Tag: beneath

The power of stories

We are on the road to Johannesburg from Cape Town driving through the beautifully barren landscapes of the Karoo. I love road trips for many reasons, but mostly because they give perspective to a life. There have been riots in London, the gold price is soaring, the ice is melting and yet life goes on. I woke up wondering (as I do sometimes) how we can make it all better. I know that I want us to clean up pollution, but for a person struggling to feed his or her children, or someone who has even abandoned that essential task out of utter hopelessness, the accumulation of plastic in the oceans simply does not matter. We are faced with many potentially irreconcilable dilemmas everywhere.  And so I think and think and think about how to take action that breaks through intractable world problems.

My main idea this morning is that it is critical for people to tell their stories (and to be heard) as a stepping stone towards caring for themselves, their communities and their environment. And so, for today, I decided to ask people their stories when I met them. The waitress at the Wimpy told me a little of her story. She  managed to become qualified in various aspects of hospitality despite having very limited resources. Hers is a story of determination.

I have been musing about how we can tell our stories whilst using our hands and also through our handiwork – making patchwork blankets, knitting, painting, crafting of one kind or another –  in a slower, older way of living and communicating and stitching the fragments of our lives into coherent wholes. And finally, thinking about how we can pay more attention to the untold stories of our unconscious minds, releasing the demons and discovering the magic that is sometimes stored there.

Beneath, Between and Beyond

Or Beyond, Beneath and Between?

I recently saw the film about Jane Goodall (I think it is called Jane’s Story) and it tells the story of her evolution from young chimp researcher to world environmental activist (see www.rootsandshoots.org for her work with young people worldwide). The film is understated and humble, and Goodall has a similar feel about her. I do not know much else about her and her work, but importantly, I was quietly, yet powerfully inspired. Goodall comments and seems to act on the idea of connecting human fulfilment with environmental goals, particularly working with children and youth.

I thought about my own work and its place in the world. As a result of such early Sunday morning thoughts, I finally formulated my BIG VISION, or so it seemed to me. In summary, I believe that we, as humans, need to have a three dimensional approach, including Beneath (inside us and our unconscious selves) Between (our relationships and resource sharing arrangements with others) and Beyond (the earth, the air, the oceans and the other species that live on our planet) and use all the creativity and technology at our disposal, in order to express ourselves as living beings; solve dilemmas and tensions that compromise bio- and psychodiversity; communicate virally;  and thereby take individual and collective action that is ecologically sound at the deepest level in order to ensure a thriving planet.

Anger and repair

Anger is such a terrifying emotion.  Every now and then I become aware of feeling furious about something. It may be triggered by a seemingly inconsequential event such as an interaction with a rude customer service person, or more seriously by a random act of cruelty. Those reactive flashes of engagement with the world are still manageable, although unpleasant.

Sometimes, however, the thing that happens resonates at the core level of myself, reminding of a violation that occurred before I could fend for myself. And then, with the surge of a volcanic eruption, I become subsumed by the primitive ferocity of a threatened wild animal, and I pity those who stand in my way.  It is only later that I understand the dislocation in time and space, but by then the damage is done.

The process of creative work

I have finally completed a book called Beneath – Exploring the unconscious in individuals that I have been working on for five years. It has gone to the printers and will be back in 4 weeks time, ready to be sold. For five years I thought about the book, spent hours and hours working on it, researching the subject matter, writing and rewriting words and sentences. During the process, I often imagined the joy I would feel when I finally finished. I was impatient to see the complete work and anticipated a feeling of great satisfaction. The anticipation kept me going when the work was tedious, which was thankfully not often. Most of the time, I was extremely motivated. I felt that I had something to say and that it was worth saying. I worked with an extremely talented designer, Pluto Panoussis, who ensured that the book was beautiful to look at and I was delighted as I watched the final product unfold. And then we sent it to the printers.

It has been very strange since then. I unexpectedly felt completely empty. I needed to start thinking about marketing the book and telling people about it, but the more I imagined what I would say, the less I could think of anything to say. I felt as if I have nothing more to offer. That is fortunately no longer the case, I am starting to reconnect with the wellspring of ideas inside me. But, the expected euphoria of completing a creative process did not manifest as I imagined. It was more as if I was compelled to allow the flow of the work through me, and then was exhausted and depleted by the process. To me it seems as if creativity is bigger than the human being who delivers it to the world, and that in the end we are merely vehicles for the life force. In retrospect, the biggest joy was the sense of being meaningfully occupied in the creative process itself, the joy of being an instrument that is being played.