A paradox: people see common things as precious. Every human being, for example, thinks and feels him or herself to be special, regardless of the fact that more than seven billion others think and feel the same.
Consider sexual identity: my private parts are just that; I cover them up; I would not like them to be seen. Not only are they private but they also seem special, an expression of my identity, exclusive to moi, never mind that every other male on the planet thinks the same. Some refer to them as ‘the crown jewels’, hitting new lows of hyperbole.
Making the common special is the art of being human. Privacy is one of its expressions. A great deal of money, time, material and space goes into affording billions of people the opportunity to be rid of their body’s waste substances without anyone else seeing the act, even though everyone knows and does exactly the same. That this enormous amount of effort and expenditure lessens the likelihood of disease is valid, but the Romans used to sit alongside, doing their business, chatting away happily as if in a sauna. Nowadays, however, the privacy of a toilet space helps establish and safeguard one’s special identity.
When it comes to what goes into our bodies, not out of, there is an interesting difference. Though nothing in this world is shared more than food, all of us having a body that needs food, underlying this commonality is an individual’s choice over how and what it is fed. Were eating merely a function of the body, like breathing, the principle of eat when your body tells you it is hungry would be mechanically and universally practised; eating disorders would not exist. Our bodies would be managed like machines: they need fuel to maintain their working order; they show this need via hunger pangs; when such are felt, feed the body.
But our bodies have sensory capacities which are linked to a mind which exercises choice, and though eating is common to all humankind, every individual develops a relationship to food which is different from another’s. Were you to speak to the chef who has pioneered brinjal biltong or pineapple carpaccio, a tale of experiment, discovery and excitement might unfold; but speak to a more ascetically-minded person and food is a fuel to be added to the body in the right amounts at the right times so as to maintain it properly. Some people become conflicted and guilt-ridden about the food they eat: do I respond to what my body needs or what it wants? This can lead to extreme and dysfunctional conditions such as anorexia and bulimia, where something seemingly simple, eating, becomes agonisingly complex.
Whereas light, air and heat are living conditions mostly beyond our control, coming in the package the universe has provided in this part of its reach, food has to be brought to the table through individual effort, part of the curse God laid on Adam for his disobedience: ”… in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread…“. People fight and kill over it because, without it, one dies; they also rejoice with it because it pleases and satisfies. The more we have of it, the less we value it; the less we have of it, the more we value it.
Though our relationship with food might seem paradoxical, it differs from the three other paradoxes, none of which comes with the element of choice. Because we are part of its creation and consumption, we choose its provision or lack of it. It is what hinges us to this world: the condition of that hinge is within our control.
