Without the sour the sweet wouldn't be.

I've been thinking a lot lately about opposites and if/why we need them.

I've held the idea that whoever said "better to have loved and lost" probably never lost. One of those optimists because he found what he was looking for without much trouble. I disagree with his theory. Sometimes I wish I'd never met certain people.

Satan tempted Adam and Eve with the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. I was wondering what he had to gain from that. It is true that eating the fruit would allow the couple to fulfill God's plan and learn the good (because without one, the other cannot exist). So what was Satan's motive? And then I remembered, Satan wants us to be as miserable as he is. He knows what he has lost, and that knowledge tears him apart. He wants us to know what we are losing. When we screw up, when we make mistakes, when we make ourselves unhappy--we suffer because we know what we had before. It is the contrast that aids our guilt or sorrow or frustration or hatred against the fates.

Two weeks ago, I had food poisoning. I didn't appreciate my body until it felt like it was dying. I knew what I was missing out on. I felt terrible because I was physically ill, and I felt terrible because I didn't feel well.

My religion often takes the view that through the bad times we can appreciate the good more fully. It is my stand that the negative side of the binary opposite, whatever it is, not only makes us recognize the good for what it is, but motivates us to get back to it, a repentance of sorts, for what is repentance if not a remedy for poor spiritual health, a solution for that pesky anti-moral binge and resulting spiritual hangover?

But aside from religion, sin, repentance, etc., opposites exist. Opposition exists. Oppositional forces exist.

For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

I feel that my actions are always met with their theoretical companions, and I never get anywhere. For every triumph, there is a failure.

And if we stop pushing, nothing pushes back. We stand still. So is it better to go nowhere than back and forth? Or is that still going nowhere?

Without the sour the sweet wouldn't be sweet. But without the sweet, neither would the sour be sour.

Can we simply choose what we put in our mouth, decide what flavor our taste buds will discover? It is the solution and the problem. If we choose sweet, we become numb to it and we lose sight of the reason we chose it. If we choose sour, we forget the sweet, and become apathetic towards our ill deeds.

So is it necessary to choose bad over good once in a while? Can we experience that pain by proxy?

So many questions.

I think I'll go eat something bitter.