My fantasies and longings are pointers and guides for myself.
My fantasy
I notice a fantasy in the back of my mind: that someone eventually will take my writings here and do a study of the intersection of awakening, trauma, society, culture, and how it all unfolded in this life.
Maybe as one among many similar studies to find more universal patterns and their expressions in real and lived lives.
In real life
I know it’s a fantasy and it’s very unlikely that it will happen, and a part of me feels embarrassed that the fantasy sometimes comes up as an image far in the back of my mind.
Of course, there is a tiny possibility it will happen. I have written extensively and I try to be transparent and honest in my writings1. Some are interested in how awakening unfolds in real lived lives. AI makes it feasible to sift through a large collection of writings, extract the important articles, and find patterns and how it all unfolds over time.
And, as mentioned, there is a chance someone will do just that with a larger collection of writings and documented lives to find patterns, and mine will be part of that sample. (My dark night journey is already included as one of several personal accounts in The Dark Night of the Soul: A Journey from Absence to Presence.)
If I were a student or researcher at a university open to these topics, I would love to do just that kind of study2.
As a pointer and guide
There is something about that fantasy that’s more important.
I notice there is a very good reason for that fantasy: I long to be seen, for my life to be taken seriously, and for someone to be on my side. I didn’t have it growing up, and I didn’t learn to do it well for myself.
I long for me to do that – to see me, take my life seriously, and more consistently be on my own side. That’s what the longing is really about.
It’s a pointer and invitation for me to do just that.
My writings here
I assume my writings here – more than 10,000 published articles and more than 6 million words – are an attempt to do just that, and the volume may reflect both the urgency of that need and that writing doesn’t quite hit the mark.
Why did I gravitate to writing? It’s likely for several reasons: I have loved reading and writing since early childhood, I tend to try to find safety in understanding, and it’s something I can do even if I am bedbound. There is nothing inherently wrong with that approach, and it does serve other purposes, although it may not be the most direct way for me to meet those primal and very understandable needs.
A more direct approach
A direct approach is likely more effective, and I do that too, although maybe less consistently.
This means being with the wounded parts of me, getting to know them through dialogue – including the child and teenage versions of me, listening to them, feeling and allowing what comes up, and more consistently being on their (my) side.
Equally or more importantly, it means being on my side now – in how I am with myself and others, and in how I live in the world.
NOTES
(1) Although I usually don’t go into great detail of how it all looks in my daily life, so that’s missing. I tend to use broader strokes for that part of the process.
(2) It would be a dream project, and possibly something I can do even if I am not connected to a research institution. Informal studies are valuable too. I am not immediately drawn to it, but have been in the past and it may well return.
The photo is of me, likely the summer I was four or five somewhere in the mountains of Norway.