Benjamin Button’s case is not curious but insightful. Benjamin Button is a classic specimen study of evolution of human stages irrespective of age. Moving from birth to death, irrespective of size and wrinkles on skin. A progression of emotionality and rationality. The way experiences add to age and maturity of human existence.
As quoted here, from a moment in the movie:
“Daisy: You're so young.
Benjamin: Only on the outside.”
There are plenty of quotes from the movie. And just those are enough to describe what the insightful journey is about with ‘Curious case of Benjamin Button.’
*We are all different. Just that ‘different’ has been exaggerated(in this case – old age to younger Benjamin) to drive the point, of what makes you different.
“You'll see little man, plenty of times you be alone. You different like us, it's gonna be that way. But I tell you a little secret I find out. We know we alone. Fat people, skinny people, tall people, white people. they just as alone as us. but they scared shitless.”
"Everyone feels different about themselves one way or another, but we all goin' the same way.”
This story elaborates on how lives flow into each other leaving you feeling different than before. And making an evolved you or probably entirely different you.
“Sometimes we're on a collision course, and we just don't know it. Whether it's by accident or by design, there's not a thing we can do about it.”
“Along the way you bump into people who make a dent on your life. Some people get struck by lightning. Some are born to sit by a river. Some have an ear for music. Some are artists. Some swim the English Channel. Some know buttons. Some know Shakespeare. Some are mothers. And some people can dance.”
“And if only one thing had happened differently: if that shoelace hadn't broken; or that delivery truck had moved moments earlier; or that package had been wrapped and ready, because the girl hadn't broken up with her boyfriend; or that man had set his alarm and got up five minutes earlier; or that taxi driver hadn't stopped for a cup of coffee; or that woman had remembered her coat, and got into an earlier cab, Daisy and her friend would've crossed the street, and the taxi would've driven by. But life being what it is - a series of intersecting lives and incidents, out of anyone's control - that taxi did not go by, and that driver was momentarily distracted, and that taxi hit Daisy, and her leg was crushed.”
The greater role of interplay and destiny has been emphasized.
Did I ever tell you I been struck by lightning seven times?.
Blinded in one eye; can't hardly hear. I get twitches and shakes out of nowhere; always losing my line of thought. But you know what? God keeps reminding me I'm lucky to be alive.
*This story narrative elicits realizations and that realizations are the turning points in maturity.
“Some days, I feel different than the day before."
"Everyone feels different about themselves one way or another, but we all goin' the same way.”
“It's a funny thing about comin' home. Looks the same, smells the same, feels the same. You'll realize what's changed is you.”
*“I promise you, I'll never lose myself to self-pity again.
And I think, right there and then, she realized none of us is perfect forever.”
The story outlines the journey of human mind. Where one stops in this journey defines the course. This journey may be unique. But what one experiences is expansive and not unique. The experience is universal.
“I'm always lookin' out my own eyes.”
“Your life is defined by its opportunities. even the ones you miss.”
“For what it's worth: it's never too late or, in my case, too early to be whoever you want to be. There's no time limit, stop whenever you want. You can change or stay the same, there are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. And I hope you see things that startle you. I hope you feel things you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life you're proud of. If you find that you're not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.”
The story revolves around the most important lesson of life: Love. The evolved Love. Love that brings destiny closer. Love that realizes the realization. Love brings the most important lesson of life. This is how you intensely come closest to your own existence. To experience what has touched you the most. To love and to weep the loss. What you experience is your take away.
“Benjamin, we're meant to lose the people we love. How else would we know how important they are to us?”
“You can be as mad as a mad dog at the way things went. You could swear, curse the fates, but when it comes to the end, you have to let go.”
Essence:
*‘Life is a journey. You stop where you want to stop, for as long as you want to stop.”
We are all different. Just that ‘different’ has been exaggerated to drive the point of what makes you different.
What happens to you is destiny. What you make or break in other’s life is also other’s destiny. And that interplay is constantly at work to realize ‘the destiny’.
Human ecstasies and agonies are universal. Manifestations are different. Unless human mind experiences the extreme, it does not graduate to the next stage.
That it is great happiness to accept and be exactly the way you are, and it is ecstatic to feel accepted for exactly the way you are. And Loving is just about that. Only and only about that.
