Life is uncertain. I'm not the first to notice this, and for eons, people have been building the kinds of structures, institutions and superstitions designed to make life sensical, predictable, manageable and understandable. It's the never-ending quest to be certain that if one simple does x,y or z, there will be protection from uncertainty.
Pray the right way, invest the right way, wear the right clothes, eat the right food, live in the right neighborhood, employ the right security measures, say the right polite words, have the right attitude, exercise the right way...you name it and there's a 'right way' to do anything and everything.
And the right way is different depending on your culture, religion, socio-economic status, gender, nationality, political affiliation, education, and on and on and on.
I've been so certain I found the 'right way' that I lived according to it unquestioning, safe from uncertainty, but also cut off from most of human experience. No real choices to make, and a great sense of security within that, but also feeling kind of dead most of the time. And angry and frustrated too.
The thing is, there is no certainty. There are moments in time that are safe and predictable, and there are some things we can control, but so much is beyond us, and the trick isn't to control more and more of what's in our lives, but to be to experience with the absolute security and safety of the one thing we can know, which is who we are and what we are about.
So right now in my life, I'm settling down in a way I didn't think would ever happen, and I've got some space, literally and figuratively, that I want to fill. I haven't had that space before, and I think figuring out what belongs in it will be the next big adventure.
Pray the right way, invest the right way, wear the right clothes, eat the right food, live in the right neighborhood, employ the right security measures, say the right polite words, have the right attitude, exercise the right way...you name it and there's a 'right way' to do anything and everything.
And the right way is different depending on your culture, religion, socio-economic status, gender, nationality, political affiliation, education, and on and on and on.
I've been so certain I found the 'right way' that I lived according to it unquestioning, safe from uncertainty, but also cut off from most of human experience. No real choices to make, and a great sense of security within that, but also feeling kind of dead most of the time. And angry and frustrated too.
The thing is, there is no certainty. There are moments in time that are safe and predictable, and there are some things we can control, but so much is beyond us, and the trick isn't to control more and more of what's in our lives, but to be to experience with the absolute security and safety of the one thing we can know, which is who we are and what we are about.
So right now in my life, I'm settling down in a way I didn't think would ever happen, and I've got some space, literally and figuratively, that I want to fill. I haven't had that space before, and I think figuring out what belongs in it will be the next big adventure.
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