I was recently struck again by how deeply contradictory human beings can be. The contrast is so stark that it almost feels unreal.
While wars rage in some parts of the world, people elsewhere fill stadiums, cheering for baseball or basketball.
In countries at war, lives are lost every day, and violence continues without pause.
Isn’t that strange?
War itself is already difficult to comprehend—a colossal waste that turns what has been carefully built into rubble. But the fact that people are actually losing their lives makes it even harder to accept.
Human beings are inherently full of contradictions. Every one of us carries them.
Much of this contradiction likely stems from our self-centered nature. We are told not to inconvenience others, to be mindful of those around us. And yet, we often disregard that completely and impose on others without hesitation. That, too, is a contradiction.
Why should we avoid troubling others? Because no human being can live alone.
The same applies to nations. No matter how powerful a country may be, it cannot sustain itself in complete isolation.
Perhaps the problem lies in the fact that both individuals and nations have “mass”—a presence that inevitably occupies space.
When you place an object in water, it displaces an equal volume.
To exist is, in a sense, to push something else aside.
What we do each day may be nothing more than a continuous act of displacing one another.
At times, I even wonder whether things would be simpler if we did not have physical bodies at all.
Even now, nations are engaged in the same kind of mutual displacement.
The very act of forming countries among human beings may itself be a contradiction.
On the maps of animals, there are no lines like the ones we draw.
Perhaps it is only humans who insist on drawing boundaries—and then struggle because of them.
