Do you get upset when scrolling through your favorite social media platform and your eyes, unable to tear them away, flash across a spoiler for your favorite book, movie, or game?
When in conversation do you get bummed out when it morphs into conversation in a book, movie, or game you haven’t read, watched or played yet? You just have to say “Stop I haven’t ‘…….’ it yet, I can’t have it spoiled” conversation lulling into disapointment.
SPOILER WARNING!!!! The conclusion of this piece is. Don’t let the destination ruin the journey.
As humans we love that feeling of starting off on a journey — working through hardships and drama — and then, reaching a conclusion or ending. So, naturally when we start off a journey, or have one planned, a lot of us become displeased when the ending is revealed. Most individuals have experienced this on some level, maybe not the being displeased part, but most have seen the end before they reach it.
Everyone learns about death eventually; and if you haven’t yet, well SPOILER WARNING!!!!!
You are going to die. I hope that didn’t upset anybody
Death may be the universal spoiler that we all try to forget. No one complains about this spoiler though we just go through the actions of everyday life and forget about it.
I may be a minority, but I have no issue when the end of anything, or any plot point is diverged. They don’t detract from the story I’m reading, or the movie or shows I’m watching. The revelation of the thing, is not the thing to me. It’s not that thing until I’ve had all the context leading up to it. It’s not the thing until I’ve taken the journey that leads to that point. Someone may communicate the same thing to me, but if I’m honest, I don’t have faith in how others characterize endings, plot points, most things in life.
Death, the spoiler of all spoilers, I know what it is, yet I don’t go around believing what every non-dead person tells me it is. I listen, but retrospectively I remember, they have no clue what it’s like, even if they know they will die.
People can and will characterize and narrate the ending points of so many things in life, but none of those are your endings. You don’t even get to make it your ending until you’ve gone through the story that leads to that end; and only then can you really listen to others’ representations of that ending. You need to read the book, watch the movie, or play the game and the duration of that process is “your” ending, no one else’s. It may be as simple as the spoiler you saw or were told, but I find, when something is spoiled for me and I still walk the path — read or watch the thing — the spoiler I received is scarcely representative of the path I took.
Death may be the outcome, but that doesn’t stop us from living. I’ll believe the ending when I reach it myself.