Archive for the ‘mediocrity’ tag
On Being in Mud and Muck
Every once in a while I find a need to post a bit more often, not because there is an audience waiting to hear my words, but because I need to write the words down before they are lost to me. Today is one of those times. I went golfing after my morning post, a mediocre effort that was rewarded by a beautiful day weather-wise. My mind couldn’t focus too well on golfing. The truth was that it wasn’t focusing well on anything. Following the game, I checked e-mail and finally got around to doing a few small bits of tasks that sit waiting for me to finally get around to doing them. Mostly, it has been a day of avoiding doing much of anything. My dreams lately have been messy things, filled with agitation and contradictions and a bit of danger. I have deliberately made a point of avoiding these as well. I have been reading, though even that is half-hearted. I have to admit I am guilty of giving myself space … Perhaps it is about needing to conserve a bit of energy for the near future when I will be attempting to engage fully for quite a few days without taking time for re-charging. Regardless, I admit to being messy in terms of my psyche.
In this photo, I see myself resting, not too much above the water line, with my feet stuck in the muck. Even the fact of breathing seems to be requiring effort – a reflection of my real state of restricted air flow because of seasonal allergies. Yet, none of this worries me. Rather, I find it a release from stress to just allow myself to “muck” about, not worrying about appearances or agendas.
Back to my reading, Hollis talks about mud and messes:
Our journey through the dreck and dross of our messes is an invitation to an enlargement of soul. What a terrible disservice conventional piety has performed in suggesting that the realm of the spirit is bloodless, above the earth, ethereal and perfect. It is rather in the realm of mud and blood, defeat and despair, that the soul’s fiber is fashioned. The mess of life is our mess. Questions of self-esteem are a waste of time, a diversion we can ill afford. There is more mess of things to make ahead; some of them will be our great teachers, some will cause us to grow, and some will bring the fullness of failure to bear on the encounter with the mystery. Great meaning will often come from such dismal moments; they are our moments, our meaning, and we will be entitled to them because we will have paid dearly for them. (Hollis, Celebrating a Life, 2001, p. 91)
Heady stuff, but good stuff. And so I learn to accept the mud, the muck, the low moments, the lassitude and more. Even these are worthy parts of my journey, a journey of discovery of self and a celebration of life, my life.
