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Flow Philosophy
Sep. 15th, 2006 09:44 amI've been meaning to write this post since I got back from the permaculture course, but haven't felt right about it. I still don't feel right about it-- the words aren't singing through me-- but the idea wants to come out. Besides, I need reminding.
This is all going to be weird mystical neo-hippie babble, so deal.
I work on several premises that most of the people around me don't have, but that I take from my experience as applicable to my life. I believe that the world around me will provide what I need (cue Rolling Stones here), I believe I have lots of options and opportunities, I believe I don't know everything nor can I forsee all the consequences of things.
In short, I believe that life is trustworthy. I know that my mind is somewhat crazy; it jumps at shadows and has the ability to find bad in everything. When I am trying to control everything in my life I get jumpy, because the whole world, put together, is uncontrollable. We can carve out little fragments of it to bend to our will, but not all of it at once.
Trying to control every aspect of my life leads to failure, and I hate failure, but it also leads to a life that is limited to my powers of prediction and imagination. If the only things that happen are the things that I make happen, well, my life will never be bigger than me. It will never hold things I can't think of in order to enact them.
What, then, should I do? Well, obviously I should lean back and let the world happen to me, since it's so beneficient. I should avoid putting up obstructions to get in its way; avoid nudging my life into the desired and therefore limited channels that my mind can produce.
What does this look like? It looks like stepping out the door with little enough sttachment to plans that, if something important comes up, I can do that important thing instead. It looks like making lots and lots of at-the-moment decisions of 'is this better than that?' It looks, oddly enough, like having your goals solid in your mind (happiness? social interaction? world improvement?) so you can make your decisions quickly and easily in line with those goals, and not flounder around because you're stuck in micromanagement. I have a tendancy to do that-- make a specific concrete plan, like go somewhere for a weekend or do something at ten o clock or take a specific university program-- and thus lose sight of the larger goal that the plan was supposed to enable. Think, is this helping me to a means, or to the end? Things get tangled that way.
It looks like paying attention to what you have now, and enjoying it, and looking at the things that could come naturally from it. Be here enough that when a path to the next place opens up, you notice it. If you're busy with your head in your pre-planned future, you miss things.
I find that, when I open up my schedule and pay attention, life naturally flows for me. This happens; the next thing happens; something else happens. Suddenly I'm somewhere I never expected to be, and it's generally a pretty wonderful place. If I try to micromanage, to control, to fully-schedule, I still end up somewhere I don't expect to be-- but it tends to be somewhere disappointing, where I'm looking at my broken plans rather than the new surprising places I've achieved.
Anyhow, there you are. Not elegant, not detailed, but the gist.
This is all going to be weird mystical neo-hippie babble, so deal.
I work on several premises that most of the people around me don't have, but that I take from my experience as applicable to my life. I believe that the world around me will provide what I need (cue Rolling Stones here), I believe I have lots of options and opportunities, I believe I don't know everything nor can I forsee all the consequences of things.
In short, I believe that life is trustworthy. I know that my mind is somewhat crazy; it jumps at shadows and has the ability to find bad in everything. When I am trying to control everything in my life I get jumpy, because the whole world, put together, is uncontrollable. We can carve out little fragments of it to bend to our will, but not all of it at once.
Trying to control every aspect of my life leads to failure, and I hate failure, but it also leads to a life that is limited to my powers of prediction and imagination. If the only things that happen are the things that I make happen, well, my life will never be bigger than me. It will never hold things I can't think of in order to enact them.
What, then, should I do? Well, obviously I should lean back and let the world happen to me, since it's so beneficient. I should avoid putting up obstructions to get in its way; avoid nudging my life into the desired and therefore limited channels that my mind can produce.
What does this look like? It looks like stepping out the door with little enough sttachment to plans that, if something important comes up, I can do that important thing instead. It looks like making lots and lots of at-the-moment decisions of 'is this better than that?' It looks, oddly enough, like having your goals solid in your mind (happiness? social interaction? world improvement?) so you can make your decisions quickly and easily in line with those goals, and not flounder around because you're stuck in micromanagement. I have a tendancy to do that-- make a specific concrete plan, like go somewhere for a weekend or do something at ten o clock or take a specific university program-- and thus lose sight of the larger goal that the plan was supposed to enable. Think, is this helping me to a means, or to the end? Things get tangled that way.
It looks like paying attention to what you have now, and enjoying it, and looking at the things that could come naturally from it. Be here enough that when a path to the next place opens up, you notice it. If you're busy with your head in your pre-planned future, you miss things.
I find that, when I open up my schedule and pay attention, life naturally flows for me. This happens; the next thing happens; something else happens. Suddenly I'm somewhere I never expected to be, and it's generally a pretty wonderful place. If I try to micromanage, to control, to fully-schedule, I still end up somewhere I don't expect to be-- but it tends to be somewhere disappointing, where I'm looking at my broken plans rather than the new surprising places I've achieved.
Anyhow, there you are. Not elegant, not detailed, but the gist.
