While on the phone with my mother the other day, I told her that I really want to get to know all of the people in my life even more but the problem is that I just hate people [in which she laughed at but I was being serious].
No, the title of this post isn’t supposed to be with an ironic or sarcastic emphasis which is how I typically say that line. I really do love human beings, or at least find them all so interesting. They’re God’s most beautiful and complex creations afterall.
I love people but I think it’s the imperfections that people (including myself) inevitably have that make me hate people. I hate my own imperfections. I hate that the phrase “I’m just human” is completely accurate. We all have our limitations and unfortunately, some people figure out how to go about them in a civil manner quicker than others. I always say this, and mean it wholeheartedly every time, but I would always take an animal’s side before a human being’s. Especially considering what some humans do to innocent animals who act only on their instincts without any of the pre-conceived knowledge that I would assume would stop humans from doing such cruel things in the world, but I guess not. I think what makes me mad at humans is that they still act on those urges even while knowing the consequences and hopefully understanding morals. That’s why I’d always take an animal’s side. They never intend to hurt, just to protect themselves and their loved ones. I genuinely believe they too have feelings along with complexities and are aware of how cruel the wild can be, but they almost always choose love. Why do we not? Why must we let judgements, greed, impatience, etc consume us and determine our decisions? I am guilty at this myself as well. So maybe it’s animals that are God’s most beautiful creations instead?
But that’s where my heart gets conflicted. I still love human beings so much. Humans are technically animals as well and are ruled by survival and protection too so I guess I shouldn’t blame them fully for their actions either? They should know better though! Or perhaps I just give the human population way too much credit and my expectations of the masses aren’t realistic. I have morals and [in my opinion] a very caring heart, so maybe I’m just one of the lucky ones. That must be why I cannot take the negative traits, which then makes me negative.
However, that’s why I’m so interested in psychology and want to study it deeper. Or maybe it’s genetic since my mother studied it and is interested in it as well? We both just so happen to be very intuitive people as well. Just like how I’m equally interested in how businesses and computers work, in which my father studied. I have forever been a storyteller and an artist which led to me to fall in love with filmmaking, which honestly is a perfect marriage between my parents’ two studies with a pinch of my creative traits [that may possibly be genetic too, I have no idea]. Look how that works! [that was sarcasm… sorry, can’t resist] It always seemed to be ingrained within me, it just took me to figure them out for myself and now I’m still figuring out all that I want to do with them. You may debate what that means in terms of biology and psychology yourself, but that’s just what happened and is still happening to me.
So, I do love meeting people. I think that’s why I love to do things (besides the fact that it’s fun and I love to experience all that life [positively] offers). I love to meet new people and get to know the people that are already in my life on a deeper level. I find their stories and the psychologies behind them so interesting. It makes perfect sense that a storyteller and artist, whom thrives off of realizations and experiences within life and nature to make-up their creations, would love that. It allows me to dig deeper within myself and grow in reaction to the people and experiences placed in my life [or as I’d like to say, that I’m blessed with]. That’s exactly what I intend my films/stories to do. To present new characters for the viewer to meet and experiences they don’t even have to physically react with to dwell on things that could influence themselves and their lives positively. That’s the beauty of technology.
On the other end, just like people, I admit there too are negative aspects as well but right now, we’re focusing on the positive. Always choose to focus on the positive even if the negative definitely is present. They may be potentially forever present, but you get to choose which things you see and what you get to react off of. In all honesty, that’s kind of how media works and what information we subconsciously choose to process so why not use that technique to keep our lives mostly sunny and bright? Try to change the negative, yes, but don’t let them rule over. That’s what I presume gets humans to act cruelly. You don’t see animals stop living life or decide to kill everything in sight just because they know there’s predators out in the wild.
But back to filmmaking or rather creative production overall… Artists honestly are scientists too. They study the world and people in it and create from their observations. They just use their work to display their findings in a debatebly more entertaining way (which definitely makes life more fun–or so it does for me). My point is, don’t take artists for granted please. They too are smart and are important to our society. I’m not saying that doctors, firefighters, lawyers, teachers, professional scientists, and beyond aren’t important. They definitely, definitely are. But so many people decide to just toss artists into the “unnecessary” pile when their own lives are heavily influenced by artwork whether they even realize it or not. Artists are smart too, if not some of the smartest [especially in terms of street/life-smart which sometimes is the one that counts the most] people you’ll ever meet. That’s our jobs, to use our psychological studies (just like all of the observations that I spent this whole post dwelling on) from life to create things that the public (you) don’t even have to sit and think about to have it work its magic on you. You should think about them, though.
Your life might just be a bit better if you did. Mine is.
Ha, this post certainly took a sharp turn on ya, didn’t it? Maybe that was my intention. Maybe not. That’s how films, stories, and other art-forms are intended to work. To make you think it out for yourself, just like life does for me. Overall, I just want to make it clear that there for sure are things I dislike about humans but I choose to overlook them the best I can to focus on all the things I love about them which far out numbers the negative. I want to love everyone. Some humans make that difficult for me, which I choose to ultimately blame psychology and their environments for but the truth is that they too have the ability to choose which path to go down. Please choose to go down the positive path too. Please choose to think and respect everything and everyone. Animals, peers, people and discourses you don’t understand. Life doesn’t have to be negative if you don’t want it to be, don’t make it so for other people and most importantly, yourself. Just think about that.
xoxo, lizzie 🙂
PS- Originally, this post was meant to dwell on how great a college environment is for artists/storytellers like me who love to learn from other people from different backgrounds. It went into way deeper turf, as it usually does for me. Sigh. But I just want to thank all of those amazing people in my life who share their stories with me and let me learn from them. I hope I can do the same for them. They will definitely be influences and inspiration for characters/plots in my own stories someday. I just love it and love them. <3
PSS- To lighten the mood, I’ll share an example of how a college environment’s diversity makes life so interesting and allows people to learn so much from those they meet. Minutes ago, I saw a guy walking around [or shall I say, slamming into every student in his wake] with a giant reflective umbrella in clear sunlight. I sure do hope hat he’s allergic to the sun or something big like that, because that is so not necessary. But it’s things like that in which I want to dive even deeper in to understand something I may judge. Like, just why? I don’t know, but it sure adds color to my world.
