In the last few days something happened to me. It felt as though “I have found my power”. In 1972 I read some shortened English version of Valmiki’s Ramayana, which if my memory is not distorted began with some yogis competing for “powers” (called siddhis) through fierce meditation, zealous fasting and strenuous renunciation. Looking back, I think its very exaggeration must have had a satirical purpose, but I was too earnest to notice that at the time.
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I went to a conference of therapists last weekend, designed to educate us in the latest techniques, and give us renewed enthusiasm. For me it did the opposite, reinforced the feeling that none of this was for me. “So what are you now?” asked one of them. Rebelling against the scripts we’d been taught, I found words in my head from I know not where, and replied “A world-child” without troubling as to what it meant. Perhaps it means I’m orphaned no longer, having found my long-lost mother, the earth.
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What else shall I renounce? Being middle-class, for a start, not that I’ve ever admitted to it, not even to knowing what it
means. In fantasy I’ve been a member of some invisible aristocracy of poet-philosophers, some Dead Poets’ Society.
Descending from Parnassus, let me start by belonging to this neighbourhood. They call it The Pastures. The houses are fairly new, clinging to a hillside like those in Santorini or Amalfi (which I’ve only visited in imagination), except that they are mostly ill-kempt social housing, quite recently built but mellowed, if that is the right word, by litter, splintered fences, graffiti, bottles, cans, broken washing machines dumped in unkempt corners. But if there was conscious pride and effort, it could shine. The ingredients are there. It faces south to catch any sun: there are paths, steps, creepers, shrubs, retaining walls begging for adornment, cats sprawling in the afternoon sun. A forlorn doll had been left on some steps. Children would grow up here, probably want to go far away, but they’d have memories. I hear a parent shamelessly yelling at her child, who was struggling to move a rubbish bin taller than herself. All human life is in a neighbourhood, both comedy and pathos.
Sentimentally, I tell myself I’d be happy live here, instead of the two rooms I currently rent not far away. I would blend in, rise to the noble status of “working class”. As if to establish the point, I stop to talk with a man washing his car. We almost swap our life-stories; at any rate we recognised we have much in common. He shows me round the inside of his place, a habit he’s got into because he’s put it up for sale, and pointed out various other houses for sale nearby. It seems like an omen that I shall find a new identity.
I’ve renounced being a full-time idler, professional cloud-gazer, pilgrim of windswept paths. I expect to be commuting into a regular job soon, like workers everywhere. It’s a step forward into some new phase, some new connection, as yet unknown.
You are such a fine writer, what is this therapy stuff? And now, a JOB? I thought you were retired. Anyway, I can’t get a job anywhere, and the places act like I don’t have a right to exist, how does one get a job, I seem to have lost the power, I know I once had it because I have had very many jobs, plenty! I have been blaming it on the Republicans over here, but I am not so sure about that any more. At any rate, I finally decided to be self-employed again, so I am making art now full-time, as a job.I’ll have to see if this is my real job. Good luck Vincent, with yours, whatever it is!
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Thanks, Jim, the therapy stuff is a consequence of my miraculous cure from chronic illness in July 2005. I decided to train in the therapy which had cured me. It’s not the same as being a shrink! As for the job, it seems like yet another offering from the angels. It came out of the blue. Interview is today. It is the power, Jim, that is the thing to aim for. It does not come from the head, but from a deeper place, as you know. You have such a generous spirit, Jim, and the power to stimulate with your own provocative ideas, that I’m sure you must be needed somewhere, as a teacher. All you need do is inform those with discernment (not the sleepwalking majority) of your availability, and and wait for them to request your services.
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i am in the same predicament, now. trained in the therapies that healed me……….and working to establish myself outside of the marriage that restricted me for 15 years. Challenges only fuel for the fire………the people that need our help are waiting for us to emerge. i`m glad there were those who did that for me, and my clients are grateful too.
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“The people that need our help are waiting for us to emerge”. This is a powerful thought: do you have more on this theme? My objection is not so much to practising a particular therapy, but being restricted by its dogma and disciplines. It seems to be another guru-disciple relationship—something I’ve been immunised from by a previous infection.