essay i found that i vaguely remember writing

I wrote this last year for English, I guess. I don't remember writing it or turning it in, but I remember thinking these things, and I still agree with them, so I thought I would post it in case it gets lost in the ether.

The Means Are the Ends We Seek

We exist in a society that lives for the future. The illusory goals of humanity- happiness, utopia, freedom, individual worth, equality of power- can never be achieved under the current American psychological complex, the wavering conviction in the realization of tomorrow. ‘Tomorrow’ never comes, and in that truth lies the excuse for the stagnation of human ideals in America.

So often Americans seek utopia through consistency; however, the only real consistency in life, the only real control, is not found in the ends we seek, but in dystopia, the antithesis of the ‘perfect’ society. Only misery allows a real sense of security. People can count on the companionship of depression in a way that they can never count on the ends they seek. Because of America’s reliance on what is reliable, what cannot be lost, the ends of a utopia can never be found in the American psyche. We have convinced ourselves that we are fighting for freedom, for happiness, but are incapable of attaining it. We use this imagined fundamental shortcoming as an excuse to remain unmoving in our consistent existences. Americans continue to relapse into immobility, and we have convinced ourselves it is because we don’t have the self-control to abstain from dystopia. However, because in our great search for happiness we are constantly choosing to be unhappy, we are falling short of the ends we seek and finding comfort in bondage and a wild inconsistency in our concept of freedom.

The remedy to the situation is the diametrical opposite of the pseudo-utopia America seeks: letting go of the unattainable end and finding consummation in the means. Genuine freedom, individual worth, and equality of power are not an end, not a destination. The American interpretation of a utopia really is inconsistent; it really is untrustworthy, and it isn’t a utopia that could ever accommodate our goals; however, there are alternate versions of a utopia that are not found in the ends, but rather in the means. We plan for the future. We do everything we can to be happy tomorrow. We have forgotten today. Now is the only time we will be alive. If we aren’t free now, we will never be free, no matter how hard we work for it. Freedom isn’t simply an end; it is a way of life we choose. It is not something we can own but something we are.

We seek utopia, happiness, freedom, individual worth, and equality of power. America has placed these ideals in tomorrow. We have made them a reward we can earn from living; however, these goals are inherent in the very act of living. Happiness is found only in the search for happiness. Utopia is found in the constant struggle for excellence- not perfection- today. Freedom can only be seized by living, not through it. Equality of power and individual worth can only be actualized by the individual’s decision to live on the same plane as his peers, not by a government struggling to arbitrate it.
There is the possibility, every day, of all of the ends we’ve ever desired, but the only way to achieve these ends is by absorbing them into the action of living and denying the contemporary American psyche. If we conform to the habits of society, we will never reach the future and never repeat the past. We can exist only in the moment, and only in this moment, through the means of living, can we achieve the utopia we seek.