Losing my Relig... oh wait. There it is.

So finals are over. I'd say thank God, but I've been particularly sketchy on what/if I believe regarding a higher power these days. I have always had a feeling that there is something up there, but for many years now, I've been rather vague as to what or whom.

Agnosticism is, in my opinion, the closest thing to right a person can be when it comes to picking a religion. To state with any level of certainty that there is nothing is no less a leap of faith than any other religion, and short of God himself revealing it to you (yeah, suuuuure He did) it's highly unlikely that any of the particular faiths got it just right, much less that you chanced upon the correct one. Still, agnosticism leaves one very frustrated when you need to say a quick prayer to someone, ask for a blessing, or just plain thank the heavens for your good fortune. If you default to a particular god, it feels like I'm committing a heresy against agnosticism. If you just pray to "whoever," I have a hard time believing "whoever" is up there is going to be especially persuaded. "Dear what's-your-name, please help me pass my accounting test tomorrow, Amen." I mean, if I was an all-powerful deity and my subjects couldn't even be bothered to guess my name, I doubt I could be bothered to alter reality in their favor. I wouldn't do favors for friends when they can't remember my name, why would I do it for my subjects?

And so, I think I'm going to start my own religion. I'm at least 20% serious here. It might drop to 10% after lunch, I'm not sure yet.

In Accounting, everything has always been about balance. It's an impossibly intricate system in which every action demands an equal and opposite reaction, thus necessitating a perfect balance at all times. Imbalances simply cannot happen in Accounting. This is not to say that it's against the rules for there to be no balance, as it is to say that it is impossible. If things in an accounting system do not appear to balance, then you have erred. The balance is there, it's always there, you've simply failed to properly measure things. It is no more possible for your debits to be unequal to your credits than for a large mass in space to naturally repel smaller masses rather than attract them.

Accounting is, for most intents and purposes, a theoretical, rather than a physical science. It measures something that is not tangible. Physics, chemistry, and even psychology, for example, are attempts by humanity to define in human terms the reality of what is going on. What is going on, in these cases, is always physical. Accounting is an attempt to express, in human terms, what is going on, but it's not physically happening. While it's true that some assets (like a building) have a physical form, we are not measuring anything physical about that asset. We are not measuring it's weight, or it's size, but rather it's worth. We are measuring what this asset could yield, what a liability could cost, or what assets and liability unit of equity entitles the holder to. We are measuring something that, while it has no physical form, truly impacts the physical world every day. If the dollar were to lose all its value, an accounting system that measures in dollars would naturally adjust itself to represent this change (for example, a physical asset would be worth more dollars, because dollars are worth less but the asset's physical worth remains unchanged). In other words, we are measuring power.

Thus far, accounting is the science of studying the power of wealth. But I imagine the most basic principle of balance can be applied to power in all its forms. In all systems, there is a balance. the power of wealth is a man-made system, and is therefore incredibly simple, relatively speaking. There are only two sides which must balance, and a finite number of forces that can act upon the balance. As hard as it is to understand even this simple system, it is an immensely rudimentary facsimile of more complicated systems, like ecosystems, or the universe itself.

Yes, that's right, the universe itself is a system of perpetual balance. Perpetual meaning that at no point is there an imbalance. It's not that when one thing acts to change that balance, another thing acts to readjust it, but rather that actions and there associated reactions occur simultaneously. Whenever one thing happens, something else happens not in response, but in tandem, to maintain the perpetual balance. This balance could no more be upset than the very laws of reality could shift and readjust themselves. It's not a question of probability or the lack of sufficient force, but rather it is a logical impossibility.

This is the Great Balance, in which we all have some amount of weight, both through our physical forms, our actions, and even our thoughts and beliefs. Everything that we do has a reaction, and everything that happens has happened as part of a balance. Although you most assuredly can impact the world around you, events of "chance" are simply the random result of the universe maintaining itself. All the other forces within the system go through various actions, and the concurrent reactions are what resulted in the world being the way it is.

So from now on, when the machinations of the Great Balance are in my favor, I shall be grateful to the Balance. When they oppose me, I shall curse It, if I'm feeling cheeky. This does not provide an ideal answer to my afore-mentioned troubles, as the Great Balance is more of a natural state of things than a sentient god, but all things considered, that doesn't necessarily make it any less likely to care.

And, with all that in mind, I'd like to say. Fuck the Balance, because I didn't get my 3.5 GPA.


This has been,

B.S.

PS: There were no spelling errors to correct when I finished this post, and this post was highlighting the potential existence of a higher power. Coincidence? I think so.
[EDIT: damn you Kurt. Damn you and your keen sense of grammar.]