Saturday, June 26, 2010

Little joys, slight smiles, happy heart

There is a great deal which takes place for me out of the sight of others. In other words, I'm introverted enough that my life experience, much of it, is lived out in the space where my sense of self resides.

The way it works for me is to make forays out into the world to collect experiences and touch/be touched by the lives of the folks who I meet as I wander, and then to return to solitude to cogitate.

The thinking may or may not be directly about the experiences I just logged. Certainly, the processing I do is influenced by what I have learned.

It can be simple, small changes in perspective that I allow to flow through the semi-fixed foundational structures which support the story I am writing, the story which is me becoming.

At times, it gets convoluted and impossibly recursive. It is at those times that I am best served to remember that life isn't either. I have created a trap and then willingly stepped into its maw.

Oddly, we are least able to step back and gain the perspective of distance exactly when we are most in need of it.

My wife, Julia Rogers Hamrick, has developed tools which help to find the exit and step out of the self-created trap. It's a good way to handle it: build mechanisms while you are able to do so which help the troubled you find the way to the light when you have forgotten how to.

It is amazing how resistant our self-in-crisis can be to proffered assistance. I know that, for me, there are times when I almost get comfortable in that sense of helplessness and doom. Yes, I always come back to knowing who I am--who I am becoming--and I pour a little more energy into the support systems I have in place for myself each time.

It would seem that, for all of us in Earth suits, there is a requirement for delving into the animal, the physical, the dirt and mud and grass-stained direct experience. We don't have to be there all the time, though.

Are you willing to step out of the mundane, to touch the miracle barely below the surface? I’m not asking you to do anything, just to consider if you might be willing to.

2 comments:

Lynilu said...

I plan to download Julia's book as soon as it is released, and I requested the publisher of her earlier book "Kindle-ize" that one, too. I'm eager to read her!

I chuckled when you said "Earth suits." Have you read "The Operator's Manual for Planet Earth: An Adventure for the Soul" by D. Trinidad Hunt? I made me think of their preparations for the adventures on Earth. :)

Rick Hamrick said...

See my email to you, Lynilu!

For anyone reading this comment thread, it should be noted that a Kindle version of Recreating Eden (Julia's first book) is not likely, at least not in the short term.