April 28, 2005

• Grrrrr….

  
  

  I seem to be moving towards “that stage” again. “That stage” is the point at which I stop writing. It’s the point at which writing seems to no longer represent Truth– instead it is merely a “distraction” that keeps me from other things.

  
  

  On some level, writing– these blawgs, my journal, spiritual and self-help articles– are a spiritual experience for me. The thing that annoys me about all this is that I seem unable to find a way in which my spiritual self can be alive while I am functional in the world that requires me to be making a living. That doesn’t mean that I don’t know how to make a living, merely that I haven’t yet found a way to make a living in a spiritually meaningful way.

  
  

  I swing back and forth, like a pendulum. At the moment, the pendulum is swinging towards the part of my life I perceive as “reality.” It is the life of mortgage payments, utility bills, doctor’s visits, insurance payments and maintenance work on the house. Whereas I don’t have any huge aversion to dealing with these things of “reality,” I am saddened by the fact that my spiritual self seems to go dormant when I am in the “real” world. A sort of “atrophy of the soul” sets in. The balanced and compassionate essence is replaced by some dull gray stressmonster.

  
  

  These transition times are often the ones that reveal the most about where the “potholes” of my life are. They serve as notice that no matter how far I may think I have grown, I am still far from “anywhere.” Once again, the transition time is pointing out to me that I am not a “bad” person, nor a “lazy” person. I am merely someone who has allowed an infrastructure to surround me in such a way that its maintenance requires more “real life” effort than I can give, while still remaining a “centered” human being. In other words, my infrastructure is too big for my life.

  
  

  Sigh.

  
  

  What are these choices I have made? Why do I live in these growth-downsizing cycles? Why does it always feel like I grow, at the encouragement of others, until I reach a stage where I must downsize, in order to preserve my sanity, and my sense of self? Each time I stand on the brink of another iteration, I have the same thought: “How did my life get to be bigger than me… again?”

  
  

  I remember visiting a friend, in Copenhagen, some years ago. The thing I admired most about his surroundings was the almost austerely simple quality of his environment. Everything in his life was simplified, in the service of providing the best possible infrastructure in which he could pursue his passion– painting. All the “busy-work” of life had been minimized to where its intrusion was minimal. All the “tools” of procrastination had been removed. His effort could go to the work, itself, with only a minimal effort going towards the surrounding confusion.

  
  

  It’s about “intent,” I suppose. There’s a popular saying that “Life is what happens while you’re busy making other plans.” What I don’t like about that statement is the utter lack of intent; the idea that life “just happens” and we’re powerless to direct it, in any way. I grant you that we may not be able to pick the destination or outcome– but we do have a choice whether we’re going to travel by boat, bicycle or airplane.

  
  

  I don’t know if I’m about to stop writing again. But I do sense myself growing less Truthful, or having to work harder to get at the Truth. Which is a sure sign that my soul is distracted. I’m thinking that I have created a “cop-out option” in that I could continue the “life story” I had started. Maybe because it feels like a sort of soulless narrative that I could churn out, even under stress. But who the frak wants to read a soulless narrative? Who the frak wants to write it?

  
  

  I have seen this fork in the road before, and I inevitably end up posing a question I have posed before, at this junction: “Would I be any less distracted, if the distraction was a $700 rent payment and a $40 utility bill, rather than a $2000 mortgage payment, and a $300 utility bill?” It feels like simplification is the answer– but where does “simplification” end, and “denying ourselves life” begin? 

  
  

   

  • 7:04 pm
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