Not My Eutopia

            Sometimes I like to dream up my own eutopia. Yes, that is the correct spelling, because in the Greek “eu” means “good.” Eutopia means “good place.” “Utopia,” the spelling which we usually prefer, means “no place.” I’d rather be in a good place than no place, I think.

            This world likes to wield the power of eutopian ideals over and inside our heads, like we don’t have reason to enjoy what we’ve got now. My thoughts jump from this--now--to heaven, never formulating thoughts of possible eutopias in between, because when people try to force you to dream up perfection it can be rather off-putting.

            I know of no “eutopia,” in the truest sense of the word, but we live in “utopia,” I think. Our reference point for beauty is airbrushed photos, sliced and stretched wealthy people who live lives that I can’t even imagine--the most intricate and extravagant and painted up. So I don’t know where their beauty is coming from--the person or the alterations. And I don’t have any major alterations, so where does my beauty come from? Probably “no-place.”

            Sometimes I want to turn off my cell phone or ignore text messages, delete my Facebook account and never check my email. But that makes people angry. They get offended. Sometimes I just need some peace. Complete and total solitude. Is there any place we can go to get that, without repercussions that evoke guilt? Nope. “No-place.”

            There is no way to banish insecurities or the belief that we are inadequate or that we should be achieving greater or making more money or losing more weight. I can’t, because there’s always a girl walking by weighing 103 pounds and an unbelievably tanned, muscular man strutting just behind. And then their bodies are always on billboards. There are always useless Louis Vuitton bags doing their song and dance in a store window. Yes, they are useless, but such a necessity. Then the girl from the billboard is carrying one so why shouldn’t I carry one too?

            I can’t banish the thoughts. They invade every corner of my mind--not always the same ones and usually not all at the same time, but there is always at least one floating around. There is “no-place” for my thoughts to travel and hide from inadequacy, no place where they will not encounter that from which they are fleeing. They flee from our misjudged and wrongly created eutopias that are not what they claim to be. They flee from “eutopia” and end up wandering around in “utopia.”

            Within a utopian mindset, knowledge is pleasure and pleasures are happiness. Within this mindset, we believe that God created us for the purpose of giving us total earthly happiness. Utopians believe that genuine happiness can be found in earthly pleasures. Scripture says ultimate happiness is inherent in the nature of God. That is what we must pursue for true happiness and fulfillment and pleasure.

“How happy is the man

who does not follow the advice of the wicked,

or take the path of sinners,

or join a group of mockers!

Instead, his delight is in the Lord’s instruction,

and he meditates on it day and night.

He is like a tree planted beside streams of water

that bears its fruit in season

and whose leaf does not wither.

Whatever he does prospers” (Psalm 1:1-3). 

Father,

May we find pleasure in your instruction

in the strength of your salvation

in your undying compassion

in your loving mercy

in your relentless grace

in your concern for our

transcendent joy.

We love you.

Amen.

Erin E. Daugherty, Abilene Christian University