Snowing like crazy this morning--I woke up unsure today.
Perception is reality the problem has always been that my perception isn't the same as others reality. I live in a world in my head where I am a fabulous person while I struggle at the same time feeling like I am worthy of no one and nothing. Somewhere in all that I keep setting myself up to fail repeatedly; I strive for outside approval so much that I step over the task at hand which is to write. To write freely is to not need approval...writing is just being who you are, what you think, expressing how you feel and sharing what you see....writing is absolute freedom of expression...the expression of your reality and your perception.
I went to school in a one room school house that had two floors. Downstairs was Mrs. Hartle's room where she taught Kindergarten, First and Second grade. Upstairs Mrs. Cook taught Third and Fourth grade. The pencil sharpener for the downstairs was in the hallway near the bathroom. Every day there would be a line to use the pencil sharpener. I would stand there inching closer and closer to the wonderful smell of shaved wood. It was a treat to get a red cedar No. 2 instead of the old yellow No. 2. For me the wood smelled different between the two pencils. The cedar was stronger and just holding it made me feel alive and different from whom I was. I felt I could be anything and anyone when I held and used the red cedar No. 2.
Of course I wasn't different. I was still just that quiet kid, who felt out of place and who had a whole world living inside her head that she didn't know how to express. And not much has changed since I was 4 years old standing in line at the pencil sharpener. I still look for that red cedar No. 2 to make me feel more than I am.
Jane Seymour was quoted as saying, "You have to count on living every single day in a way you believe will make you feel good about your life..." Do I do that? Do I live every day in a way that will make me feel good about my life? No, I don't. I have moments in a day where I do the right thing to make me feel good, but not every moment in the day and some days there are no moments at all. Some days I just stay within myself hiding from the world choosing not to feel good and that can happen at home alone or in a room filled with people.
I woke up knowing that to have another day disjointed from the muse was to have another day living the wrong way. So I took what was a risk for me; I'm not sure the risk made me feel good about my life, but it changed how I'm looking at my life today and I know that this feeling may not last all day it may disappear at any time and probably will. How is that for hopeless?
I wrote yesterday that when I couldn't write the article with a drink in my hand I needed a drink in my hand because I couldn't write the article. The drink in my hand comes in a variety of forms not all liquid. After reflecting on this thought yesterday and sleeping with the knowledge that I was able to come to a place within myself where I could see and feel the moment my life took a different path I have come to see the drink is actually a series of people, places and things.
I drank the red cedar pencil, I drank the whiskey, I drank all the relationships, I drank all the geographical cures, I drank all the emotions and feelings so I could remain the distracted failure I am comfortable being. And I'm still doing it; I've been doing it for the past few weeks especially last week and over the weekend. I drink so much emotion that I can't do anything else but suffer. And not until the suffering gets overwhelming do I take the littlest risk to see if the cause was real or imagined. Was my perception of reality real or imagined? I still don’t know.
What I am trying to say is that even after all these years I am still trying to write the article with a drink in my hand and I've come to need the drink in my hand because I can't write the article. The drink being anything that prevents me from sitting still and just doing it—“it” being write the F...ing article!!!
Yesterday I dug out an old idea for a magazine article about Existentialism and the Baby Boomer. I use to pride myself on being an Existentialist which I have come to now understand is a $9 word for self-centered, self-seeking, selfish, self-absorbed behavior. Jean-Paul Sartre wrote: "When a man commits himself to anything, fully realizing that he is not only choosing what he will be, but is thereby at the same time a legislator deciding the whole of mankind--in such a moment a man cannot escape from the sense of complete and profound responsibility."
My writing life is all about not committing to and taking responsibility for writing or anything else for that matter. That is why this blog is numbered by the day because I am committed to not missing a day...I am willing to take on the responsibility of writing every day. How often have I cheated readers from getting to know me just a little bit, believed a lie I told myself about myself to keep readers from getting to know me and how often have I stolen time and love from readers who see the good inside me that I can't see in myself by running and pushing them away when I get afraid because I am believing my own lies that I have nothing to say, to write, to offer so it is best to deprive them and the world of me.
How filled with anguish I am when I am that self-absorbed. I am filled with anguish from the responsibility and commitment of taking the risk to be a part of someone else, something else and of some new life. I am filled with the anguish of success, happiness and admiration when I am self-absorbed.
Sartre believed that responsibility and commitment were pure anguish for the Existentialist, but I go further and say they are both pure anguish for the writer as well. Every time I am so filled with self that I hurt those I proclaim to love I fill myself with the anguish of an Existentialist. I drink anguish like a pig...I can't get enough….anguish and self-absorption is comfortable...I know what to do with anguish...I don't know what to do with success........
Perception is reality the problem has always been that my perception isn't the same as others reality. I live in a world in my head where I am a fabulous person while I struggle at the same time feeling like I am worthy of no one and nothing. Somewhere in all that I keep setting myself up to fail repeatedly; I strive for outside approval so much that I step over the task at hand which is to write. To write freely is to not need approval...writing is just being who you are, what you think, expressing how you feel and sharing what you see....writing is absolute freedom of expression...the expression of your reality and your perception.
I went to school in a one room school house that had two floors. Downstairs was Mrs. Hartle's room where she taught Kindergarten, First and Second grade. Upstairs Mrs. Cook taught Third and Fourth grade. The pencil sharpener for the downstairs was in the hallway near the bathroom. Every day there would be a line to use the pencil sharpener. I would stand there inching closer and closer to the wonderful smell of shaved wood. It was a treat to get a red cedar No. 2 instead of the old yellow No. 2. For me the wood smelled different between the two pencils. The cedar was stronger and just holding it made me feel alive and different from whom I was. I felt I could be anything and anyone when I held and used the red cedar No. 2.
Of course I wasn't different. I was still just that quiet kid, who felt out of place and who had a whole world living inside her head that she didn't know how to express. And not much has changed since I was 4 years old standing in line at the pencil sharpener. I still look for that red cedar No. 2 to make me feel more than I am.
Jane Seymour was quoted as saying, "You have to count on living every single day in a way you believe will make you feel good about your life..." Do I do that? Do I live every day in a way that will make me feel good about my life? No, I don't. I have moments in a day where I do the right thing to make me feel good, but not every moment in the day and some days there are no moments at all. Some days I just stay within myself hiding from the world choosing not to feel good and that can happen at home alone or in a room filled with people.
I woke up knowing that to have another day disjointed from the muse was to have another day living the wrong way. So I took what was a risk for me; I'm not sure the risk made me feel good about my life, but it changed how I'm looking at my life today and I know that this feeling may not last all day it may disappear at any time and probably will. How is that for hopeless?
I wrote yesterday that when I couldn't write the article with a drink in my hand I needed a drink in my hand because I couldn't write the article. The drink in my hand comes in a variety of forms not all liquid. After reflecting on this thought yesterday and sleeping with the knowledge that I was able to come to a place within myself where I could see and feel the moment my life took a different path I have come to see the drink is actually a series of people, places and things.
I drank the red cedar pencil, I drank the whiskey, I drank all the relationships, I drank all the geographical cures, I drank all the emotions and feelings so I could remain the distracted failure I am comfortable being. And I'm still doing it; I've been doing it for the past few weeks especially last week and over the weekend. I drink so much emotion that I can't do anything else but suffer. And not until the suffering gets overwhelming do I take the littlest risk to see if the cause was real or imagined. Was my perception of reality real or imagined? I still don’t know.
What I am trying to say is that even after all these years I am still trying to write the article with a drink in my hand and I've come to need the drink in my hand because I can't write the article. The drink being anything that prevents me from sitting still and just doing it—“it” being write the F...ing article!!!
Yesterday I dug out an old idea for a magazine article about Existentialism and the Baby Boomer. I use to pride myself on being an Existentialist which I have come to now understand is a $9 word for self-centered, self-seeking, selfish, self-absorbed behavior. Jean-Paul Sartre wrote: "When a man commits himself to anything, fully realizing that he is not only choosing what he will be, but is thereby at the same time a legislator deciding the whole of mankind--in such a moment a man cannot escape from the sense of complete and profound responsibility."
My writing life is all about not committing to and taking responsibility for writing or anything else for that matter. That is why this blog is numbered by the day because I am committed to not missing a day...I am willing to take on the responsibility of writing every day. How often have I cheated readers from getting to know me just a little bit, believed a lie I told myself about myself to keep readers from getting to know me and how often have I stolen time and love from readers who see the good inside me that I can't see in myself by running and pushing them away when I get afraid because I am believing my own lies that I have nothing to say, to write, to offer so it is best to deprive them and the world of me.
How filled with anguish I am when I am that self-absorbed. I am filled with anguish from the responsibility and commitment of taking the risk to be a part of someone else, something else and of some new life. I am filled with the anguish of success, happiness and admiration when I am self-absorbed.
Sartre believed that responsibility and commitment were pure anguish for the Existentialist, but I go further and say they are both pure anguish for the writer as well. Every time I am so filled with self that I hurt those I proclaim to love I fill myself with the anguish of an Existentialist. I drink anguish like a pig...I can't get enough….anguish and self-absorption is comfortable...I know what to do with anguish...I don't know what to do with success........
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