When the soul needs revitalisation..

Have you ever felt like everything you're doing at a particular moment doesn't make sense, and you want an escapade away from it all?

Have you ever felt that something within you wants to break out of the body, but it is constrained nonetheless - and you know deep down that finding somebody to talk doesn't reduce the discomfort?

Have you ever felt that you want to stop in your tracks, but are worried that the time could be better spent on more "meaningful" indulgences?

Have you ever felt that it has been a long while since you had a proper session of crying, and want to do so even though there's really nothing concrete bothering you?

Have you ever felt that your heart and your mind are all twined up in a mess that even thinking about life in the long term and your eventual death doesn't help to clear things up?

In my opinion, these are the times when the soul needs revitalisation - a new spur of energy to keep it, and yourself, moving.

For me, I seek solace in soft melodious music which proclaim the most noble feelings of mankind - both the triumph and failure of them - and have my soul enter a state of resonance. A doze of human weakness appearing before the eyes also helps to penetrate the tough castle of the physical. Or when that doesn't work, sunsets or the starry sky usually moves me, though the effect on the emotions is quite different.

Imagination hits the affection, and the affection, the will. Once the wall of the will collapses, the soul soars - up and above to a state of heavenly painful pleasure.

No, this is not masochism. It's renewal. A state of existence when you are reminded that life itself places you in the middle of restraints and constraints you can never hope to overcome, when you are reminded that there exists a dilemma between body and soul, when you become alert to self-deception which you have employed on yourself in the hope of seeking illusive happiness, when you renew your faith and belief that you are still a living being, not a follower of some philosophy/knowledge or a part of human race's mechanism.

Humans need conscious imagination apart from all the plots our brains write automatically in the middle of the night. Since imagination takes different forms, what steers it in the "right path" is the creation of beauty that has lifting the spirits as its ultimate End. Our feelings are the obvious and straightforward indication of us as something blessed with the breath of life. While this may be what age-old philosophers like Socrates or Aristotle see as insignificant compared to higher Reason, in this age of Reason overdose, it's time we revert back to square one of our existence - and start being a living being before attempting to be human in its highest sense.

Perhaps, this gives us a little insight into why our Chinese ancestors advocated the "heart" for 5000 yrs. We have been a people that elevated aesthetics to the realm of belief and maintained this habit which Westerners lost after the fall of the Roman empire in the course of our history. In this sense, we can say our ancestors never lost sight of their primary positions as living creatures of Nature. Its significance becomes prominent today, and somehow reveals the fact that time is but a man-made concept.