I feel like I am at a bit of a crossroads. There is an issue though, I am not actually at the crossroads, I am lost near the crossroads. I say that because I am still not clear what my choices are and I don’t know the landscape so I can’t predict where these different roads may lead.
That’s ok.
None of this is cause for panic. Actually quite the contrary, I can be sure that no matter which way I go, big changes are coming.
Will they be mainly changes in my attitude and my goals and desires, or will they lead to tangible changes in my life? I can’t be sure yet, all I know is that I welcome the change.
I welcome it because it is inevitable and because that no matter what it is, there will be a way to come out better than I was before.
So I am lost and I am excited about it.
I’m lost because I am no longer sure what motivates me. All i know is that it’s not the same things that motivated me before. I know that because I often audit myself to understand better why I think and feel and do all the things I think and feel and do, and I suddenly find I’m not the same person as I was even just a few weeks ago.
I've reached a new level of this whole self-discovery thing and the old laws of my internal physics no longer seem to apply.
I no longer feel the need to prove anything to myself. I don’t feel any kind of attachment to certain definitions or associations I’ve made with regards to how I interact with the world. I see myself as an artist but if the world doesn’t see that, that’s ok. I know I am capable of anything, but I'm ok even if I achieve nothing.
I wanted the world to value me because it gave me a sense of security but I’m starting to accept the reality that I have no control over whether people value me or not. All I can do is do what feels valuable to me. I can try to convince them if that's my prerogative, but unlike most people I see, I'm not even sure if that is worth pursuing. Do I really need to convince anyone? Is that not just more fear based thinking? I've already convinced a bunch of people, you are here aren't you? And so what if it's not enough people to provide me with more physical security. I'm still here aren't I?
Breaking through these old fears is liberating but also opens up a whole new can of fears for me to conquer. I feel free to be myself but I’m also aware of all the terrifying consequences that come with that. Who will I offend? Who will ridicule me? Who will attack me because they disagree with the things I say or do?
I have ideas which could get me in trouble in certain situations. What happens when I work through these new fears and I am not longer afraid of the consequences? None of my ideas should be threatening to anyone but we live in a world where people fear ideas. It makes sense even if it's unjustified, ideas are far more powerful than any individual could ever be.
I always saw a parallel between the people who shape the world and the people mumbling to themselves in the street. That’s right. Yoko Ono, Steve Jobs, Mother Theresa and that guy talking to himself on the train, to me they all posses very similar energies. The only difference is orientation.
They carry the same energy but how do they channel it? What are their beliefs about the world? How much love do they feel and how much fear? What is their focus?
The CEO’s, the prolific or strange artists, the drug addicts and the people who society deems sick, they often have more in common with each other than any of them have with the average citizen.
They all channel a lot of energy. There is a kind of fire there. Most of them are fueled by a complex variety of motivators... a desire for a better world, various insecurities, love or fear, an obsession with beauty. They are not primarily motivated by self preservation. They are driven by the desire for us to evolve and to thrive as a species. This can also be corrupted and turned into a desire to destroy. It can be distorted and turn into a desire to manipulate others because of course we always know what is best, right? 😜
Hence the fear people have of such channels of energy, and of the ideas they carry.
The fear of ideas comes from the fact that ideas can’t be controlled in the same way people can. And some people have ideas that could really change things. This power shakes us, as it should, and if we are stuck in survival mode, then fear is a natural reaction.
If we are honest with ourselves though, we know that what is best for us is hardly as clear cut as we want to believe. That good and bad are relative terms, and perhaps its our purpose to decide for ourselves what is good or bad, but that on some level, there is no meaning unless we ascribe meaning.
We imagine an idea is bad and therefore dangerous, but that idea existing could just as easily create the contrast necessary for an opposite idea to thrive. So even if we correctly identify something which everyone would agree is positive (let's say "no more war"), none of us truly know how to achieve that, we can only give our best guesses.
At some point, if we are honest enough, we reach a crossroads. At some point we will choose between faith that all is love and that life guides us, resignation that we will never know and that we are merely acting on our best guesses, or going back into the dream, the world of denial, where everything fits neatly into good or bad as defined by whatever value system we subscribe to.
That is not the crossroads that I am at right now.
The crossroads I am at is one where I will decide to be the babbling fool on the corner, the inspired voice with a following, or to try my best to act like a normal person in society, to change things from the inside until things change me, until the energy I channel is less and less and I no longer feel so much in common with these outliers.
In reality, I won’t be making this choice at all. I have already made my desires well known, and I’ve tried many things to achieve them. The ball is no longer in my court, so I’m waiting for the right sign or indicator to see which of these roads will lead to where I am trying to go.
Here’s to the journey!
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