Aging Capriciously

For the next 45 days until the New Year of 2016, I am going to post some blogs on the subject of Time and its implications for our lives.  I will post one a day for each day of the remaining 2015 year.

Crazy time today often has a very negative connotation. We think of the crazies in our world and the damage they often do. We try to figure out what made them crazy or what ticked off their crazy streak. We wonder “How could anyone do something so bizarre? What made them do such things?” However, being somewhat crazy and having some crazy time can have other connotations. For instance, many of us are straitlaced and very uptight. We are constantly trained to think about our duties, responsibilities and obligations to others and ourselves. There comes a time when we all need to let go of these “duties” and to be somewhat “crazy.”

Here are four definitions of the word crazy:

1. Mentally deranged; demented; insane.
2. Senseless; impractical; totally unsound: a crazy scheme.
3. Informal. Intensely enthusiastic; passionately excited: crazy about baseball.
4. Informal. Very enamored or infatuated (usually fol. by about): He was crazy
about her. (www.dictionary.com)

No one wants the first definition to apply to them, but the second definition has often been applied to geniuses and entrepreneurs.  The third and fourth definitions can probably be applied to all of us at one time or another.  Who among us is not crazy about something? Thus, craziness is simply a state of being that others do not share at that time. This definition can also be considered the essence of nonconformity. Those who dance to their own drummers seldom share the same state of being that others do. Thus, going a little crazy might be good not only for our spirit but also for our creative side.

Who among us would venture out and do anything really unique or different if we were not willing to flaunt convention and ignore practical reality? In fact, craziness might just be the sine qua non of the adventurous and spirited.

The answer I found is you stay away from the people who make fun of you, and you join these ad hoc groups who understand your craziness. — Ray Bradbury

Time for Questions:

Have you ever been called crazy? Why? Do you ever indulge in activities that others think are crazy? What would your life be like if you were just a little more crazy? What if you danced a little crazier? Acted a little crazier? Dressed a little crazier?

Life is just beginning.

Nothing I read about grief seemed to exactly express the craziness of it; which was the interesting aspect of it to me – how really tenuous our sanity is.  — Joan Didion