Challenge Behind
Three and a half years ago, I asked myself a question.
When I was young, in my early twenties, I was naïve, stupid and I lacked experience. But with that came a certain sweetness and innocence. Then as I got older, I had to face life. With experience I gained wisdom and knowledge. I am able to see more clearly how the world works and how people behave. I am able to understand things that seemed strange or at least accept that they are the way they are. With that comes cynicism, skepticism. Nothing is what it seems. Look for the inner motivation and the hidden agenda. Once I was able to think about what motivates people, I realized that I could manipulate a situation to my advantage.
Three and a half years ago, I asked myself a question. Is it possible to grow wise and yet remain sweet?
Is it possible to look at what is going on in life clearly, without sugar coating it and remain hopeful? Can I understand but not become manipulative? Can I be practical yet live with integrity? Can I be realistic and not compromise? Can I?
My eldest daughter believes that I can read her mind. For example the other day, I was outside taking out the garbage, when I came inside, I found my daughter wiping the tiles in the kitchen. "What did you spill this time?" I asked her. "How did you know that I had spilled something?" She answered with amazement. "Experience my dear", I want to tell her. "I have been around this earth much longer that you and I can guess what your thinking and feeling with one glance at you face". But letting her believe that I can read her mind is easier. That way she is reluctant to lie to me.
I learned when I was child that depending solely on my emotions is wrong, because I noticed that my emotions had failed me on many occasions. I decided at age 8, that would be a rational person, a person of reason. While living in Jerusalem at age 28 I realized that my reason had failed me as well and that I couldn't approach life through solely depending on my logic because it was badly flawed. For the past several years, I have attempted to grasp spirituality and depend soley on my sense of intuition, disassociating myself from reason and my emotions. Doing things which didn't make sense, but that my gut feeling told me was the thing to do. Today as I approach 38, I can see clearly that all three approaches are flawed. That God gave me reason, feelings and a spirit. I will attempt to use all three in an integrated way. Ignoring one is an abuse of a given gift. While the last few years
have been an interesting and a useful experiment, I don't regret it, I can finally see where I went wrong.
I spent three and a half years, waiting patiently for an answer. Observing quietly in corner. Standing in a swimming pool and allowing the waves to come over me, resisting the urge to make waves. The answer came loud and clear.
Yes!
When I was young, in my early twenties, I was naïve, stupid and I lacked experience. But with that came a certain sweetness and innocence. Then as I got older, I had to face life. With experience I gained wisdom and knowledge. I am able to see more clearly how the world works and how people behave. I am able to understand things that seemed strange or at least accept that they are the way they are. With that comes cynicism, skepticism. Nothing is what it seems. Look for the inner motivation and the hidden agenda. Once I was able to think about what motivates people, I realized that I could manipulate a situation to my advantage.
Three and a half years ago, I asked myself a question. Is it possible to grow wise and yet remain sweet?
Is it possible to look at what is going on in life clearly, without sugar coating it and remain hopeful? Can I understand but not become manipulative? Can I be practical yet live with integrity? Can I be realistic and not compromise? Can I?
My eldest daughter believes that I can read her mind. For example the other day, I was outside taking out the garbage, when I came inside, I found my daughter wiping the tiles in the kitchen. "What did you spill this time?" I asked her. "How did you know that I had spilled something?" She answered with amazement. "Experience my dear", I want to tell her. "I have been around this earth much longer that you and I can guess what your thinking and feeling with one glance at you face". But letting her believe that I can read her mind is easier. That way she is reluctant to lie to me.
I learned when I was child that depending solely on my emotions is wrong, because I noticed that my emotions had failed me on many occasions. I decided at age 8, that would be a rational person, a person of reason. While living in Jerusalem at age 28 I realized that my reason had failed me as well and that I couldn't approach life through solely depending on my logic because it was badly flawed. For the past several years, I have attempted to grasp spirituality and depend soley on my sense of intuition, disassociating myself from reason and my emotions. Doing things which didn't make sense, but that my gut feeling told me was the thing to do. Today as I approach 38, I can see clearly that all three approaches are flawed. That God gave me reason, feelings and a spirit. I will attempt to use all three in an integrated way. Ignoring one is an abuse of a given gift. While the last few years
have been an interesting and a useful experiment, I don't regret it, I can finally see where I went wrong.
I spent three and a half years, waiting patiently for an answer. Observing quietly in corner. Standing in a swimming pool and allowing the waves to come over me, resisting the urge to make waves. The answer came loud and clear.
Yes!
There is a way between voice and presence where information flows.
In disciplined silence it opens.
With wandering talk it closes. .... Rumi
5:56 AMDoes your daughter read your blog?
Anyway. I'm interested your epiphany came at age eight. I was listening to someone just this week, talking about how his epiphany came at age eight, after he had finished reading the children's section of the library and the librarian lead him to the adult section and handed him The Grapes of Wrath. More interestingly, he was relating this story to a writer, whose epiphany came when she had her first work published, at age eight (when else). And it got me thinking, about my own age eight epiphany, when I began reading the newspaper (I read everything, including billboards). At any rate, I was reading the newspaper, at age eight, and saw an article, about a man who had been sentenced to death. I was appalled. You see, I was an eight year old about the same time as you were, and the world was supposed to have advanced past enlightenment and be a glorious place of hope for the new borns who hadn't experienced any major world wars yet, at least, that is what I had thought, with what I had gleaned, in my other readings. We were, I had thought, supposed to be modern now, and people were not, I had thought, supposed to be killed. What a terrible world it is out there, I thought, a gross place, worse than I could of ever imagined, worse then anything I thought I had experienced already. You see, I had, until that point, held a sort of naive belief that the world could not be as awful as it was on occassion in my private sphere, and I had thought, up until that point, that I would quite like to go out into it.
But what can one do as an eight year old, when the inevitable enormity of human failing makes itself known by accident and by surprise. Thankfully, I was still only eight years old, and naively able to think I could still go out into the world and make some changes.
Perhaps I did, perhaps I didn't. Who can tell.
I suspect age eight is an age when the world suddenly impacts itself somehow, in a conscience. Suddenly everything is so much more then feeding the dog and going to school and greasing your bicycle chain (if you're an eight year old lucky enough to have and do such things). Suddenly, a person becomes aware of big issues and questions, at age eight. It seems.
Also, I'm not sure about that Rumi quote you still have on your blog. I'm not really sure it's suited, if you know what I mean.
8:21 AM
Very interesting. Maybe even perplexing. I think I agree, but I come at it from a different perspective. As an example, I am in my middle 40's, but I still am "naive, stupid and I lack [sufficient] experience." And, I am forever "seeing where I went wrong."
Recently, I heard a saying that was purportedly a native american saying,
There are two dogs inside me. The one I feed the most is the one I will become.
When I heard this saying, I thought of your post. It seems to me to speak about the spirit, and I find it profoundly descriptive. To me, it also addresses the question of how one understands without becoming manipulative, retains integrity, and recognizes the difference between compromise and betrayal.
I am going to go feed the nice, friendly dog.
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