Rand’s novel about the greatest architect in history makes a profound point about integrity. Not only in reference to the structures of buildings, but also the hearts of men.
Roark claimed that an honest building, like an honest man, had to be one piece and one faith; what constituted the life source. And if one small part committed treason to that idea, the thing or the creature was dead. The good, the high and the noble on earth, he said, is only that which has kept its integrity.
He quickly learns, though, that in practical life, one can’t always be so flawlessly consistent. There’s always the incalculable human element of emotion.
My heart skipped a beat when I first read this passage. Because consistency was always something that mattered to me. My expectation for myself was to become unified system without internal contradictions or disharmony.
It didn’t work. Turns out, most of us are an absolute clusterfuck of contradictions. We’re all just one big series of overlapping and conflicting impulses. And no matter how hard we try to scrub away those layers of inconsistency, another one always resurfaces.
But this contradiction doesn’t mean we’re hypocrites, it means we’re growing, moving, imperfect human beings taking new shape and form.
Therefore:
Let us stretch our hearts wide enough to embrace paradox.
Let us feel alive in all our contradictions, without trying to put our many selves in neat little categories and patterns.
Let us live multiple life purposes fit together seamlessly into a composite life purpose agenda.
LET ME ASK YA THIS…
How are you making sense out of multiple selves that seem at odds with each other?
* * * *
Scott Ginsberg
That Guy with the Nametag
Author. Speaker. Strategist. Inventor. Filmmaker. Publisher. Songwriter.
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