Where is Paradise?

…and thus God kicked out Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden, closed the enormous creaking iron gates, and put up a sign board that said ‘Keep off, or suffer my wrath.’

Myth or truth, who knows. But ever since the unceremonious drumming out of our forefathers from the land of eternal joy, we have been miserable. It opened a void within our being. A huge gap. Through the years, we realize that it cannot be filled with hot supercars, huge mansions, or hefty account balance.

We want paradise. Nothing else. Like a child dragged back home from Disneyland, we yearn to go back. We wander around all our lives searching for a way back. This is a glitch in our being.

Shortcuts to paradise

But there is no need to be depressed. Many human demigods claim they have found crevices in the compound wall surrounding the Garden of Eden. They promise a free pass to paradise if we follow them.

These demigods are politicians, or leaders of our religious, ethnic, or sectarian groups. They assert that they have found the only path to paradise and profess the doom that awaits those who do not follow them blindly.

But they seldom stop there. With uncanny clairvoyance, they proclaim that all others, who promise paradise are liars who must be exterminated along with their ideologies.

Hypocrisy? Blatantly so.

Rewards to the followers

The jury is out on the question of whether anyone has ever really found a secret way into paradise. We may never know the verdict. But the pull it has on the human mind is undeniable. Whether it be the ideas of mono-ethnicity, a religious state, or an afterlife of eternal joy, we follow these leaders blindly.

However, danger lurks in blindness. Sometimes, these leaders demand their followers to color their paths to Eden with the blood of their assumed rivals. “Well, you have to wage wars to win paradise”, the proponents of these philosophies say. And many take up arms.

But throughout history, no one has handed parachutes to the lemmings that jump off the cliff in faith. Inevitably, they have landed fatally on the rocky valleys of reality.

Likewise, these leaders and their ideologies destroy us. We are forced to sacrifice our virtue, reason, and our lives, in the hope of making the future brighter.

Never never land

Notice, however, all their promises are not for a better today, but a better tomorrow. A tomorrow that never comes. These demigods know they can dangle such hollow pledges in front of us and lead us wherever they want.

However, when we start thinking, everything changes. We become awake. We realize that the hypnotizing tones of these snake charmers only spread hatred, prompt violence, and demand blind belief and turn away from it.

Why hurt others for a promised land locked away behind the iron gates of a never-coming future? Instead, why don’t we spread love, heal pain, and bring a smile to everyone?

Let us create paradise here, now.

Thank you for reading. Please let me know your thoughts in the comment box below.