Henri Poincare
Have you ever had a feeling of certainty you can't shake despite all the facts in the world fighting your belief? It's a struggle that hits to the core because it questions your sanity. Am I being a fool? Am I giving in to desires in my soul or is this a real feeling of intuition that will prove to be correct? Stories mount in your mind of all the times people have just "had a gut feeling" and years down the road they look back and they were right. You start to add up the pieces - the soft facts that maybe give you a glimmer of that reality, a vague idea that you might be right. The hard facts fight you. That piece of hope, those stories and soft facts are what cause pain. The questioning of yourself, and the hope that one day your feeling will be justified and you won't be left at the end with anger at yourself for trusting your intuition. For having belief. Maybe this time you won't take another step away from spiritual matters and instead embrace that there's something bigger out there that was guiding you. If your intuition evolves into reality - then everything is bliss. Embrace that all the things that have lead you to this point...all the waiting was worth it.
I have the banner on my facebook a very simple quote that serves as more than just something to fill space - but it's a reminder to myself. "Many of life's failures are people who didn't realize how close they were to success when they gave up." I keep that prevalent in my life because the logical side of me shuts away those feelings of certainty. Those moments when I just feel like I know eventually get pushed down by the facts around me. Sometimes it's good. Sometimes - maybe more than I would like to admit - those feels were nothing more than desire in disguise. Part of being a writer is you feel things very deeply and your imagination makes things more tangible than I think the average person experiences. I can't really say for sure, because I was born this way, but listening to others and the depth of their feelings I think that's the case. My imagination makes things seem so real it can pacify a lot of my desires. I can jump into a scene and get enough of a feeling of contentment when I'm alone to satisfy my heart for at least a little while. In the end though, it's nothing more than a fabrication and that catches up to me. The same happens with those "little feelings" although by now I think I'm learning the difference...and that's the scariest part. It's terrifying when you can identify what's desire and what's intuition and all the facts, everything your told says your intuition is wrong. When you don't have those moments of doubt and you know it's actually intuition...it then becomes a waiting game.
Even recently I thought I had a feeling that something was going to work out and at the time, I wanted to believe it was intuition, but deep down, I knew I was forcing pieces of a puzzle. I was clutching to the hope of that reality because I had nothing better to substitute. I tried to convince myself it was real intuition, that it was more than desire. The feeling that the future I wanted was going to happen. But I knew it was built up in my head. Like a scene I fabricate, knit together in the pool or when I get lost in a day dream. Only stronger because it's fantasy I mix with desire. With desperate, desperate need. My heart wanted to believe, but my head knew I was having false hope. Nothing divine, nothing inspired. It was my heart running away. And I knew that, at the time. I know it more now. And when I let go of that dream, that false "known" was when life ushered in new opportunities, most importantly new beliefs and new moments that I couldn't have had without the release from falsehood. That's where my hope comes from. That's where my struggle also comes from. I release what I KNOW is false, and yet what I FEEL is real I hold to and yet time seems to pull me along so slowly that I'm in a constant waiting game to see if I was right. To see if I failed or succeeded. To know if I'll be a mess of anger in the end or have everything I ever wanted. All the feelings I've had that are lacking any doubt have proven real. You would think that would give me comfort - but when facts mount against it, it only caused me pain.
I wish I had the ability to give it all over to faith. It's something friends have that I simply cannot manufacture. I've tried, but the way I was built won't let me hand everything over to faith. I ask for guidance, I listen when the "little voice" urges me continually along a path I wanted to vacate and it's proven successful thus far. Even now I'm listening and still feeling lost in the ocean of truths. The listening is a life ring that seems to be continually disintegrating - I'm watching myself get closer to slipping below the waves every moment. Is it only when the waves have chipped away at all but enough to maintain a grip that the boat I knew was coming will arrive? Or have I wasted so much time floating rather than swimming in any direction for land? If I just swim away though, then the life boat might never find me in the expanse when it was suppose to because I didn't listen to the voice telling me to be patient, it's coming.
I decided to write about hope and certainty now because it's a topic I feel like a lot of people struggle with, but one that doesn't get discussed often. Love, fear, pain, sadness, loss - all get described, discussed at length, but the most constant, nagging feelings I have are those of this unknown certainty. Maybe others don't get these feelings. Maybe I'm more tapped in to the subconscious than most so I have these struggles more. I find that hard to believe, but it would explain why a weight on my shoulders doesn't seem to be discussed much. So this is for those of you struggling with the same thing I am. The struggle of knowing something that all the facts tell you is nothing more than false hope. You're not alone. I don't know the answers, I don't know the cure for it. I just know that when I feel even a twinge of doubt - it's proven to not be real. But when I feel nothing but certainty...it has always proved real. Just took more time than I wanted. I'm struggling with a very big one now, one that could take years to come to fruition and in the mean time leaves me in a struggle. But it's also a "known" that I've tried to shake, that facts have allowed my heart to settle with far more than any others before, yet remains. How these pan out I guess is just, ironically, a matter of faith.
Live, Laugh and Above All...Love.
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