In my Blog article of June 10th2018 on www.daviddivine.co titled ‘Re-Imagining Yourself,’ I outlined three incidents of how, given certain circumstances, we can create a different identity to the one we habitually inhabit. Whilst identities are normally incrementally variable in time, unless consciously dramatically altered, more or less they remain a constant. Today’s article and the following three revolve around the theme of allowing ourselves the privilege in the face of constant competing demands-economic, social, work, family- of creating space, uninterrupted time, secluded mental expanse, to focus on ourselves.
We need to give ourselves permission to spend time on ourselves because in our society it is seen as a gross act of selfishness and self- idolatry, to even think that one merits such attention even if it is only from your self. On the contrary I would argue that life, and how you handle it, necessitates you spending appropriate time reflecting on the life journey, the twists and turns, how you negotiate through the maze and come to the decision to go this way-or that way. Granting your self, permission, is a decisive action. Putting it into practice is a political act. You are defying convention. You are allowing your self the opportunity to begin to think differently. This is radical. You may be surprised by the outcome. What is being encouraged here is thought about you by you. You are original, exceptional, beautiful and important. Why keep that creation and how it continues to form and adapt to circumstances and people it interacts with, hidden from your conscious sense of self.
There are moments in your life when circumstances surrounding you compel you to make life-changing, dramatic and permanent changes in your life that you live with thereafter. In short, in life there are times when critical decisions need to be made and there are permanent repercussions that you have to live with. In time those consequences can be adapted, explained differently, not talked about at all, or simply re-told in another version totally different to the original.
Telling your story about your life is a little like this. Our memories as you know are variable, catching some elements of past life and not others; adding layers or removing layers of complexity depending on our need to be able to live with the stories we tell. Not telling something because in the utterance of it, we may unintentionally give the audience permission and opportunity to see us in a light that is not wished and therefore needs to be avoided. In the telling of our stories we are engaged in a social act, reaching out to others to see if there is anything in our story that echoes in the lives of others in the audience: perhaps a similar experience, maybe a feeling shared, or a sense of helplessness in the face of a life event that we hold in common.
Major life decisions are not momentary, transitory incidents whose effects are like smoke disappearing in the air after a while. The impact of such decisions flow throughout your life afterwards. Sometimes we are unaware of this but the effects impact our later conduct and thought. As stated in the opening paragraph of today’s article, I humbly ask us to consider allowing ourselves the regular opportunity, freed from the daily clutter of day-to-day life demands, to think about our lives. It is like making an appointment with yourself that will not be cancelled because it is too important. We need to clear the decks for a moment, pause, take a deep breath and quietly think.
I discovered the value of spending uninterrupted time just thinking, walking, valuing the scenery about me, and the company I was in, being at peace with myself as a very young child growing up in the highlands of Scotland. During those moments that occurred between the ages I would say of seven to eleven, life decisions and practices emerged that have shaped the subsequent decades of my life. In next week’s article I shall outline a few of those.