Just watched the new movie 'Up in the Air'. I could see a lot of common between myself and Ryan Bingham.
I used to fly a a lot, sometimes, by myself and sometimes with companies. I have a lot of mileage cards for airlines and hotels and I own the same one Alex used to open the window of the classroom (the yellow Hilton card).
Is life better with company?
We are always surrounded but felt lonely and alone being surrounded. Why is it? Is it only a mind game? What is loneiness?
Below is the original quotes from Bingham:-
How much does your life weigh?
Imagine for a second that you're carrying a backpack.
I want you to feel the straps on your shoulders. Feel them?
I want you to pack it with all the stuff that you have in your life.
You start with the little things.
Things on shelves, in the drawers, the knickknacks, collectibles.
Feel the weight it all adds up.
Then you start adding larger stuff.
Clothes, tabletop appliances, lamps, linens, your TV.
The backpack should be getting pretty heavy now.
You go bigger.
Your couch, your bed, your kitchen table, stuff it all in there.
Your car, get it in there.
Your home, whether it's a studio apartment or a two-bedroom house.
I want you to stuff it all into that backpack.
Now try to walk. It's kinda hard, isn't it?
This is what we do to ourselves on a daily basis:
we weigh ourselves down til we can't even move
and make no mistake; moving is living
Now, I'm gonna set that backpack on fire.
What do you wanna take out of it?
Photos? Photos are for people who can't remember.
Drink some ginkgo and let the photos burn.
In fact let everything burn and imagine waking up tomorrow with nothing.
It's kinda exhilarating, isn't it?
...
This is how I start everyday of my life.
Now this is gonna be a little difficult, so stay with me.
You have a new backpack.
Now this time, I want you to fill it with people
Start with casual acquaintances, friends of friends, folks around the office.
And then you move into the people you trust with your most intimate secrets.
Your cousins, your aunts, your uncles. Your brothers, your sisters, your parents.
And finally your husband, your wife, your boyfriend, your girlfriend.
Get them into that backpack.
Don't worry I'm gonna ask you to light it on fire.
Feel the weight of that bag.
Make no mistake your relationships are the heaviest components in your life.
Feel the straps cutting into your shoulders.
All those negotiations and arguments and secrets, the compromises.
You need to carry all that weight.
Then you set that bag down.
Some animals were meant to carry each other to live symbiotically for a lifetime.
Star-crossed lovers, monogamous swans.
We are not those animals.
The slower we move, the faster we die.
We are not swans, We're sharks.
I don't know if you are swans or sharks, but I am neither both. I enjoy freedom but I also enjoy company. It is obviously that life is full of contradictions and hence we are human being.
A lot of time, we are tied up by relationships, family, friends, companies, qualifications, backgrounds, you name it...If we can just leave our 'back pack' can we be a happier person?
