As Good As It Gets

I watched an interesting programme on I-player recently looking at unfinished works of art and our need for endings.

Should incomplete novels and symphonies be left that way or should another artist pick up the baton and finish the job?

A need for endings has a strong hold on our lives - a desire for situations to be resolved in some way.

Why is it that I watch a film to the end even if I realise halfway through that I'm not enjoying it?

This was beautifully expressed in the TV programme by a reference to the critic Frank Kermode who noted that even though a clock may tick, tick, tick we have invented an alternate tock to satisfy our need for a release from the tension of something that never ends.

I think the need for resolution plays a big part in our unconscious desires and our understanding of the world.

John Gray explores the idea in his book 'Black Mass' and looks at its underlying importance throughout civilisation.

Gray's view is that ideas of a final resolution have led to misguided evangelical crusades that have done more harm than good from the terror of the French revolution to the Bush/Blair policy of invading Iraq.

I think the notion that there is a promised land just around the corner has a profound effect on our personal lives and ambitions. If we could just get that pay rise/ new car/ just get everything sorted out, then we would be happy.

We might want an ending but that doesn't mean there is one and maybe we would be better off just taking pleasure in the tick, tick, tick of existence.