What Is Your Profession?

It seems that recently, I am running into more and more people who are tired of the “rat race” that is American life.  More people seem to be getting disillusioned with the idea that for the rest of their lives they are going to have to sell their time for money often doing things that they have little to no interest in.  Some of them are responding by starting their own businesses. Some are responding by taking more time off to be with their loved one and cultivating a que sera sera mindset. And some are spending more time doing creative endeavors in order to cultivate their talents.  The happiest people I know are people who have somehow managed to do all three at once. And the saddest are those people who have already given up and are just burying their heads until they get laid off or die. Then there are people like me who are stumbling their way through this life picking up clues as I go and shifting as necessary. Then of course there are also those people who just love making money for money’s sake.  They’ll be fine no matter what because frankly they aren’t thinking about any of this stuff I am talking about anyway, so there’s no conflict and they will always do whatever they have to do to survive–by hook or by crook.

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So, If you watched the video, you know that the point I am trying to make in this post is that we become what we profess. While many of us think of our “profession” as our job, it more accurately has to do with the vows we make in life with our words, work, deeds, and our very being.  Even though most of us Americans seem to define ourselves by our jobs, very few of us give much thought to the fact that often we cease to be people, and rather, become extensions of our jobs. In essence we are slaves. Sure, you could say that we are free, but if we were really free we would know that we have a choice about whether or not or at least how we would like to participate in this people project that is our country.  But really how many of us feel free?  If we were free, we would profess that above other things.  And more of us would allow ourselves to cultivate the God given talents and gifts that each of us have.  But instead, most of us just do what we are advised to do by external sources.  We become such a big part of the production line that even our desires are manufactured.  I’m convinced that most of us don’t even really want the things we think we want or even like the things we say we like.  We have just been professing the status quo so much that we can’t tell what we really feel or desire. Maybe I’m wrong, but if I’m not and you want to shift, what can we do about it?  Well I think it all starts with imagination. Creating a world from within and then professing it without.

Recently I got to learn more about one of the parents from the bus stop where I drop off my daughter in the morning.  She happens to be an artist.  In our brief conversations, I was able to learn a little about the different types of art she does.  Her art is very eclectic and very thought provoking.  What really amazed me was that her work invited me into spaces I had never seen, because she created art that I would have never conceived of like the one above.  When I saw this picture and some of her other work, I felt this sense of relief.  I was just happy to see so many out of the box works.  It reminded me that within each of us is this infinite resource of creativity and imagination.  I look at my daughter and hr friends and remember that it is something that we are all born with and as youths we profess the limitless nature of our being.  But then one day we start professing that we are this or that and then the more we say it the more we become it.  After a while we forget how much more we are.  We profess, “I am a teacher, a parent, a divorcee, a home owner, a vacationer, a Pats Fan… yadda yadda yadda.”  And that’s it.  That’s all we seem to be.  But that’s not all we are. We are so much more.

Because I choose to experience myself as more, I am professing it to others that they are more.  I’m at the point where I don’t even care if anyone is listening. I am just going to profess it because I know that I will become whatever I profess–that is I will become the vows I make through my words, works, deeds, and very being.  I also know that if I hang out with other who are professing that they are more than the work they do or the roles they play, then this awareness will be even more established in me.  Does that make sense?  Well if so, reach out.  With all these forms of communication, there’s no excuse for more people willing to make this profession not connecting.

You May Say I’m Not A Dreamer

For in the multitude of dreams and many words there is also vanity.–Ecclesiastes 5:7

I remember when I was a child and my brothers and my cousins would always look out the windows on a drive and point out to nice cars saying, “That’s my car! That’s my car!”  I never really participated.  When they would try to get me to play along I would just say, “I’m too young for a car and so are all of you.  Those are not your cars.”  Of course they thought I was being boring and maybe they were right.  But to me I was just being with the present reality.  I was too young for a car and really had no interest in pretending that those cars were mine.  I knew that one day I would have a car and when that time came, I’d start paying more attention to them. I was the same way with females.  When my male family and friends were lusting over girls and women and trying to get girlfriends at an early age, I had little interest.  I liked girls, but I had no interest in pretending like we were in a full blown relationship when I didn’t even have a driver’s license.  I enjoyed the company of females, but I didn’t project a future onto them.  I just wanted to be where we were and just see how the mystery unfolded.  Of course, this didn’t go over with the females well either.  Like my brothers and cousins, with few exceptions they thought I was being boring at best and I was frequently accused of not caring.  But just like with the cars, I just was more inclined to be in the moment.

As I said in the video, I was like that for most of my life.  I’m pretty sure when I said to my soon to be mother in law that I had no hopes and dreams she probably thought her daughter was dating a complete fool.  Aren’t hopes and dreams what it’s all about?  Maybe. Maybe not.  The way I see it, we are all already dreaming.  Haven’t you noticed? How many times have you gone through a day and before you know it it’s gone.  You’re wondering what the heck happened to the time. Or you look back on your younger days when you were a kid and now here you are middle aged or a senior citizen. Where did the time go?  Is it possible you dreamed it away?  I think so.  So from my vantage point, dreaming is more of a problem than a solution. Maybe for some others, dreaming is just what the doctor ordered.  For me staying awake is where it’s at.  If I am awake, then I will know what is going on and how to best respond to what is happening.  If I’m dreaming, I take the chance of being suddenly awakened only to find that I have no clue what is going on.

Still, trying to stay awake doesn’t mean I can’t look forward to some things or enjoy the thought of possibilities.  It just means that I keep these projections in their proper perspective and don’t get too attached to outcomes. Besides, I have this feeling that whatever unfolds out of this mystery called life will be a lot more interesting if I surrender to God’s vision for me than if I rely on what  I can come up with out of my own limited imagination.

C.S. Lewis On time [From The Screwtape Letters]

[The demon Screwtape writes:] The humans live in time but our Enemy destines them to eternity. He therefore, I believe, wants them to attend chiefly to two things, to eternity itself, and to that point of time which they call the Present. For the Present is the point at which time touches eternity. Of the present moment, and of it only, humans have an experience analogous to the experience which our Enemy has of reality as a whole; in it alone freedom and actuality are offered them. He would therefore have them continually concerned either with eternity (which means being concerned with Him) or with the Present—either meditating on their eternal union with, or separation from, Himself, or else obeying the present voice of conscience, bearing the present cross, receiving the present grace, giving thanks for the present pleasure.

Our business is to get them away from the eternal, and from the Present. With this in view, we sometimes tempt a human (say a widow or a scholar) to live in the Past. But this is of limited value, for they have some real knowledge of the past and it has a determinate nature and, to that extent, resembles eternity. It is far better to make them live in the Future. Biological necessity makes all their passions point in that direction already, so that thought about the Future inflames hope and fear. Also, it is unknown to them, so that in making them think about it we make them think of unrealities. In a word, the Future is, of all things, the thing least like eternity. It is the most completely temporal part of time —for the Past is frozen and no longer flows, and the Present is all lit up with eternal rays.

How to Win at Losing

On Tuesday June 25th, I received 2nd place in a poetry contest at our local library. I had my daughter there with me who was going back and forth between fearing I would “lose” and hoping I would “win”.  I tried to just be present with my own feelings, monitoring my thoughts for growing edges–those inner places where I am living as less than my ideal self.  For me, the poetry contest was not about winning or losing in the conventional sense, but more about searching myself to see what my thoughts were about the idea of winning or losing.  Does that makes sense?  It should if you watched the video.  If not, go back to the video and then reread that sentence.

Basically, I entered the contest because I am trying to recreate some ways of expressing myself and my talents.  For years I have not been receiving the full gift of who I am to myself, because I gave power to other people’s stories about who I am or the meaning they assigned to my actions.  Well, that might not be 100% accurate.  It wasn’t so much as I gave them power as it was that I denied my own–that is the power to fully express the being God created in me.  But to say that I was denying the power within me is not to say that I was not aware of it.  I am as aware of my potential as I am of the sun’s potential to shine.  Chances are it will.  But whether we experience it directly or not depends on the clouds that are in the way.  I am confident that every single one of us has infinite power to shine.  But on the other hand, we also have an equal ability to set up dark clouds to block our light.  Or we invite in other people to do it for us–people who deny their own gifts and then want us to deny ours too.

Growing up in the South, there was this whole light skin vs. dark skin ignorance that had poisoned many of our consciousnesses.  It was terrible. I won’t get too much into it.  All I will say is that there were many people I knew who bought into the lie that skin color had something to do with intelligence or attractiveness etc. As a result, there was needless competition among some of us and people who thought they were less trying to convince others that they were of lesser value as well.  I dealt with that stuff a lot and eventually saw standing out as not being worth the trouble.  Now, I’d still do my best if someone gave me their trust, but I would be less likely to put myself out there on my own if I thought someone I cared about would get wind of it and start the business of trying to bring me “down to earth”.  How I managed this is not worth telling.  Just call it mental and psychological gymnastics.  What is worth telling is that no one should do anything like that longer than necessary. We are all meant to and have the right to shine to the full extent of our ability and we owe it to ourselves to cultivate our abilities.

Entering the poetry contest was my way of breaking out of a pattern.  I love to write poetry.  I don’t do it to beat other poets.  That is ignorant to me.  No one can out poet another poet.  And ultimately, no one can outlive another life.  Each of us is of infinite value.  We just don’t know it.  Because we feel less we act less.  And sadly, when some of us live our lives as the gifts we are, some of our brothers and sisters are reminded that they are denying their own greatness.  Then rather than seeing this as a wake up call to their own power, they try to tell other people to slow down and give someone else a chance.  If someone ever asks such thing of you, just tell them no one needs to give them a chance, but that they just need to take one.

Below is the poem I entered into the contest.  Enjoy.

Nature and Beyond

In every grain of sand, a world
Times three thousand more
There’s more to the natural world than eyes can see
Thus impossible to keep score

Can we count the raindrops
Or the hairs on a single head?
It’s overwhelming to imagine
So we distract ourselves instead

Have you noticed the ants at work
Or a family of deer playing?
Have you listened to the honks of geese
And wondered what they’re saying?

Most of us can’t say so
We have better things to do
When there are things to be bought and sold
Who has time for nature too?

But we are in a relationship
With everything that lives
We can’t seem to get that what we receive
Comes from that which nature gives

So when we take and take and take
Hoarding for fear of lack
We, at the same time, hurt ourselves
Putting knives in our own backs

Now only nature can save us
That’s what it’s trying to do
By revealing to us her secrets
Hoping we’ll get the clue

We know that she is infinitely vast
Yet somehow infinitely small
Jam packed full of paradox
Yet able to contain them all

She gives us room for freedom
As long as we trust her law
Love everything as we love ourselves
And we will be free from flaw

If you doubt, this ask the sparrow
Or the lilies of the field
Like everything else, they live by Nature’s Way
Will we join them in what’s real?

© Copyright 2013 Pedro S. Silva II