Only the universe itself defies the dictum: the more things change the more they stay the same. Not so the heavenly bodies. All is in flux.
Nothing stays in or returns to the same place as the galaxies, stars, planets rotate and glide in their constant shift. What an interesting anomaly!
Okay. So how have my attitudes and perspectives changed of the years?
I’m more forgiving, but still vulnerable to guilt (is that why I’m more forgiving?) I see the socio-political world as immature, self-serving, often cruel – not much change there. While I’m not sure I forgive the world, I have some understanding of its slowness in evoloving.
As one of the more or less comfortable U.S. middle-class privileged –
and grateful – I long to be part of a country that is more beneficient than merely self-serving and aggressive both at home and abroad. Look to your own beneficence, Peggy! And watch your own selfishness and sometimes aggressive mouth! (There’s a bit of change in attitude.)
In a culture touting, in large letters, NEW! (products, that is) there is such a fearful resistance to flexibility and shift from the familiar. When things are relatively “good”…who wants to plunge into something different. If it ain’t broke, it don’t need fixin’. Hmmm. Well, that might apply to many situations, personally and publicly, but if we’re not willing to take at least a small leap into the dark, the unknown, where is the creativity…the movement, in behavior and interaction with others (not always as good as it could be)…as well as in impersonal fields of exploration…science, the arts, technology, etc.?
What is a constant inspiration for me is the memory of a television program interviewing artists, all in their eighties, in which, to a person they said that the next project was what interested them…not what they had already accomplished. I do apply that to my creative writing and attempts at art…but what about my daily interactions? I believe heartily in transcendance in art…How do I transcend my petty annoyances, my foolish prejudices, my unnecessary defenses? As in creating a new poem…I listen not to just the surface image or phrase…but allow surprise to leap and inform…So it’s attentiveness, awareness at a new level that can bring more than the same old, same old.
THANK FOR GIVING US FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Good to be well received. Wish there were more like you…in more ways than one!!
Good to be well received! Wish there were more like you…in more ways than this!! Love… Your PegoAug 23, 2009 08:56:19 PM, comment+r7xb4ep7o8nc9@comment.wordpress.com wrote:
I love that you are still examining yourself and seeking ways to continue evolving and growing in your being and with others. This is what gives any of us a feeling of aliveness, I think. Thank you for sharing your process, dear Pegeen!
Love,
Lauren