The Death of Beauty

America is a great country, it truly is a blessing to live here. But we have got something very wrong by creating a culture that bastardizes beauty and often is too busy to notice. I do not say this angrily, it is truly a sad thing how little we focus on and appreciate beauty.

Exhibit A: In an experiment for the Washington Post, world famous violinist Joshua Bell took a cab to the Washington D.C. metro and played "Chaconne" from Johann Sebastian Bach's Partita No. 2 in D Minor - one of hardest and most beautiful violin solos ever written - on a 3.5 million dollar Stradivarius in the harsh, tiled room which, surprisingly, had decent acoustics.

Over 1,000 people walked by in the 45 minutes that he played, few stopped and even fewer dropped any money into the open violin case on the floor. Three days before, he sold out Boston's Symphony Hall where the cheap seats went for $100.

Clearly people do care for beauty but will pay for the status symbol of being seen at the orchestra and to feel cultured.

You can watch the video of this here. It sounds amazing. There is something intrinsically wrong with the American Dream if we have become insensitive to beauty because we are hell bent on success. The dream should be to arrive at a point where we can enjoy life, not chase it.

Tolstoy said it best:
"I have lived through much, and now I think I have found what is needed for happiness. A quiet secluded life in the country, with the possibility of being useful to people whom it is easy to do good, and who are not accustomed to have it done to them; then work which one hopes may be of some use; then rest, nature, books, music, love for one's neighbor-such is my idea of happiness. And then, on top of all that, you for a mate, and children, perhaps-what more can the heart of a man desire?"

From "Family Happiness"