Today, Maria is making some limited edition “Back Porch Potholders,” featuring our “Books” sign, Flo, our barn cat in her wooden box, and the red hen, who loves to join her there. The barn cats and chickens have taken over our porch.
This is a touching and peaceful and meditative potholder, Maria has sold her potholders all over the world, a kind of friendly, re-invented and utilitarian art form, although I am told most people hang them on walls rather than cook with them. I love the simplicity and affection woven into this new potholder.
And also the nod to books, important around here.
Maria is re-inventing the art form in a way, the potholders are very utilitarian but also quite friendly and unpretentious. Our lives and are art are no longer separable, and we have accepted that, and making the most of it. I think the artist is making a small number of these potholders (such things are secret here, and not discussed with me) and they will cost $25 plus shipping. The Back Porch Potholders will soon be going up for sale on Maria’s website, fullmoonfiberart.com.
Carl Jung wrote that enlightenment doesn’t occur from sitting around visualizing images of light, but from integrating the darker aspects of the Self into the conscious personality. Darkness does not always relate to evil, just as light does not always bring good.
For me, much of the past decade or so has been spent trying to integrate the person I wish to be with the person I am. I am reminded daily that I am not yet the person I want to be. I make mistakes, get angry, misjudge people. I am prone to being used, to living in delusion, to intolerance and frustration – especially with myself.
I frighten people, make them uncomfortable, speak too plainly sometimes. I am driven and impatient. I need to integrate the person I am with the person I wish to be. As I grow older, I am coming to understand that this is a journey without end, I will never quite get there, the value comes from trying, working, staying on the path, not accepting the person I am or giving up on being the person I wish to be.
To do this, I have to know who I am. When I make a mistake, I know now that I must not be defensive about it, deny it, or wallow in it. I must learn from it, use it to see myself clearly. The point is not to be perfect, it is to comprehend the dark side as well as the light, and be aware of both.
I am not expecting to be a saint, I don’t think the spiritual path ever leads to perfection, that is the turf of the Gods, not the humans. I am learning to accept my flaws and problems as well as my strengths, I am learning to see both of them clearly and honestly. When I make a mistake now, as I often do, I immediately set out to understand why and how I can learn from it and grow.
Oddly enough, I think of George Washington, someone I rarely think of. But I’m reading a good book about him and one of his dominant characteristics was to understand his mistakes and grow from them. That is who I want to be, not a perfect man, but a man who can see his mistakes, acknowledge them, and grow. I began doing that a few years ago, and it has benefited me greatly. The more I know myself, the more thoughtfully I can integrate the darker aspects of me into my conscious personality, the happier I am, the more I can accomplish, the less tormented and frightened I have felt myself to be.
There is no point in beating myself up, I am no better than you, you are no better than me. We share the experience of being human beings, which is to say we are flawed.
This is the hard work of the self, of self-awareness. I know so many people who talk about change, I know so few people who change. I have changed, I am changing. When I realized someone who claimed to be a close friend was using me – alas, this happens even to minor celebrities – I understood this was my flaw, not hers. No one can use you if you don’t wish to be used, it takes two to do that.
I learned a lot about myself after that painful episode. Co-dependence does not disappear because you learn about it, it lurks in the genes and the subconscious.
It won’t happen again.
I learned what I could, faced the truth about myself, and moved on. I never thought to compare myself to George Washington before, but he was a shining example of the notion of changing and growing. He was a lousy general at first, but learned from his mistakes and became a great general. He was a bumbling politician at first, but learned how to be politic and grew into a statesman. He was shallow and ill-informed, but came to embrace great vision.
Reading his own words about his life, I realized that his enlightenment came from integrating the darker aspects of he Self into his conscious personality.
I’m not sure we have anything in common apart from that, but it is an interesting idea for me. Self-awareness is hard work, and continuous work. It is easy to talk about change, it is hard to do it. It is simple to look at the bright side of ourselves, harder to see the darkness. But I am working to embrace both and see both clearly, I think the human experience consists of both. Enlightenment comes from authenticity.
I am freed of the burden of needing to be perfect, but I am free to seek true enlightenment every day of my life. Every day, I find a piece of it.
Necessity is the mother of invention, they say. Red is at the vet, limping badly on his right rear leg, getting X-Rays. We had to move the sheep out of the side pasture after two hours of grazing, so I took Fate out to see what we could do. She did her usual joyous racing around the flock, then I got her to stand and face the sheep and approach them, and they turned and walked (slowly) out of the pasture.
After some shouting, I got Fate to lie down and stay still, and she pressured them out of the gate. I thought she did great, all things considered. Fate is the Queen of Distraction, but perhaps she is settling down a bit. Come and see. (In the interests of full disclosure, I was pressuring the sheep a bit myself, but she definitely turned them around.
I’m pretty much accepting that Fate is not going to be a working dog like Red, but she might end up somewhere in the middle. I was impressed this morning.
Every morning, a morning meeting in the pasture. Maria, me, Red and Fate. Red sits atop the hill keeping an eye on the flow of things, Fate scurries around the pasture, looking busy, accomplishing little. The equines gather around Maria for their morning treat, some training lessons with the ball, a conversation about the day. Then we march to the pasture of the day for grazing, and Maria and I get to work.
Every afternoon, the hens gather on the porch (often the barn cats are head of them.). They also like the Rapunzel chair and they are fond of starting at nothing in particular for a good while, something most animals do – they meditate naturally and without smartphones and instant messages. One of the many things I learn from our animals is to take time out to think, to get to know the space in my head without advice, warnings, intrusions and interruptions.
We meant to sit on the porch, but the animals got there first, we have ceded the space to them.
