A basic concept within many novels is that happiness is living on the far side of the problems that the characters have to go through and realistically if that journey is a long and arduous one, the further away that celebratory place seems not unlike what we experience. The feelings of those personas then translate into the repeating thought of “Are we there yet?” while keeping rhythm with the sound of their steps along the trail which is also completely familiar to us. It’s like when we fall into one of the hundreds of thousands of thorny bushes in our lives and get a glimpse of a what appears to be the perfect path on the other side, just out of our reach, and it’s all we can think about. Those stories also contain solutions to whatever the conflicts are because it’s an actual deep desire within all of us to be able to solve our issues although it’s far easier to put words on pages detailing a remedy then it is when we are actually the ones being enfolded in unwelcoming ways in real life. Of course, those stories would lack depth and desirability without the presence of the fixed as well as the evolving sidekicks, helpers and antagonists that either assist or hinder finding “the key” that holds the power to change the very existence of the characters’ world. In our hearts we feel the same type of strife and needs it’s just that authors use the particulars of mystical creatures or whatever BLAH as the visuals to describe what really is our own seemingly mundane kinds of quests and battles with personal dragons to get to where we believe the sun always shines and there are lots of flowers to be amongst. Every novel though, in order to be authentic, contains terrible weeds and piercing prickles but eventually there are smiles and perhaps even a closing scene where the main characters ride off into the sunset or they step through the door into the place that contentment supposedly exists until the next adventure comes along where they are once again thrown off of a cliff into the darkness and go through the exact same feelings but for different or even similar reasons. In other words, every single time they experience fear, anger, mistakes, doubt, frustration, relief, grins, cheers, etc. while overcoming the problems because there will always be debris and the value of every story comes from all the ways that we actually live not just the moments or places of happiness. How flat and boring would a tale be if every day held just the magic of what we believe is picture perfect or the dream path? Yeah, even if it would feel good for a period of time, I am pretty confident that eventually you would be out looking for dragons to slay because we are made up of a whole series of stories that involve pain and beauty. It’s just that we become polarized about talking to and only writing in some areas of ourselves particularly if it involves the weeds rather than the magic of us. So, as the main character in your epic tale are you the fixed supporter, repeating that same phrase in your mind, or the evolving one who allows you to feel what you feel knowing it’s a part of the process of how life is lived? Or perhaps you are the antagonist who is making finding your particular key harder by implying to yourself that the magic is only on other persona’s trails? More than likely, though, you at various times have been all of those types but depending upon how long your journey has been, doubt is the tool that you are leaning into even while carrying the magic of hope in your heart. Today is a good day to ask yourself which one you feel like and then sit with yourself because it’s where you are, but it’s not the end of the story so move the plot by finding another word to say to yourself. I feel you there because my view has also had to change even when I haven’t been able to step and sometimes that sunny debris-free path does look so appealing but then I remind myself that it is always easier to write a story about someone else or stand on the outside as an observer than it is to be enfolded by all the ways we actually experience life. There’s pain and problems and it’s most certainly not just about the flowers, but it is always epic. Have the best day POSSIBLE for you because the magic is just another way to say the beauty of you. Love Always, Heavell
The journey to write a novel is often a very long one and along the way, all authors have moments in which their words and their creativity stagnate. In fact, the longer that they find themselves in a place of inaction, the harder it is to move from what has become familiar into a position that allows the expansion of their polarization in order to create the ideal experience for their readers. It is even possible for them to have moments where they don’t feel that they have what it takes to go through because essentially it can take hundreds of thousands of words in the wrong direction for them to find the right ones in another area. So, while writers use phrases to bring the particulars of the characters, the plot, the setting, the conflict and the resolution into being, we navigate the very same things authentically and although the realistic dragons in our stories are often invisible to others, they still hold the same ability to destroy us as well as “the forest” that surrounds us just like the make-believe ones in novels portray. After all, our journeys and the missteps that accompany us happen because we experience life while the details are what place us within an account or on the outside as the observers. Where will you find yourself tomorrow? Will it still be the place where you located all of the ways that didn’t work for you? Or will you expand your view and add to the terms that you are already comfortable with? You know those intimate ones that you have been carrying along your trail that are no longer contributing to your story in an ideal manner? Did you know that self-doubters assume that their words will be meaningless before they are even placed on a page despite the real truth that every term written brings them a step closer to what they hope to create as an author? That’s another aspect that we share in our kind of lives where we feel confined by our emotions and encounters, resulting in different types of inaction, but each one holds the possibility of getting to know ourselves better. You see we all have moments where our value fluctuates and some feel far worse than others do for whatever reason or no particular event at all, but it is still who we are and all of it is always all right. When we believe that our trails have to be sunny, free of debris and full of blooms because it appears to be so for others, we fail to find our specific way which means that we are not being authentic but rather flat walk-on characters in a story that we are actually creating about ourselves. I remember desperately wanting Ryan to “value” himself during his substance use years, but you know what, I was actually making him feel worse because there is merit in all the ways that we feel life not just in the fabulous or fun parts. I am now learning to be with every detail of me, but I wish I had understood long ago how important all feelings and things are in the process of our showing up for ourselves as the real personas in epic tales. Yeah, I still have moments where I hate the BLAH, but change is more about our finding words that help us enfold feelings like that because if we close the door on that mess, we are telling ourselves there is something wrong with us which will never be in our best interest or encourage us to move the plot or to embrace the weeds that touch us as life really is. Ryan, in the last year or so of his life, frequently reminded me to be grateful for the tough lessons and my response was always “Nope, I hate them!” but in the past three years since he died, I am really beginning to feel his phrase as I have been finding words to help me navigate a trail that isn’t what I wished for and sometimes throws me off of a cliff right into the prickles or has me up against a fire-breathing dragon that scares me. While you are finding words, be kind to you by giving yourself a moment to feel what you feel as a part of your experience and of course always have a box of tissues nearby in case there are tears from pain or laughter. In other words, it’s not where you are on the outside but where you are on the inside that matters. Have the best day POSSIBLE for you in all the ways that you live your epic tale. Love Always, Heavell
When we don’t know ourselves well enough as the main characters in our personal stories and we become polarized about only one of our details, we fall into what is known as one-dimensional thinking where a particular part becomes what we believe defines us. In a way by focusing on whatever that thing is, our view dims and the shadow of it then spreads out like a thick mist that cloaks everything within us, even the sunniest places in our hearts. Of course, it’s not that that specific BLAH isn’t important, it is a piece of us, but it is only so in some of the moments in our lives rather than all of them. It’s hard to ignore the loud voice of what hurts, though, because if we feel it, it must mean it is the truth about us. How can we write a love story about ourselves, then, if the words that should express what is good about us are always being enfolded by our terms that know what we don’t want or even hate about ourselves? In other words, how do we make sense of who we are as feeling individuals that are making our way on our inner journeys as well as traversing in our outside lives when what we say or fail to say to ourselves has the ability to throw us off of a cliff even when we are currently filled with hope on a debris-free, level trail? Imagine a story where the lead character is the exact definition of what you think beauty looks like. Words flow from that persona in the right tone as well as being the perfect choice in every moment. His or her location is ideal because the weather is always the proper mix of sunshine and rain allowing for a bouquet of flowers to be on the table at all times without having to find them. The home is always clean because no one ever makes a mess there. There are no rocks to stumble over, no glimpses of other views to feel bad about, no conflict and no uncertainty. That character even smiles while sleeping because there isn’t any anger, worry, hurt or feelings of inadequacies or mystical creatures to defeat. There isn’t even a need for words like hope and wishes because knowing what they feel like on the inside doesn’t fit with the easiness of replicating a matching view each day. Nor is there a necessity for understanding or curiosity because what is seen at first blush will be found in all of the sightings just like when we are polarized about a detail as being the definition of ourselves or someone else. With the turn of each page in that story, the same information will be repeated over and over and if that’s an accurate depiction of what is hoped for, then why would anyone want or need to see what’s around the bend or find other flowers when he or she could just stay safely there? Perhaps, though, the real truth is that that seemingly easy narrative holds a surprise plot twist where it’s really an account of a battle with a hidden dragon on the inside of that person. The kind of fire-breathing mystical creature that makes change impossible by using an individual’s desire not to feel the things that he or she doesn’t want to prevent him or her from venturing more than a few steps away from what is comfortable and familiar. That, of course, leads to remaining right where he or she is not unlike what we ourselves do in our own stories. Today or any day for that matter is a good day to move the plot in your epic tale by asking yourself where will you be tomorrow in your heart? What will you say there, and will it include at least one word of love for yourself that you have given yourself a moment to discover? Some of the most devastating dragons to ever inhabit our epic tales exist in the shadows of our feelings that we express in our words even when no one else can see, hear or experience them. Move your plot so that the BLAH is present in only some of your moments because it was never meant to be the only thing you believed about yourself. After all, you are not a one-dimensional, flat, walk-on character in someone else’s account but rather the writer as well as the main character in your own epic life. Have the best day POSSIBLE for you. Love Always, Heavell
Do you think that you would have acted differently in your life if the process of “living through your feelings” entailed only what can be found on an easy trail where the sun is always shining, and blooms are in abundance and there are no rocks to trip you? Or what if the feelings that occupy you were the results of battles with mystical creatures? Would they be acceptable then? What if those familiar feelings that live so loudly in you still found a way to come together even if the events and backdrop were changed on your journey? How would you feel about that? About you? Life would certainly feel easier if the things along our rides didn’t forge who we are but then we are not living as bland expressionless walk-ons in a story who move through emotionally charged moments without feeling them. Perhaps the problem is that it sounds so much more interesting to talk about a fire-breathing dragon that is determined to prevent you from reaching your goal then it is to say that your feelings, which have burning super-powers too, have you walking in circles and unable to commit to moving forth? Or maybe it’s that you never envisioned this BLAH as a part of your life so now you don’t feel safe enough going through with you as the writer? Of course, it could also be that after stumbling and falling enough times that it feels like the power of hope is an insufficient tool when facing the kinds of weeds that can move even on a calm day. It’s the touch in our hearts of those kinds of personal feelings that makes us who we are as individuals. In other words, being authentic means, the feelings that we know inhabit us and that includes the ones we don’t want. A change of location to a flat, debris-free trail where we can stop to sit in fields of flowers, then, would certainly appear to be the better choice to stroll on but the truth is that we can’t really see the thorns on those blooms or what is waiting around the bend to pounce upon us which is what our lives are really like no matter what we think we perceive is on another trail. We can even do everything right and still have it all go horribly wrong because this is life, and we live it. An extended family member was happily on a sun-filled journey that he loved when he was tragically killed three weeks ago at the age of 23. That person was Ryan’s younger brother and the remaining son of a father as well as the last brother of three sisters and the only son of a mother. The loss of that one person will bring unfathomable pain to the trails of many even if they were on what looked like the better path or don’t want to be pierced by the thousands of thorns found in the anguish of loss. By each of us being an original, we hold a contradiction of feelings that continually enfold us in a little and a lot of ways that often leave us painfully unsure of ourselves as well as life. Every day, though, we get to decide what we are going to say to ourselves even when we are thinking about what we could have done differently in the yesterdays, or we wish we could change our backdrops. So where will you be tomorrow in your heart? Will you write about what inhabits you and will that include a story of love for yourself in the exact setting that you are “living through your feelings” now? It is, after all your better story. Have the best day POSSIBLE as an original. Love Always, Heavell
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