Ontological Mystery: Gabriel Marcel wrote that all too often as humans we define ourselves --our identity, value -- based on what we do, our routine, various roles or functions we are assigned or assign ourselves to.
Who am I?
a student
someone who likes to sleep in but lately gets up before 8 (early! ...for me) every day
member of several faith sharing groups
a thesis writer
there is a routine to my day, an expectedness, this structure is good and helpful, as long as I remember that whatever my routine is is not a definition of me.
and there are other functions i assign to myself: the organizer; the connector. Especially this last one can be very limiting to me in my relationships with others, that in my desire to bring other people together, I forget to include myself in that.
and this is the mystery -- ontological (the word about being). The Mystery of Being is that I am not a sum of parts. There is more. I be. And there is something intrinsically good and important and valuable about that BEING -- and the way that I be is different, unique just to me -- and it is from this core am-ness that my identity flows, that determines my worth and value as a person being.
and this is not to completely discount what i do and my various roles and functions and routines. That surely those too are part of me, and part of a manifestation of who I am, but the thing that is easily lost is that it is just a part.
but how is this mystery? well...who are you? try making a list of you that doesn't include what you do. and then how do they come together.
I asked my philosophy professor... well what if I forget about the things I do in how I think about myself and think only of that being part? his answer: we live in a very physical tangible active world and everythign arround us brings us back to : you are your successes and your failures, your schedule, your function, your routine. This, actions and do-ings, are what we see of one another. and so constantly we are brought back to ourselves in terms of functionality.
hang on to the mystery that there is more.
what does this have to do with a bucket list?
i was thinking about the Rilke quote:
"... and the point is to live everything. "
in context, he says to be gentle with unresolved questions in the heart, to not seek answers that couldn't be lived, because the point is to live everything, live the questions now.
but that one line "and the point is to live everything" has been reverberating around me this past week. To live everything. To take risks. to not live in fear-- i guess that's what i thought of first.
and it makes me think: what I haven't i lived, and silly enough, but some of the first things that come to mind are things like: drugs, gotten drunk ... And I'm pretty happy with that, though it seems like I skipped the stereotypical high school experience -- and maybe college for that matter. and i wonder how much of that was done out of respect for my body and how much out of fear. and are both reasons legit? "Do not be afraid" is a common theme throughout the new testament, do not be afraid to be to live, but some fear maybe is legit and self protective.
and then... what do I want to live before I die? And I thought of the movie the Bucket List.
But the truth is there isn't a list for me of things I want to do before I die. but if the list were about HOW I wanted to live. Yes, there is a list for that.
I want to live dangerously. And while the first thing that may come to mind with that statement is a motorcycle and tatoos (though that's pretty cool) or extreme sports, that's not what I mean.
I mean I want to live un-comfortably, in a way that is continuously putting me in contact with reality. Relaity buzz word from my El Salvador program. What I mean is I want the world: pain suffering hardship hand in hand with joy hope love faith generousity. I've written about this before, but the hard and the joyful are inherently connected and to truly live there must be room for both. So that means living at risk: living in a way that is open to pain and deep hurt that can puncture the protective walls i sometimes desperately try to throw up around myself. It is those some puncture wounds that let in (and maybe sometimes even bring) deep joy hope.
Living dangerously-- loving wastefully, as a friend once said. To approach both myself and those around me with this wasteful, this deep appreciation of our BEING.
This is a being (this ontological mystery) that is the core of humanity and no where is this seen more clearly than in the presence of those who are different, who live and speak and think and approach life differently. WHo have been wounded in ways I could never dream of and yet... and yet we, them and I, we share this being in common.
Living dangerously because to appreciate my being does not mean that I must protect myself from hurt. Appreciating my being (my creation -- which begs the question of a CREATOR)means not reducing myself to a function, to means constantly striving to be toe person I am created to be -- that I am a being in progress and to live in that knowledge, seeking to be faithful to that which is my core identity. And like anything else, faithfulness takes discipline and dedication and commitment because it won't always be easy, it will be hard, there will be people or events or situations that will challenge me, that will hurt me, that maybe will make me want to curl up give up on living into myself. Christ is a perfect example, right? He loved his created being -- who he was and who he was created to be -- so much that he stayed faithful to the end, which meant his death. Through such constant and faithful appreciation of Himself, he died, when he could have denied his being (his created being) and avoided the pain, saved His life.
To live dangerously. To love wastefully.
and maybe, just maybe, i'll get a motorcycle and tatoo some where along the way.
25 September 2009
07 September 2009
from Rilke to Relient K
Relient K, "High of 75"
Junior year of high school I was introduced to Relient K. For Christmas, I asked for all three of the cds they had out at the time and all spring, driving to school, to play rehearsal, errands, whereever, Relient K was blasting. Whenever I hear them now, if I close my eyes I can smell the spring of my junior year in high school, feel the wind blowing through my open car windows, see the road to school zooming by and my heart swells with the hope, anticipation, nervousness for the future that I experienced so often more than 4 years ago.
And all the listening... well I suppose I could say many Relient K songs are part of my Wisdom literature. This one in partiular hist me every once in a while when I am feeling overwhelmed or sad or anxious or discouraged -- when I let these feelings overcome and I convince myself that I am surround by black darkness. Usually in those times the line "It's funny how you find you enjoy your life when you're happy to be alive"
when you're happy to be alive. and as my middle school life science teacher (another wisdom source) said, as humans, the fact that we work that we can move and breath and live is amazing.
and then i remember the wonder that it is to live and it's as if all of a sudden i've remember to look up into a black velvety night sky and all above and around me are stars, pinpricks of light and that black darkness is beautiful, awe inspiring, still terrifying but also kind of comforting. It becomes a blackness that draws me out of myself rather than trapping and confining me in my fears and worries.
at one point over the summer -- in a black and starless dark -- i decided that i didn't need to be happy, that life whatever it was, all i wanted from it was to know what was coming next. understandable, especially if put in the context that in the 2 year period surrounding today (from one year ago to one year in the future) I will have moved residences 7 (very likely to be 8) times. And so far they have been good moves, hard but who wants easy. But in this much instability all I could think of was screw the rest I just want to KNOW.
When i can name this I do a lot better living in the unknowing. When I can name it I actually often rejoice in the fact that I cannot and do not know nor control everything (or often anything...) The world and universe is a vast glorious mysterious place. and so i can breath and live and be without fear of being crushed.
And my senior year.... it's looking much different than I had anticipated. I've commented to several people that it feels a little bit like I'm a freshman all over again. Living with some lovely ladies, but women I've never lived with before. The main claim on my time are my classes and thesis (THESIS! alright fine with that word I absolutely do not feel like a freshman!) but no leadership positions in any clubs. I could, oh so easily, give into the temptation to play pinochle in the bottom of the boat : to keep my head down and myself thoroughly engaged in the darkness but oh to be on deck, even in the midst of the storm. But it seems that I'm learning my way around the boat all over again and, meaning to reach wind-blown deck, I find myself, somehow, in the galley.
And i try, I try, to remember to laugh and be gentle with myself and , well as long as i'm there, explore the galley see what i can find, who i might meet. The universe has an amazing sense of humor and I don't want to miss anything, even if the joke's on me, that there is something wonderful for me here, now, living and i want it--to know what it is to live it experience it taste it and hold it so close that it becomes a part of me.
not that life is a scavenger hunt and i'm afraid of missing clues but rather that if i am too afraid to take risks, if i am waiting to be found or too obsessed with finding "it", if i am so absorbed with "shoulds" and "rights" then, like sand held too tightly, it will be gone.
So I'm learning and living -- and sometimes that means I hurt and ache sometimes with pain and longing and regret but often from the beauty (and that beauty always terrible) and abundance and sweet happenstance that IS.
We were talkin' together
I said "What's up with this weather?"
Don't know whether or not
How sad I just got
Was of my own volition
Or if I'm just missin' the sun
And tomorrow I know
Will be rainy at best
And the forecast, I know
Is that I'll be depressed
But I'll wait outside
Hoping that I'll catch sight of the sun
Because on and off
The clouds have fought
For control over the sky
And lately the weather
Has been so bi-polar and
Consequently so have I
But now I'm sunny with a high of 75
Since You took my heavy heart and made it light
And it's funny how you find you enjoy your life
When you're happy to be alive
And the tempature is freezing
And then after dark
There's a cold front sweeping
In over my heart
And we might break up
If I don't wake up to the sun
Because on and off
The clouds have fought
For control over the sky
And lately the weather
Has been so bi-polar and
Consequently so have I
But now I'm sunny with a high of 75
Since You took my heavy heart and made it light
And it's funny how you find you enjoy your life
When you're happy to be alive
Junior year of high school I was introduced to Relient K. For Christmas, I asked for all three of the cds they had out at the time and all spring, driving to school, to play rehearsal, errands, whereever, Relient K was blasting. Whenever I hear them now, if I close my eyes I can smell the spring of my junior year in high school, feel the wind blowing through my open car windows, see the road to school zooming by and my heart swells with the hope, anticipation, nervousness for the future that I experienced so often more than 4 years ago.
And all the listening... well I suppose I could say many Relient K songs are part of my Wisdom literature. This one in partiular hist me every once in a while when I am feeling overwhelmed or sad or anxious or discouraged -- when I let these feelings overcome and I convince myself that I am surround by black darkness. Usually in those times the line "It's funny how you find you enjoy your life when you're happy to be alive"
when you're happy to be alive. and as my middle school life science teacher (another wisdom source) said, as humans, the fact that we work that we can move and breath and live is amazing.
and then i remember the wonder that it is to live and it's as if all of a sudden i've remember to look up into a black velvety night sky and all above and around me are stars, pinpricks of light and that black darkness is beautiful, awe inspiring, still terrifying but also kind of comforting. It becomes a blackness that draws me out of myself rather than trapping and confining me in my fears and worries.
at one point over the summer -- in a black and starless dark -- i decided that i didn't need to be happy, that life whatever it was, all i wanted from it was to know what was coming next. understandable, especially if put in the context that in the 2 year period surrounding today (from one year ago to one year in the future) I will have moved residences 7 (very likely to be 8) times. And so far they have been good moves, hard but who wants easy. But in this much instability all I could think of was screw the rest I just want to KNOW.
When i can name this I do a lot better living in the unknowing. When I can name it I actually often rejoice in the fact that I cannot and do not know nor control everything (or often anything...) The world and universe is a vast glorious mysterious place. and so i can breath and live and be without fear of being crushed.
And my senior year.... it's looking much different than I had anticipated. I've commented to several people that it feels a little bit like I'm a freshman all over again. Living with some lovely ladies, but women I've never lived with before. The main claim on my time are my classes and thesis (THESIS! alright fine with that word I absolutely do not feel like a freshman!) but no leadership positions in any clubs. I could, oh so easily, give into the temptation to play pinochle in the bottom of the boat : to keep my head down and myself thoroughly engaged in the darkness but oh to be on deck, even in the midst of the storm. But it seems that I'm learning my way around the boat all over again and, meaning to reach wind-blown deck, I find myself, somehow, in the galley.
And i try, I try, to remember to laugh and be gentle with myself and , well as long as i'm there, explore the galley see what i can find, who i might meet. The universe has an amazing sense of humor and I don't want to miss anything, even if the joke's on me, that there is something wonderful for me here, now, living and i want it--to know what it is to live it experience it taste it and hold it so close that it becomes a part of me.
not that life is a scavenger hunt and i'm afraid of missing clues but rather that if i am too afraid to take risks, if i am waiting to be found or too obsessed with finding "it", if i am so absorbed with "shoulds" and "rights" then, like sand held too tightly, it will be gone.
So I'm learning and living -- and sometimes that means I hurt and ache sometimes with pain and longing and regret but often from the beauty (and that beauty always terrible) and abundance and sweet happenstance that IS.
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