Determination

It's quite filling, I'm told

It can be said that one of the most admirable traits that a person can profess to is that of determination towards something, anything, that a sort of end or purpose. Be that a dream, a responsibility, a job, a chore or any degrees in-between, the purpose to fuel forward momentum can define any one person as an enviable exemplar promoting performance towards a singular end. Were we to whittle do all that down to some binary functions, and I'm pretty sure in this life that is the ultimate goal of most, then the best human one can be is a 'sure' one. A person who knows who they are, what they are, and how to be them. To be anything short of that, is to either be incomplete or to be a failure. Because indecision is death as would be all that woeful disdain we reserve for the ambivalent. So how does one obtain and maintain such a thing as vague and conceptual as 'determination'?

One thing I've really come to understand is absolutely no one really sets out to the aid of someone else. Or rather, the innate beating heart of selfish humanity means that at some small degree, to any small measure, all anyone does in life is in the pursuit of something for themselves. Money, fulfilment, spiritual brownie points- there's forever a manner of exchange in the process. Motivation can be whittled down, in a most basic form, as desire towards that transactional goal, whatever the prize at the end of the rainbow be. A often quoted, thought rarely sourced, quip occurs. The classic: 'It's about the journey not the destination'. A phrase extolling the virtue of forward motion in supposed perpetuity .I would infer, from this discussion, that the lacking a destination would, ironically, nullify the purpose of the journey. Perhaps, then, the great 'motivation' lies between the unreachable and the believable, in whatever nether space that permits.

And what of those that are lacking in such a department? What remains for those that struggle everyday to find some spark of that illusive 'determination'? I like to equate this with the image of the hooded men in Final Fantasy VII, wandering after the promise of a union that will never come, like aimless zombies bobbing about and waiting to die or be used by someone more 'motivated' than they. Were we in a fiction we might instead characterise such people as barrels of tinder just waiting to be lit, but determination needs to be self perpetuating because remember- no one wants to help anyone else unless they get something in return. What benefits await the one who sets another one, apart from him, on their path. Their 'awakening' to be spiritual? Is the benefit Nothing? Then it's simply not worth their time.

There's something cosmically ugly about the undetermined. The lost and the searching. Like a mistake of being placed in a position that another soul in another universe might have made better use of. The cracks in the slate of that 'grand holy design', were we to resort back to the 'spirtual' angle from earlier. Because who exactly are you, if you can't identify with a creed? If you can't define your trade, spell out your career, voice your dream, define your purpose. Even the search for a purpose itself is a pursuit worthy of some commendation. But otherwise? We save our more clinical eye for the otherwise. Pity and diagnosis for the obviously broken, because as experience and example shows: Working Humans have determination.

I think perhaps the most famous video game utilisation of 'determination as a mechanic' that I can think of is it's constant reference throughout underground smash hit RPG 'Undertale', wherein everytime the player character makes to save their game in the various accessible locations throughout the world they are greeted with the message 'X fills you with Determination'. In this instance Determination is linked with the quality of persistence which is gamified in the way that we can reload from our save points after suffering from failure in order to try again and see if we can crack it next time. Which highlights another classically 'heroic' trait of 'determination'- obstinance in the face of adversity To prove oneself as 'Determined', they need to be faced with the realisation of failure and push back- otherwise success 'means nothing'.

But can a straightforward path not still be a deeply 'Determined' one? Can a person not be dedicated to where they want to go simply because the route to achieve that go splayed out clearly for them? Well then we delve a further into the murky realms of outward perception, wherein a lot of 'determination's power resides. Oftentimes respect is a value thought to be earned, and 'resilience' from there can only be proven in the face of notable opposition. 'Privilege', on the otherhand, can see interpreted as something of a poison that twists the noble stuff of determination into a tool of misappropriated oppression, unconsciously or otherwise, wielded against the less fortunate. In this mirror state, determination becomes a sort of pig-headed ignorance, in it's worst extremes.

What I find myself personally reflecting on more than any of that, however, is the 'Determination' which hides 'stubbornness' towards the fruitless. Those that become dedicated towards the kind of wall that will never give in, or the mountain that can never be scaled. Can a life of determination be considered one well lived if you never achieve any faint smidge of the plateau you once swore to master? Is a dream unchased the worse inevitability, when a dream failed ends the same way? How do you know when what you have isn't ambition or drive, but bitterness and blind, unwarranted, optimism. And what's more sad, to realise you are going nowhere and give up, or to persist forever not realising there'll never be a chance for you?

Determination is a concept that rules a vast degree about the lives we live and how we choose to examine the human experience, and studying our relationship with the word can help us learn a bit more about ourselves. Getting to the core of what keeps anyone waking up in the morning is kind of like transcribing the bible of their soul, because the ascension of sentience kind of means an evolution away from rule by instinct and genetic purpose. Speak all you might about 'ancestral values' or 'tradtional mindsets', but the truth is that the human mind doesn't work like that anymore, and society has driven itself up to a point of rejecting all that mundanity- now the fuel we run on is our determination, and the better we learn to manipulate such a resource the more in-control of our worlds we can become.