My Pen Mates,
Like sand between the toes on a beach walk, it is calming to fall out of structure and be free of the norm_ the norm being the world expectation of production, conformity, clarity.
I watched a television commercial where the subject was in soft focus, like the whole scene was being filmed through gauze. I was drawn to the images like one is forced to conjure a picture through fog. After a while, I stopped staring and just absorbed the message in its murkiness and lack of definition. In the short span of time I watched, I realized that the way it was presented demanded not my attention, but brought down my resistance to watching it. It's the counter-logic approach where instead of challenging you and ensnaring your attention, holding on to it, and driving in a solid, intractable message, this particular add sought to first lower your resistance; prepare your mind not by hooking it with a gag or soundbite, but by withholding detail and allow the viewer to watch instead of wonder. I found it both clever and revealing, and I liked the way it made me reflect on how much everyone needs a conscious moment, when we can feel a lack of demand.
For all our waking hours, we constantly need to perform tasks requiring focus, demanding detail and undivided attention. The underlying principle being the optimization of energy, reducing loss and waste, and ensuring good relationships. We are expected to communicate clearly, work efficiently, and cause no harm to others by complying with laws and ethical principles. Those who claim to live simply are by no means simple but rather careful people who put a lot of effort to living by the rules, thereby putting on extra stress by constantly clarifying those rules. The rest of us who label them as simple are otherwise preoccupied with working around those rules and stress out covering our tracks so our weaknesses are not uncovered.
Bottom line is that while we are well aware of a need to have sand between our toes_ to have that moment when we can just stare without seeing, to be awake without being challenged_ many cannot enjoy those times even when forced to do so. Modern life has pushed us all so much to perform and deliver that we've somehow learned to expect to see harshness at every turn, and goodness in the ether. Questing to be the best, the foremost, the least flawed; and having the whole world to compete against has created the paradox of a clouded mind needing to lurk in the fog to find itself. And finding one's self does not require the artifice of diversion or artificial stimulation. The only vacation from this burden is a trip of the mind, and accept the fluidity of the human condition; that the world keeps on turning for both the strong and the weak. The herd lives through conformity but conformity is not the norm.
It takes effort to unfocus, but it's small energy spent to find that corner of the mind where the senses are marginalized, and nature is allowed to swallow the spirit that keeps the heart beating......
Mon
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