, by ignoring it, that humans become able to get a grasp of, and elevate from obscurity new extremities at unseen boundaries. Even better and even worse expressions and variations of themselves - for those that their thought, their understanding and interpretation of things, still balances on a manicheistic mentality, those who still wander where the metronome comes closer to a still.

"You have your way. I have my way.

As for the right way, the correct way and the only way, it does not exist."

                                         Friedrich Nietzsche

And it is through new boundaries that the renewal of that tendency comes, interest is rekindled, that "Ithaca" stands for new values, new pioneers now in quest of her.

And if those new boundaries frighten you, look for the human within them. You will, find him within. Within seemingly adverse forces, in a ceaselessly and inescapably changing state, forced to bear unbreakable bonds, as one more Prometheus, as its part and variable, and only in ignorance, its mere receiver.

Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
angry Poseidon—don’t be afraid of them:
you’ll never find things like that on your way
as long as you keep your thoughts raised high,
as long as a rare excitement
stirs your spirit and your body.
Laistrygonians and Cyclops,
wild Poseidon—you won’t encounter them
unless you bring them along inside your soul,
unless your soul sets them up in front of you.

                 "Ithaca"

                  C.P. Cavafy

If you are forced to change, do not consider it a warp. In a world that never deviates from its course and its course is true, a world that only becomes greater through us, you err only when you recognize an error. There is nothing useless in this universe. You don't designate the boundaries alone little god, you can only try alone.

Dare little god, dare to see new limits, dare to break some bonds and bring this world to new boundaries, that only you who give birth to gods and define them, can set. 

Expand your conscience, little god, to embrace cosmogony in the paths of Virtue, to withstand, both as responsibility and duty, genocide where Malice predominates.

It is between them that you as well wander, being the one called to share, bear and sustain the fate of myriads.

"Stranger, send word to Spartans, that here we lie, with faith in their order."

Never before had Sparta forged a better shield, and it wasn't without sacrifice. Sacrifice of the higher kind, as was human, not to gods but to Humans, to concepts and notions of theirs. Not for Gods but for humans, all those who die when they must, having lived the way they had to. And if you can locate redundancy in the sentence above, even Ephialtes can be allowed to find integrity in it.

Do not allow yourselves to be defined by others, know thy selves. For if you don't, it becomes imperative, by forces within, for others to define you. Either by telling you who you could be, who you should be, who you must or have to be. And there lies the source of great power, the birthplace of the pseudo-dilemma that still stands, in the eve of the third millennium, to separate oligarchy from democracy by asking who should define whom, when in fact we all constantly define each other, destined to balance in between.

 And the answer seems -to me the fool- simple and logical. We need to perpetually evolve both ends, both tendencies, because they are interconnected. And it seems to only take equally simple and logical questions: No matter the end, the system, how good are our best? How good are the brave ones, the truly rich ones in the middle, allowed to become? Which is the course and the rate of our society's evolution, the tempo and the quality of our - I 'll dare to say - harmony?

Always keep in mind, my fellow human, that it takes a god to see a god. And god, no matter the name, isn't just great but can always become greater.

Just keep raising the bar, my sisters, my brothers, my kind and my wonderful species that so "imba" you stand among others! Allow, the best to win and the game to reset, to bring up even better ones so that we can evolve, as humans. With respect to every culture and its contribution to the wonders of this world, this small, yet far from insignificant planet in this vast universe. There is great value in diversity and this is also true. Equally true with the fact that we, for the first time in our species' brief history, are presented with the opportunity, the very means of globalization, to create a global society. To break old limits and reach new boundaries. Greatness lies not in achievements but in the process, the moment one reaches out to stars above.

Don't be afraid of losing your individuality, to think as one can never become a state, it is one more tendency, hence it quickly becomes an act of immense effort - that no man can, or should, shoulder alone.

Of course, you can always keep humanity aside, tend to the animal within and have fun destroying, in a magnificent overture, that part of the world that became more theirs than yours, since now you are more than them in this common system.

I am not the one to choose. Your song, your music, your party. Make it sound to Earth's very end, to echo in time and space. I know it will become equally ugly and beautiful for there is, can be -and there lies the wonder-, much diversity within our very selves. Just try to allow me, one man of billions on planet Earth, one more anonymous, a person among you, to draw pleasure from the latter, as much -and never more- as I try to allow you to draw pleasure from the first.

Do as you must, but know this: To forgive, now, will bring evolution, not just one more revolution. And if they weren't able in yester day to stand tall in front of Justice and Truth, neither will you the day after, if you bring the dawn unjust. For if the world is won by new-born tyrants, a world of tyrants once more it will come to be, provoking revolutions to come, allowing them more space than evolution.

 After all, in a universe where there can only be illusions of freedom, a plea - a tendency towards it, it is that very illusion that we must allow others, if we really seek true and uncompromising justice, if we really want to stand equal in front of her and each other. A maiden blindfolded, measuring all equally, bringing justice among Faith and Truth, believing that the individual -the part, the fruit, the product of the very society that feels the sacred, ever-changing need to stand against it- can become "better", understanding why and how it became "worse" and, above all, withstanding the urge to remove those sacred quotes while bravely avoiding the realization of foolishness within. For it is fools that shape our world, and we all are.

"I know one thing, that I know nothing."

                               Socrates

There lies measure, there lies metron, the one that we are all constantly called to sacrifice on the ever-present altar of change and creation, to the necessities of our very existence.

And to correct an old inequity of those men, men of times long gone - yet still here. Men that you still insist on introducing to me, an earthling and a Greek with an 180 years old state, more than 2.500 years later, as my ancestors: Barbarian is not the one that isn't Greek, barbarian becomes the one that does not seek, that does not speak, the truth.

Corruption has deep roots there, and I, being a Greek, couldn't but notice. Of course, that realization's cost was a "bit" high, but what that's Greece! We, too, have our own "rhythm", our own "song". It certainly changes at its own tempo - as all. Give us time, not money. After all, we are all retarded in our own way! Retarded, yet never late, and greater things come to those who wait.

We just have to try not to forget, so that we will stand just in front of those who will stand able to be forgiven. And believe me, since everybody is bound to a role in this life, truth favors all.

Those who know, have some faith in truth and bring it forth, better late than never. Truth cleanses all, it only takes some faith.

"Those who make peaceful revolution impossible, will make violent revolution inevitable."

                                                      John F. Kennedy

Let us not evolve revolutions, not now that new horizons spread before us, not yet. Don't make us put on more masks. Don't make us use masks like most of you are forced to do. Think fast, evolve yourselves, evolve the system that we all forced to crumble. You know, and yet you remain idle, that any action taken towards improving the life of humans, no matter who and where they are, no matter who and where you are, will not go unappreciated or without global support - and there can always be more to share the cost. And should you choose the violent path, the easy path, the one of Malice, what won't extinct us, will make us stronger - for we will both remember and learn, will make us weirder - as everything new, and it will certainly make us evolve. To what, who among you could possibly imagine, let alone know. Just keep that in mind and let it be. Virtue will be ever more shining when we meet again.

 What will we not lose, and what will we not gain.

War is a way somewhere, but where do we want to go? All I know is that we cannot remain here forever, that is an illusion. And if "politics is the art of the possible", we need to consider all possibilities. It inevitably becomes the art of choosing, as is life.

If I should leave the fool speak, he would say:

Shuffle money, shuffle power. The balance between oligarchy and democracy, the individual and the total, is now disturbed to an unbearable degree, and since capitalism seems to have no way as an economic system to redistribute, to reallocate money and power, it can only peak. Credit, to countries, companies or people, is a temporary measure that not only doesn't solve the problem but actually makes things worse, since not only will one have to repay the original sum, but interest as well, at rates set by the development one achieved, against capitals that grow vast, multiple times that of the loaner's, that venture in the same market, consequently having greater influence and control over it.

The idea, the concept, the system may have lasted longer than communism, since it indeed fits our greedy nature better, but even though greed has prevailed, it is not the only part of man and a world consisting of nothing but gold, can't but be a poor one. This fool couldn't possibly know if capitalism can evolve any further and has no idea whether there is a system to replace it. All I can see, is that it has now become a fixed game and I am certainly not the only one.

This system tends to monarchy, and as great a joke as this may be -a futuristic parody of a King's court where a handful of people, not by title anymore, but by inheritance, rule 7.000.000.000 (got to love Irony)- it just can't but be one way of many. Undeniably, not the way of many.

And all you rising in power ever since the last world war, elected or not, have been proven either unable to control the situation or with vision inferior to the circumstances. Reasonably, as you shouldered too much to allow us to tend to our individuality, so much that we also reached apathy.

"If only the dead could speak" is all I will allow myself to say, "let alone what still echoes" I feel obliged to add. Can never be humble enough, but to remain silent is to disregard as well. What did we not lose, and what did we not gain. Hubris arises if one doesn't consider both.

All those setting the pace, carrying the burden of creating, borrowing and adjusting policies, be brave, dare to rise to the occasion and the best of luck to you. She "favors the bold" because we, as well, do. All those who currently hold more money than they could possibly spent in three lifetimes, dare to create better life conditions for those in need, give rise to civilizations, bring more diversity and wonders to this piece of rock that floats in space. Share, the vision or the illusion, of a new earth, on this rock or another. There are both solid examples and elusive dreams. Act soon, the Valkyries always fly above, with more than matter in their gaze.

Realize that it is a world that most people lack the means to survive and exist, partly because they were born in less productive or rich areas of the earth, but mainly because people of highly productive areas use the power they were so randomly given in order to keep them in poverty and capitalize on their resources at the rates of their choice - while "naturally" treating them as inferior races and cultures, in a fool's attempt to feel better about himself.

Realize that they lose in a game where you are the game masters that set the rules, merely justified by a rough head start, in a race that tends to infinity.

Realize that we can't but be creating the conditions for something that may get out of hand in the future, let alone the people we have condemned, accomplices under the haze of wealthy apathy that has flooded the globe. We came to "know the price of everything and the value of nothing" as Oscar Wilde said, which today stands more accurate than ever and can only be more accurate and just in the years to come, should we continue on this path.

Realize, and see yourself stuck in the end of a game of "Monopoly". You, indeed, won - no doubt in me about it - but what now? A rematch or -oh, what visions!- another game?  

  Please realize that we are acting like apes do, when they have something others don't. Like monkeys that found "shinnies". Like children. We want what others have, and lose sight of what we could have, if we weren't so busy trying to get a same one, a similar one or that very one, if we weren't senselessly going to any length to protect them. Laugh with yourselves fools, as you mirror in all. Humor is a broad way towards evolution - always broad enough for all!

Humans in governments, you are bound to your citizens, to their will, needs and desires. I know that, most of us do. But it is also part of your role to trim the shadows, to help us realize and share the problems and difficulties you face. It was, is and will always be through problems that humans -as all animals- partly adapt and partly evolve. You cannot be lost children and yet you can't but be. Talk to each other, share as much as you can, find, not your way yet, but where you stand. All is truth, if you can understand it.

"There are horrible people who, instead of solving a problem, tangle it up and make it harder to solve for anyone who wants to deal with it. Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all."

                                                Friedrich Nietzsche           

 Either rise to the occasion as soon as possible, with metron in mind, or step aside and leave others deal with the lives of seven billions. Either being a dictator or an anarchist, if you stand pinned, we will understand and if you fly on plains above, we will bow.

Drop the masks, understand that in a world that most of us are increasingly feeling alienated, we need to be able to invest our hopes and faith anew, raising the bar every time - with the Little Prince's King in mind -, so as to be asked for our trust by humans that, at least, see the elephants in the middle of the room, that will regard, respect and treat each one of us as the considerable force, factor and variable we are. 

Do not allow yourselves to reach the point where you will have to use fear to turn us, once more, against each other. Humans did it in the past, humans will do it in the future. All you will ever owe to the rest of mankind, is what you owe to yourself - to wonder, in the liberty of solitude, whether you are one of them, whether you can make this trip, or loop, greater by avoiding to be one of them, whether you can inspire more and reach beyond. It is a world of power, a world of many forms.

Share the power for it becomes too great a burden if unevenly distributed, share the money since there is mostly apathy and idiocy where they peak. Tend to seek ways, tend to your demons and listen to angels. From what we have experienced so far, there can indeed be no limits to human stupidity, as it escalates with itself. But even if we could limit it, wouldn't we be stupid once again, avoiding even a fleeting glimpse of infinity? If that is the prize, what is the cost? How high the toll of diminishing our number, once more, in a new world war, a massacre unseen before considering the means now available? What will we be left with? Bigger space or greater gap? This fool still wonders, still wanders.

What can't we accomplice with the means available to us today, with sacrifices and patience? In a universe of constant change, nothing cannot remain for long in the same state. Find hope there.

"ποταμοῖσι τοῖσιν αὐτοῖσιν ἐμϐαίνουσιν, ἕτερα καὶ ἕτερα ὕδατα ἐπιρρεῖ." ~

"Ever-newer waters flow on those who step into the same rivers ."

                                            Heraclitus

 "Nothing more permanent than temporary" and as the years go by, I assure you that we will find it increasingly harder to persuade each other that we can see "that" far into the future, that we know "better". Especially when most of us realize that, considering the future in such a complex universe, there can only be "for better" or "for worse", both present at all times.

"O tempora, o mores". The first have changed, time for the latter to follow and adapt, to evolve on new elements and give birth to even more complicated, higher forms of being. Currency is a way, a system to share power, where one can only have more. To invent or discover another form of power, if there is one, we need another way, another system - unless I fail logic. If you are not content, keep looking, it is up to you.

                          The Human and the Fool no.3.487.563.428