The Path
Most of the observations in this section concentrate on our path through life, our life-long pilgrimage through the wonders and pitfalls of this world.
A perfectionist sets him/herself up to fail. No one wins or succeeds all the time. Perfection is not an option.
Create your path and walk down it. And do not worry about whether it is the "best" or "perfect" path. Choose and move. Perfection is not an option. [Little secret here: for the longest time I couldn't say what I was going to do when I "grew up" because I was looking for the "perfect" thing to do. Today I know writing is what I am doing when I grow up--I am living life as it presents itself and as I touch it day by day.]
Make sure your "To-do" list does not include things you do not want to do, things others want you to do or think you should do. What do you want to do? How do I want to change the world? If your task does not fall into one of these two categories, it doesn't belong on your To-do list. Do those things that make you "loose track" of time because they are so fascinating.
The journey of life: All travel, whether physical as walking or riding in a car or airplane, or metaphysical as learning, growing, and decaying, is movement through being--actually a change in relationships. Whether I move or things move past me, relationships change. All life is a dynamic changing in the relationships between you and what is around you. Life itself is a journey. We walk down paths sometimes clear and well defined and other times faint and undefined. Sometimes we walk with another, with others; sometimes we walk alone. But walk we do, run we do, fly we do; and even when we try to stand still, the everything else moves around us, never still, always changing. How to react to that? How to live with it? How to prosper in it? How to become one with it? Walk along. Run along. Absorb the relationships, the individuals as you pass. Participate in their celebrations, in their sorrows. Rejoice in their presence. Thank them as they pass from sharing their journey with you. Do not hold them as they part and continue down their path now branching away from you. And when you see your path branching, do not hold to the known path, to the relationships, to the things that are not on your new path. Go where you must go, others are waiting along your new path. [Even as I wrote this paragraph the idea grew and developed and changed. So to life.]
The destination is not important. The journey is. In fact, the journey is all that is.
We are pilgrims on a lifelong path ending over a final unknown horizon.
It doesn't make a lot of difference what you choose to do so long as you do it to the best of your ability. Your genius will shine through. You will choose well. But the choice must be for something you are passionate about.
Commit and do not worry about the net that is not there. If you need one, the universe will provide it, or it won't. Either way, you won't have to worry about it any more.
Really, I find myself back at Charles de Foucault: Love and do what you want. All questioning is irrelevant.
What is procrastination? Too lazy to move? Too fearful of moving? Too comfortable with the current situation? When the Now becomes unbearable, you will move. Where is the time point between just waiting for a judicious time to act and procrastination--waiting beyond what time?
What a wild uncharted road we find ourselves out on (God sets us out on it?) in the beginning of life and how quickly we find (or make) familiar ruts so we don't have to wander more on those uncharted roads. Sometimes it is almost impossible to get ourselves to try something new. The old is so comfortable and familiar that the last thing we want to do is give it up for something unknown. Even when the familiar is not so comfortable, the unknown is still unknown and the familiar daemon is preferred to the unknown one. And then sometimes you have the added disincentive of another voice at the table whispering "be satisfied with what you have. You don't need more." That's, however, precisely the point, I don't need more, but more calls to be explored, to be experienced.
In all my walking, what is it that I am walking to, from? I am, indeed, just walking the path of life enjoying everything that presents itself along the way. And, though there are more than enough rough spots along the way, it is really an interesting path to follow. In fact, at this writing, I am walking a free-wheeling path. My mind is floating free, no anchor, no goal, just floating to catch or not to catch whatever is floating by.
You are a wanderer, an explorer, a traveler. Have you overstayed your time at this resting place as you have overstayed your time in many hotels over the years. You have to stop at times but you have to go after your rest, after writing your words. It will always be easier to stay than to go, especially if the hotel is particularly comfortable. You have the keys in your pocket, use them, get that car going. You can stop again later to rest and write. But go now. Lighten your load and go now.
Our Path - Creation
We are matter; we are consciousness; we are neither and we are both. Life and death, hope and despair, essence and existence, yes and no. All makes us. None makes us. We are. Just as the source is, so we are. Just as the source is not, so we are not.
We each have a unique trip to take through this world. As much as we try to tie it to others, we walk a unique line, not a lonely line but a unique one with and without others. Sometimes we swing together, sometimes far apart. But we walk none the less.
We walk knowing there is a path to take, a path designed to continue creation, to create. It is creating, it is fashioning as yet untried patterns that we are here to do. Sometimes we do it together with others in a lesser or greater society (group) and sometimes we do it as an individual. But create we must, create we cannot but do.
Sometimes that creation comes to naught, sometimes it is destructive to existing creation, sometimes it is small, and sometimes it is a quantum leap forward for creation. Even in our "worst" doldrums we are creating a new world. Our new world may not be a lot of fun and beautiful--but it is new, different, and unique from all that has come before.
So realize that all movement results in some new creation. Make it positive. Make it a worthy addition to the sum of all that has gone before. If you are going to add something to this web of relationships anyway, why not make it something that adds to the harmony and rhythm and external unity. (We are already united internally--some of us just don't realize it yet.)