People seeking the "American Dream" rarely reach the goals they set out to achieve. The following song by the band Scarlet immerses us in the experience of someone stuck in a prison of his own creation.
Scarlet- "Fluorescent Sunshine"
Army ants living a little white lie
A slave to the wage and the nine to five
I want the monotony
I need the anonymity
My job defines who I am
It's my personal Jesus
It's the evolution of man
My net worth tells me who I am
This is something you can't understand ...anymore
Take it all and beg for more
We're all drugged monkeys
Content with our role
We're all porn junkies
Looking for a hole
Stuck in the daily grind, many Americans often feel like "army ants" who live the "little white lie" that what they are doing is meaningful. It's easy to succumb to the "monotony" and "anonymity" of corporate America and its requirements for what it defines as "success." People who become absorbed in their jobs often try to make their career their salvation from meaninglessness. This can lead to the neglect of family, an inability to relax, and an overall cynical worldview.
Having been deluded into believing that this is "just the way it is," we in the West often become complacent, accepting that the "9-5" is a role we must fulfill. We feel that this sort of work schedule is necessary in order to survive. Because of this, we tend to lack excitement and seek it in things that are less than fulfilling. Our sex-obsessed culture floods our minds with images, slogans, and products that imply that fulfillment will come from sex with the most attractive member of our species. When that doesn't work out, we become "porn junkies looking for a hole." Anything will do, and we seek fulfillment in whatever trivial pleasures (not necessarily sex) will temporarily make us forget about our search for real meaning. We don't realize we're part of a society that stifles us and disables us from reaching our true potential.
Thrice- "The Earth Will Shake"
We dream of ways to break these iron bars
We dream of black nights without moon or stars
We dream of tunnels and of sleeping guards
We dream of blackouts in the prison yard
Heartbroken, we found a gleam of hope
Harken to the sound, a whistle blows
Heaven sent reply, however small
Evidence of life beyond these walls
Born and bred in this machine
Wardens dread to see us dream
We hold tight to legends of
Real life, the way it was before
We dream of jailers throwing down their arms
We dream of open gates and no alarms
Look to the day the earth will shake
These weathered walls will fall away
In the depths of our subconscious, we hope for something more. We don't want to be part of a machine that tells us how to live our lives. We're constantly searching for ways to break free of the prison that holds us, be it merely in our minds, be it the dog-eat-dog environment of the business world, or be it the suffocating walls of an office cubicle.
I recently learned that "The Earth Will Shake" by Thrice is based on a poem written by C.S. Lewis, which can be found here and in the text below. I don't know if this is the official version, since I do not have a copy of this poem in print, but the following version will suffice to show the similarities between it and the song:
"The Prudent Jailor" - by C.S. Lewis
Always the old nostalgia? Yes.
We still remember times before
We had learned to wear the prison dress
Or steel rings rubbed our ankles sore.
Escapists? Yes. Looking at bars
And chains, we think of files; and then
Of black nights without moon or stars
And luck befriending hunted men.
Still when we hear the trains at night
We envy the free travellers, whirled
In how few moments past the sight
Of the blind wall that bounds our world.
Our Jailer (well may he) prefers
Our thoughts should keep a narrower range.
‘The proper study of prisoners
is prison’, he tells us. Is it strange?
And if old freedom in our glance
Betrays itself, he calls it names
‘Dope’-‘Wishful thinking’-or ‘Romance’,
Till tireless propaganda tames.
All but the strong whose hearts they break,
All but the few whose faith is whole.
Some walls cannot a prison make
Half so secure as rigmarole.
The "tireless propaganda" that tells us that this is the way it has to be, that there is only one way to live and thrive in society, does not have to be heeded. We don't have to live in a hazy stupor that feels like happiness but is really a sad, tired complacency. From the time we are young we are told to obey. We are told that there is a proper way to think and (especially if you were raised in a religious community) believe. If one veers too far off course from what those above us feel is proper or acceptable, they are punished, shunned, corrected, or rejected. "The proper study of prisoners / is prison." If our minds go beyond the confines of that box, those who seek to control us become threatened.
We should hold tightly to the hope that there is more to life than what we are currently entangled in. We can't know that there is a life of greater meaning, purpose, and fulfillment beyond the confining walls of "society," but we can hope for it. We can work to make it a reality.
The question to consider is this: How do we find a life that holds more meaning than the daily grind, working to earn a wage that merely allows us to survive, instead of truly live? Are we willing to do what it takes to live a purposeful, fulfilling life? How do we free our minds? Are we content living in a world of false happiness, of fluorescent sunshine, or are we ready and willing to look forward to the day the earth will shake, doing what we can in the meantime to make that day become a reality?
What do you think? What does "life beyond these walls" look like? What alternatives are there? How do you find meaning?
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