The
woods are wet with melting snow and I feel it seeping through my boots, wetting
my socks, reminding me I did not waterproof my boots this year. The wetness of
my socks brings me into consciousness for a moment, and I realize how far I
have walked. As I continue walking I think of my passion for landscape
photography and how I have felt less enthusiastic about it these days, rarely
feeling inclined to get my camera out, the effort almost seeming too great in
many ways. And when I have ventured out with my camera I would find myself in
landscapes and not feel inspired to take pictures, simply content to rest in
the sanctuary that was being offered up to me, a respite from daily life, a
life in which meaning seems to elude me. Stopping, I ask myself if I am happy,
and while I am not unhappy I am not happy either. But then again happiness is
dependent on the contingencies of one’s life. Then I think of loss, the loss of
my marriage, the loss of my mother and then the loss of my brother and
brother-in-law; feeling too much loss, too much grief, not enough happiness. And
then I breathe, and standing in this sanctuary I am content simply to be, to
ask and receive nothing more than a few moments of respite, finding peace and
contentment, absorbing the beauty of the landscape and water.
I
continue to walk, trying to be more aware of where I am, noting each step but
surrender in frustration as images of my life continuously cascade, finding no
place to rest for even the briefest of moments. Then I am struck that we all
live lives that are unique to us and the more life we live, the more we learn
about life, deepening our understanding of the journey. And I think back to my
thirties, having let go, or thinking I had let go of my attachment to this
feeling of foreboding. I remember the sense of liberation I experienced in that
moment of time and the world opened up to me in a new ways that it never had
before. And perhaps that is just the nature of life as we come into our own, as
we begin to question who is this person that occupies this body of mine? Funny,
I thought I had a good handle on things then, that I had figured out life, or
at least my life but it would appear this is not true, an untruth. I feel lost,
confused, or perhaps lost and confused needs to be followed by ‘again.’ And
perhaps each moment of clarity evolves into a delusion, a truth for a moment only
to evaporate as we live more moments. And should we try to grasp that evaporating
truth rather than surrendering it, recognizing it for the delusion it is, life
becomes hard, tough, and empty; nothing makes sense.
I
remember the first time I thought about my future life in terms of years left,
the open ended life of youth ending with each minute lived passing more
quickly. All of a sudden life looked very different. I was forty-three. And now
at fifty-six I am beginning to contemplate winding down my life’s work although
I have a hard time imagining not working. But the day will come and I know
that. But when we are young the future is open, our path unfolding before us,
the possibility of the future tantalizing us, drawing us forward into life’s
journey. And I think of what it means to live with integrity, and how my life
seems to be lived through passion and grief. And it occurs to me that we can
never live an integral life until we surrender our passion and grief. I smile
at this thought and realize I seem to be stuck in my grief. My stuck-ness is my
inability to move beyond grief; I have not grieved and as I walk with this thought
as my companion it seems true, and yet I am unsure what it means to grieve, or
for me to grieve; am I to grieve people, lost opportunities, or simply the
finiteness of life? I realize that I have been standing still, not walking. And
I look before me as the vista of the lake opens up to me. I look up; the sky
has become grey, threatening to rain, or maybe snow. I watch a hawk spiralling
on the air currents and I wonder in this moment does the hawk experience joy in
its realization of its “hawkness” for hawks were born to ride the currents of
air, it is their destiny to do so; to capture a hawk, to cage it is to deny it
its destiny, the realization of what it is and so existence becomes a mere
shell of existence, and the hawk merely a parody of what a hawk should be,
merely the shadows dancing upon the walls of the cave. And I think of my
studies and the moment I recognized the absurdity of studying human behaviour,
of theorizing what it means to be human without any connection to my own
experience, of my own struggles trying to discern, and perhaps realize what it
means to live a human life, a humane life, much as the hawk realizes it
“hawkness”. I remember the moment when these questions first plagued me; I was
young, in my twenties. But I ignored the questions, questions that made me feel
vulnerable, refusing to try and answer them, or even contemplate them. And now
at this moment in time they return as I begin to contemplate the end of my professional
career, and perhaps the end of my life; it is in the years left that I remember
the questions of my youth. They are still there, waiting to be considered,
answered, to have me engage them so that I may come to understand life, my life
and what it means. Perhaps it is only in the autumn of my existence that I can
face them in the light of a life lived, that I can entertain them with the
experience they demand of me. The exuberance of youth is rooted in the
abstract, the theoretical and not in the stuff of life, the stuff of one’s own
life.
And I
am struck that my questions cannot be answered by knowledgeable people, people
who lived lives that were not mine; wisdom demands that we give up the knowledge
of others. And I am struck that when we enter the search for wisdom we must
surrender all our life has been, to hold it open to questioning, interrogation,
exposing us in our complete nakedness. Perhaps we live our life through grief
until we can surrender certainty, acknowledging that there are mysteries we may
never come to know, to understand; we must be willing to surrender all we know for
that which might be realized. Our acquired knowledge simply stories, fables,
fairy tales. Yet an integral life and its companion wisdom do need knowledge,
knowledge of another sort. Wisdom can never be realized in the absence of self-knowledge,
and as we explore this knowledge we come to accept that this too takes us into
our grief. No one gets out of life unscathed, scarred deeply from wounds
inflicted upon us by the world, and by the ones’ who proclaim their love for
us; we must own all that has been our life. And as I continue my walking I
begin to realize that my joy may only be experienced in the fullness of this
moment, and like the hawk I must ride the air currents of my own life and in
doing so live in the moments of my journey; I recognize the limits of a life
lived through passion that can only find expression in an anticipated future,
or a life lived through grief in the regrets of what were. At this moment I know
I must accept with grace and equanimity all life offers me, the joyous and the
tragic, committing to experiencing all of it fully and then letting it go. Joy
and wisdom can only be known in the fullness of a life lived well, an integral
life.
And
for a moment I look to the sky, seeing the hawk still circling on the air
currents. I offer up a ‘Thank you.’ and then I laugh; I laugh a real laugh, a
laugh of true joy. It is time to go home; I feel it in my bones. And besides, my
feet are cold.
Be well all.
Al
