the process of resolving
I love people during new years celebrations. Love them. I love meeting people at these celebrations because there is this crazy feeling of worldwide solidarity: tonight we will put away our differences and just celebrate the oncoming year, some with prayer and meditation, and others in the more westernized fashion of getting drunk and kissing a stranger at midnight. Random people you don't know will stop you on the street and wish you a happy new year. A bunch of hooligan college kids on the subway approached me for "beer money" and for once I actually gave it to them. Because for some reason I was reminded of my time in europe, and felt like i should spread the affirmation that there are, in fact, ways to connect with strangers in this world (these are ways that mostly, of course, involve beer and money, usually together.)
But I guess I just crave that kind of connection, even if it is one sided; that feeling of knowing that you're in a city surrounded by *people* not robots. I guess that's why I feel so strangely towards places like manhattan: so much potential to meet new and interesting people, and yet we'd rather put on our ipods or play with our cell phones- new yorkers actually avoid contact. Maybe that's why they're so grumpy- they've forgotten how to just be.
The teevee is raving about keeping new years resolutions, of course a typical ploy by the industry to sell more things that people don't want or need. I've always thought that new year resolutions are bound to fail because of the high pressure. I mean, sure, you may think that this year you're gonna turn a new leaf over, lose 15 pounds, kick your nasty boyfriend to the curb, quit smoking, start investing etc etc. But come March, and you're most likely back into your old bad habits. Think about it: Every day is the start of a new year. You can make your resolution on a random tuesday in June, and then a year later mark your progress. It's not that I'm against resolutions, I just think that people always wait till a benchmark time to make a life-altering decision: usually by which point it's already too late. Really we should be making these decisions when it occurs to us that something in our lives is going terribly wrong.
I made a resolution last spring to cut out the negative forces in my life. And here I am, half a year later, still trying to succeed. And this path has taken me to so many different encounters, I've met people that I so horribly wrote off before because of superficial purposes- without even realizing it, I had reverted to the highshool goth kid mentality of "I'll reject you before you reject me" and ended up missing out on interactions with very beautiful people. At the same time, this quest has proven equally destructive as constructive: I've lost many friends or people I had regarded as friends, I find myself holding others to extremely high standards and often being dissapointed when they fail to meet them. And I've found a lot of negative energy within myself surfacing as well, which causes that horrible cycle of knowing that something is wrong but feeling absolutely powerless to resolve it.
For example, upon returing from a very typical New Years weekend in New York City, I've been awashed with an overwhelming wave of discontent. I'm not quite sure why, but I think it has to do with a lot of things including some health issues I've been faced with and some tough social decisions. I feel like I'm falling in a downward spiral, at moments inexplicably happy and ecstatic to be in my current state of independence, and other moments extremely isolated and sad. And then there's this feeling that comes between the two, a feeling that I can only describe as discontent: neutral and unsatisfied, like mixing all the colors of life together and coming out grey- it's not nothing, but not the right thing either. This is what Viktor Frankl calls an existential vacuum. And I am being blown away.
Oh, but tangents, tangents. I guess what's really important is to recognize that change and creation are products of our own hands. We may not be able to change "the world" but we most certainly can change "our world." And really, isn't that all that matters? It's not as selfish as it sounds: because of this wonderful contact between people, change within ourselves will cause a ripple of change in others. Of course it will. Think about the grumpy secretary at the doctors office: if she greeted you with a warm smile instead of a cold glare or even an ambivalent look, your mood will be altered. Smiles are contagious.
I'm sounding like a hallmark greeting card. The point is, each day is an opportunity to resolve. Each moment is a moment to create. It is a continuous 7th day, so to speak. Happy New Year.
But I guess I just crave that kind of connection, even if it is one sided; that feeling of knowing that you're in a city surrounded by *people* not robots. I guess that's why I feel so strangely towards places like manhattan: so much potential to meet new and interesting people, and yet we'd rather put on our ipods or play with our cell phones- new yorkers actually avoid contact. Maybe that's why they're so grumpy- they've forgotten how to just be.
The teevee is raving about keeping new years resolutions, of course a typical ploy by the industry to sell more things that people don't want or need. I've always thought that new year resolutions are bound to fail because of the high pressure. I mean, sure, you may think that this year you're gonna turn a new leaf over, lose 15 pounds, kick your nasty boyfriend to the curb, quit smoking, start investing etc etc. But come March, and you're most likely back into your old bad habits. Think about it: Every day is the start of a new year. You can make your resolution on a random tuesday in June, and then a year later mark your progress. It's not that I'm against resolutions, I just think that people always wait till a benchmark time to make a life-altering decision: usually by which point it's already too late. Really we should be making these decisions when it occurs to us that something in our lives is going terribly wrong.
I made a resolution last spring to cut out the negative forces in my life. And here I am, half a year later, still trying to succeed. And this path has taken me to so many different encounters, I've met people that I so horribly wrote off before because of superficial purposes- without even realizing it, I had reverted to the highshool goth kid mentality of "I'll reject you before you reject me" and ended up missing out on interactions with very beautiful people. At the same time, this quest has proven equally destructive as constructive: I've lost many friends or people I had regarded as friends, I find myself holding others to extremely high standards and often being dissapointed when they fail to meet them. And I've found a lot of negative energy within myself surfacing as well, which causes that horrible cycle of knowing that something is wrong but feeling absolutely powerless to resolve it.
For example, upon returing from a very typical New Years weekend in New York City, I've been awashed with an overwhelming wave of discontent. I'm not quite sure why, but I think it has to do with a lot of things including some health issues I've been faced with and some tough social decisions. I feel like I'm falling in a downward spiral, at moments inexplicably happy and ecstatic to be in my current state of independence, and other moments extremely isolated and sad. And then there's this feeling that comes between the two, a feeling that I can only describe as discontent: neutral and unsatisfied, like mixing all the colors of life together and coming out grey- it's not nothing, but not the right thing either. This is what Viktor Frankl calls an existential vacuum. And I am being blown away.
Oh, but tangents, tangents. I guess what's really important is to recognize that change and creation are products of our own hands. We may not be able to change "the world" but we most certainly can change "our world." And really, isn't that all that matters? It's not as selfish as it sounds: because of this wonderful contact between people, change within ourselves will cause a ripple of change in others. Of course it will. Think about the grumpy secretary at the doctors office: if she greeted you with a warm smile instead of a cold glare or even an ambivalent look, your mood will be altered. Smiles are contagious.
I'm sounding like a hallmark greeting card. The point is, each day is an opportunity to resolve. Each moment is a moment to create. It is a continuous 7th day, so to speak. Happy New Year.
posted by Jessica @ 11:40 AM
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