I Believe

via http://www.e-figart.com/

I believe in dragons, unicorns, fairies, and mermaids; not to mention, giants and elves, trolls and shape-shifters, heroes and demons. I also believe in places like Atlantis, Mu, and Punt. As I have stated before, I believe that we have barely scratched the surface of knowing, much less, understanding our own history. And since we do not know everything, how can we say with certainty that certain things never existed or claim without absolute proof that we understand the languages, words, and symbols handed down to us by our ancestors.

Simply put, We Can't.

I know that admitting to believing in all the things listed above and more, most would consider me at least silly, if not a full fledged nut job. But, why? Because some teacher in some classroom told you that something didn't exist. What was their proof? In most cases when we are told that something does not exist, the proof provided to support their claim is that there is no proof. Forgetting that the absence of proof does not in and of itself provide proof of nothing.

Mountain Gorilla via WWF

Ironically, history has taught us time and time again, that not believing in something, just because there is NO proof is usually a good way to have to eat your beliefs in the end. Mountain gorillas, rhinos, 'hobits', and komodo dragons all turned out to be real creatures and not just myths and tall tales to regal listeners! In addition we now have the physical remains of such legends as Homer's Troy and the Vikings' Vineland (Newfoundland) and the Bible's Jericho. Yet, still we are more adamant than ever about our disbelief in things we have been taught don't exist.

L'Anse aux Meadows

As part of the argument that these places and stories cannot be true, we are told that ancient peoples were superstitious, unknowing, scared lesser peoples that through their imagination created fantastical stories to explain things in nature that scared them and that they were unable to understand scientifically on such an evolved intellectual level as us today. The contradiction with this concept, is the following: first, it takes an intelligent mind to imagine and create, not the mind of a simple creature that is incapable of understanding the world around them; second, it tends to be the less intelligent mind that cannot fathom things beyond their understanding, that cannot accept those things as real that they cannot see and touch and feel for themselves. Thus, their argument falls flat when we remove our desire to believe that we are superior to those that came before us.

Part of the challenge of being able to access with as little bias as possible those people and places and events that came before us, is to overcome the arrogant belief that we in our current form are the best, smartest, most advanced we have ever been. For even recent history teaches us that empires rise and fall and that great persons gain great status and then fall into obscurity. Life nor history is a straight line always leading to better and higher success.

I believe that it is the mission of those that most consider to be crazy or 'out there' to continue to provide the means by which we can truly seek the truth and then know and understand where we have been, where we are, and where we are going.