Sunday, August 22, 2010 at 11:59AM shift
What a strange and illuminating past few days this has been.
While I launched myself into the week hell bent on achieving certain things that would "shape and determine" the winter what wound up happening has not only done that (in ways that I did not even imagine) but pretty much as shaped up a whole new phase of my life.
Not so much shaped up, but returned me to where I once was and stepped away from.
It is almost like I have been on a seven year path of avoidance and denial that brought me full circle and I was presented with the same choice again. Now why does that sound familiar?
And the choice I made this time is the one I knew I should have made before and was too chicken to do so. Maybe not so much chicken as not in a position to be able to commit to it even though I was aware of it and aware of its importance in my life.
This week has turned into a full scale reordering to allow it to come into being.
And Saturday I went and walked with Christina from the video and we talked for 2 or 3 hours.
It was a good thing. And as I told her the unfolding of what has happened she got so excited - about every aspect of it. And excited for me. And I agreed with her that suddenly (a suddenly that has stretched over the past year or so) I have moved onto a place in my life where who I am and what I can do has come together in a way that I can move forward as never before. With a wholeness and integrity. Surety and still a great deal of fear but that is ok.
We talked about, how at this stage in my life - as person and artist - I have come into being. And this is the precursor to the stage she is entering, in which she acknowledges that she is beginning what will be the last phase. The conclusion of ones life and efforts. Not that it implies and sudden demise, but that the plateau has been crossed and the closing has begun.
It was good to meet and talk from these perspectives. As one beginning to cross the plateau of wholeness and one who is leaving it and what this means to us and how we view the world and our place in it.
I woke up thinking that Maslow was right in many aspects, but wrong to say that unless the base needs and safety needs are met we cannot move forward into purpose, meaning and self esteem. That it is the reverse, the only with meaning can we withstand not having the basic needs met, to lack safety and security. Without...we spin.
I mention Maslow because not only has his hierarchy of needs shaped this nations concept of social welfare. But it is the theory that has made that NYS gubernatorial candidates statement about moving all welfare recipients into prison dorms to teach them hygiene and social skills because they never learned them in their dysfunctional families possible.
He compares his plan (which he then backed off and said would be voluntary) to FDRs program during the depression. The difference being that FDRs program recognized the skill and value of each life but that each life suffered from the condition of the economy and society and he created programs to allow people to feel worthy and like they had a place and purpose in life.
This particular candidate, most likely in ignorance, proposes a solution that comes from classism.
It seems to me...that a huge part of our society bases their individual validation of the acceptance of outsiders of their lives. And I look at that statement from the perspective of an artist and person who is recently acknowledging that I have spent over a year suffering unnecessarily because I adopted that mindset too in very many ways.
Changes are a foot.
Life is suddenly looking infinitely brighter. Not because circumstances have changed (although they will) but because I have rediscovered and allowed myself to commit to a pursuit of meaning in life.
And - going back to Jung's concept of meaningful coincidences, in the brief time I have moved to embrace this acceptance I have been surrounded by a pile of coincidences that support it. I should mention, that sometimes support comes from the loss of what was never needed or important in the first place.
It is raining.
I am posting.
Then I am turning off the computer for the day.
c.2010 Cassandra Tribe. All Rights Reserved.
Reader Comments (2)
I have been reading at the hospital a Reader's Digest Condensed version of Madame Curie written by her daughter Eva Curie and took great comfort in relating to her values to live without heat, and sufficient food to pursue her love of science and education. It is just a great book and I think she would have told Maslow he had it wrong. To give total and complete focus to your purpose there are a great many sacrifices...that redefine need and comfort and one can be quite happy at the end of the day spent well, irregardless of a lack of comfort. When one gets too comfortable, one gets lazy and it is better to go without sleep than without progress, I think...
I didn't know about the Madame Curie story. I mean, I knew about her but not that part and oddly enough, thank you, it really was like...the perfect thing to hear at the perfect time but I will blog about that in a bit.