Monotony is the most beautiful or the most atrocious thing. The most beautiful if it is a reflection of eternity—the most atrocious if it is a sign of unvarying perpetuity. It is time surpassed or time sterilized. The circle is the symbol of monotony which is beautiful, the swinging of a pendulum of monotony which is atrocious.
-Simone Weil, Gravity and Grace
"Enjoy your youth!" my grandma is always urging me. "Enjoy your youth!" And so I try. I waste time like only a young person can or I busy myself mad like only a person my age can. But when monotony enters my life, I panic. I become restless. Like a sailboat waiting for wind, I paddle in circles hoping for a gust to make life exciting again. After all, isn't youthfulness synonymous with excitement and progress? Perhaps. But what if I stop dividing life into various states of existence and instead view it across a horizon of sanctification? What if instead of thinking in terms of childhood, youth, adulthood, middle-age, and old age (or to make matters more complicated read David Brooks' Column here) I operate off of a continuum of monotony—an effigy of eternity?
Because I work within a stage-of-life framework, I grow sick with nostalgia for my childhood, I panic under the pressure to enjoy my youth, and I sense an oncoming dread at the thought of arthritis and memory loss. I see in David Brooks' column and the cover story of Nov/Dec issue of Books and Culture other dangers that result from our obsession with developmental stages. And so, I am going to try to stop thinking in terms of stages—which are usually associated with a certain quality of life—and look instead at the bigger picture where, yes I do indeed change according to these phases, but I am changing within a static state of humanity towards an increasing state of sanctification.
In mathematics, a monotonic function is one which never increases or decreases even as its independent variable does increase. Likewise, as humans our quality of being never changes even while spiritually we are being perfected. In other words, one phase of life is equally as significant as an other because with each one we have new opportunities to sin less and less.
By thinking of growing old as monotonous—unvarying perpetuity of existence—I sterilize the process of sanctification by reducing life to a tedious function of decreasing interests and opportunities. But if I think of growing old as monotonous—a reflection of eternity—then suddenly life becomes a mysterious, ever-expanding horizon. I will spend eternity delving into the intimate depths of God. And then delving some more. While on earth, I can surpass time by doing the same thing. Then, the factor of why I exist never varies.
Instead of being about seizing the moment, making a memory or bracing for the future, life is about one thing: seeking the Lord so that I may be satisfied in him so that I may glorify him. If I view life as one act, repeated everyday for my entire life, then I will live a most beautiful life. Like the cliche mention of a sunset that never fails to inspire and a sunrise that always awes, my life is equally as monotonous as the rotating earth, but equally as unique and magnificent. It is the circle of sanctification.
But in this circle, there is a pendulum. The Lord has designed time so that as I stand in the present, I oscillate between nostalgia for the past and hope for the future. Is that atrocious? No, because my present is always progressing around the beautifully monotonous circle. I never swing from the same place. It is not atrocious as long as I appreciate my static worth as a progressively holy creature striving for the same goal every day.
And that is what I should be enjoying.
1 comment:
It is convicting to read this while at my monotonous job. While the Puritan work ethic should motivate my calvinistic self to do even monotonous tasks as to the glory of God (really, a biblical view of labor should be motivation to excel even at the monotonous).
It seems most people go through a period where they want to change the world, where they want to be one of those people who get three lines in a history textbook. Most people I know of that mindset hold it for good reasons, yet it seems that very few people do something 'significant'.
Ultimately, it causes us to ask, "What is a significant life?" I believe more and more the answer to that is living a life that is faithful to the situations God puts you in. Does this squelch all dreaming? No, but it measures our success in life not by how we measure up to the world's standards, but how we measure up to God's.
If we believe that knowing God intimately is the path to unsurpassed joy, that God's steadfast love is better than life itself, then faithfulness to God is of utmost importance-monotonous though it may seem. I tend to think that this life leaves plenty of room for excitement.
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