The Greatest Accomplishment a Human Being Can Achieve...

When I think of the world we live in… I think of the natural world made of rivers, mountains, lakes, forests, and wide-open spaces. This world is contrasted with the world of man we’ve created. The world we create, for me, is made of a stream of collective ideas and thoughts drifting and flowing through our minds resonating within and through the weight of our emotions… layers of illusions and beliefs… where the meaning of our lives is created along with the horrors of our existence.

I’ve thought of working on a project over the last few years that would consist of the thoughts and photos of the people I interact with. The origin of the project started one evening as I walked through downtown Denver, I’ve constantly been confronted with people with sad faces asking for help/money… I wondered about their lives and the ideas and emotions that shaped their existence. The first questions I asked were about their political opinions, I didn’t get any answers that were appealing to me. The next question I asked was “What is the most beautiful thing you’ve seen?”. I had mixed results; the answers were all similar and were missing the depth I hoped for. A month or so ago, I was walking home listening to an audio book of “A Separate Reality" by Carlos Castaneda. In the book the authors guide, Don Juan Matus, made a statement “You once said the greatest achievement a man can accomplish is to become a man of knowledge…” I thought about this statement and asked myself the question “What is the greatest achievement a human being can accomplish?”. This is the type of question I enjoy asking myself. In my life I’ve never been good at achievements, I’m a curious guy who just goes through life and does things.

If I needed to give an answer to this question my answer would be “To confront the long dark night of the soul… digging through the shadows that weave themselves through the different aspects of our lives… the personal darkness that haunts us, obscuring and hampering the light...”. For me I learned at a young age that if I examined my life, with the intent of understanding the shadows of my internal world my life would get better.

That evening walking home I stopped by a local coffee shop and the local GO club. I asked the people I was conversing with this question “What is the greatest achievement a human being can accomplish in a lifetime?” I wasn’t sure what kind of answers I’d get… the answers and conversations leading up to them were uplifting. I like to think the answers to these types of questions and the actions they lead to shape the world we create. Over the past month I’ve asked a number of people and I want to thank each one of those who participated for their insight and conversation. Here are their photos and answers: