The desire to squeeze into a life that isn’t ours can be powerful, can’t it? It takes hold of us in subtle and unsubtle ways, seducing us with promises of success and happiness. The line between living “our best life” and coveting someone else’s can become very, very blurred. We cross the boundary with effortless ease, only discovering our mistake when we find ourselves lonely amidst our “success”, unaccountably homesick. Strangely, once we squeeze into that other life, success rarely feels the way we thought and hoped it might.
For me, the hardest part can sometimes be the realisation that this life is not mine and never was. It’s not that I want it so particularly badly, truth be told, but that I want the idea of it. I somehow feel that I would be more “real, more “solid”, if I had a label I could confidently pin on myself. Oh the irony of seeking a unique identity outside myself!
The challenge is to feel at home in the world. Yes, there have been times when I have wanted to “fit”, but that’s only a small part of it. I live, to a very great extent, inside my head, and I struggle to deal with a physical, tangible world. Left to my own devices, I would happily lose myself in dreams and story, never seeking the way home. If I have sought identities already forged by others it is because I have been trying to work out how one does this “life” thing with any solid, measurable being.
Now, as I seek to re-engage with life and find myself within it, I discover that what I am really seeking is the means to give physical expression to my secret, magical inner world. It’s about being as much at home in my body as in my mind. It is a scary and daunting proposition but also a surprisingly exciting one. Rather than retreating into my world, can I create it right here and now, real and solid to the touch?
For me, the hardest part can sometimes be the realisation that this life is not mine and never was. It’s not that I want it so particularly badly, truth be told, but that I want the idea of it. I somehow feel that I would be more “real, more “solid”, if I had a label I could confidently pin on myself. Oh the irony of seeking a unique identity outside myself!
The challenge is to feel at home in the world. Yes, there have been times when I have wanted to “fit”, but that’s only a small part of it. I live, to a very great extent, inside my head, and I struggle to deal with a physical, tangible world. Left to my own devices, I would happily lose myself in dreams and story, never seeking the way home. If I have sought identities already forged by others it is because I have been trying to work out how one does this “life” thing with any solid, measurable being.
Now, as I seek to re-engage with life and find myself within it, I discover that what I am really seeking is the means to give physical expression to my secret, magical inner world. It’s about being as much at home in my body as in my mind. It is a scary and daunting proposition but also a surprisingly exciting one. Rather than retreating into my world, can I create it right here and now, real and solid to the touch?