Author's Note: This is my Life of Pi final essay. I focused on how the world is always balancing itself out. This gave me a lot to talk about, and I thought that I could put in my input to it as well. A topic like this can go a lot of ways, which is why I chose it.
Ever since our creation, humans have taken us to new and ever-changing heights. We have shaped our world, for better or worse. We have fought and we have killed, but we have also loved and lived, managing to create the world we live in today. A world where the impossible becomes possible. The basis of our world is because we choose to act upon the side of us that will bring us to where we need to go. The world exists in contrast, and that is what makes us who we are. There is both light and dark instilled in us, and that opposition is what shapes the fabric of the world.
Without a balance, there is nothing. Without a balance, what reason could there possibly be to live? In China, there is a symbol to represent balance called Yin/Yang. On one side, there is Yin, full of darkness. Then there is Yang, who represents light. There is the circle of life, and within it is two very different aspects. Pi is thrust into a way of life that he never wanted to be a part of. Darkness threatens to take control as he shifts from Pi to Richard Parker and back again, letting out an animal-like instinct, yet he still manages to keep a finger on reality. Light cannot exist without Dark, and Dark would not be known without Light. It is in Light that we find the will to survive, even when all possible things that can go wrong do. As Pi fell into the lifeboat, as he fell into a new life, he is reborn. Out of the screams and agony of the ocean comes an innocent child, without any knowledge of what might lie ahead. A new beginning where Dark and Light is not known. As a new human, Pi experiences both sides of this spectrum. Everything from the Mr. Hyde persona of Richard Parker to his own Dr. Jekyll. The former provides Life, an animal instinct that brings forth survival to the world. The latter provides sanity and rationality, to keep us from delving too far into the other side. When a newborn comes into any sort of situation, that is the only thing to rely on. If we have lived based off of this instinct ever since that point, then two sides, two paths, are formed in each and every situation, and only one person can decide which to take.
Although the outcome of both sides can creates two very different people, there are times when one side just might save us. Pi asks for survival, and is presented an island to find refuge, and it appears that the island has it all -- food, shelter, and water. Why would anyone want to leave? There are many moments like this for all of us, when it seems like nothing could ever be better. The thing about this is that Life is standing still; there is no point anymore. To get up and live the same life every day, there is no sense of urgency that keeps us going. There are those in life that do nothing, the worst people of all, and it is these people that stand in one place, choosing to let Life lose meaning even when they know that they climb out of the hole. Had Light not been shown on to this dark-lit hole, Pi would have rotted away, slowly losing himself into Dark. Sometimes a blessing is a curse, and only we can discern the difference between the two.
As it was on the island, there is more to anything and everything than what meets the eye. Too many of us are determined to believe in what has been laid out for us, that there is one side. Things like facts and numbers, for instance. Just because it is not "the straight facts" doesn't make it wrong. There are times when simple words spoken or simple blurbs written cannot describe what one has been through. Mr. Okamoto and Mr. Chiba refuse to believe another side of the balanced scale because it is not what they believe in. Mere words cannot just be believed; facts must be there to back it up. Faith to them is no faith at all. To them this is Truth, but isn't believing in facts and numbers a faith in itself? They put their faith into something, even if it is not in God or in some story about animals, but there is absolutely balance. What Pi went through is the impossible, yet he stood before them living and able to tell his story based on the way he chose to see the situation. It is a faith to put faith in science, and it is a science to put faith in faith. One cannot exist without the other, but that doesn't mean that the other cannot be true just because we don't see it that way. It is a path, and we choose to go down it for Truth, whichever side it may be.
The Truth is, contrast is what makes Life. Believe in hate or believe in love, believe in God or believe in science, but know that there is no answer. Not every moment will be love or happiness, but each moment needs to be something. The world does not seek to balance itself out; it needs to, for we cannot exist in just one way of Life. There is a fine line between both sides, and we are the only ones that can find it for ourselves. When we have done that, as Pi has done that, it is then that we find out who we are.
