What if, for example, instead of worrying about petty environments, one were to look past them? What if, instead of whinging about orders to work on mediocrity, one were to set about planning a strategy to implement a series of boundaries where one would not have to do such work? Such creativity - forging a way that is better in line with what one has to give (which can be decades in the making, requiring other work of its own) - requires extra work, but fulfilment is rarely presented on a silver platter. It has to be fought for. And in this battle, mistakes will be made. But while mistakes may lead to tough consequences, if one has already set off on the journey called Creative Learning, one will be left with something to learn from. This wouldn't be the case if one had done nothing.
As I was trying to think through several problems recently, I once again practised my favourite exercise of phrasing these problems as questions, which I then type into google. The results led me, albeit circuitously, to a business motivational speaker and an underwater diver. The former, Marcel Schwantes, speaks to human-centric management: a know thyself lateral approach to others. I would give a Creative Learning award to for Remaining Constructive Under Duress for the following (from here):
...every problem has the seeds of its own solution. You can find the answer to your problem if you look deeply enough into the problem itself.When things go wrong or are poorly managed, people get reactive, maybe even start to slap damning epithets onto peoples' backs, but one can maintain the vision that there is another way. And that there is a way out.
Diver Guillaume Néry (whose most recent fame is this breathtaking video that has transportive qualities) speaks (from 9:25) of the flurry of thoughts that begin to spin and intensify as he begins his descent to the depths of the ocean - in a description that seemed relatable enough to more general experiences of difficulty. He goes on to say that one can't control thoughts at that point: one shouldn't try to, "you have to let it happen; the more you try to control, the harder it is to manage". Once he lets go, he finds there is no need to breathe.
There has to be a letting go from the "perfunctory answer" of poorly-zoned quotidian thought if that deeper place, where wisdom lies, has a chance to be heard. In fact, I wonder if even mediocre chores are better accomplished once one has taken the plunge to this deeper place, that exists in a limbo between coming and going.
A long time ago, I saved to my phone what I found out today was a passage from Castanada who I have never read, so I have no idea how I found it, that resonates with this:
Anything is one of a million paths. Therefore you must always keep in mind that a path is only a path; ... This question is one that only a very old man asks. Does this path have a heart? All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. They are paths going through the bush, or into the bush. In my own life I could say I have traversed long long paths, but I am not anywhere. Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn't. One makes for a joyful journey; as long as you follow it, you are one with it. The other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you.(Full passage here.) The going through the bush, or into the bush reminds me of this 'coming and going' limbo that maybe I should call Tao. Néry's Tao is also tied to a going when he describes what happens on needing to return to the surface after a deep dive. It would be easy to panic, he says, because from those depths one can suddenly be overwhelmed by the desire to get to the surface. It would be easy to panic, but he says that instead of panicking, he looks straight ahead, never allowing himself to even picture himself at the surface, only looking at the line in front of him, in the present. In this way, time goes faster...
This seems equivalent to the one-foot-in-front-of-the-other approach to running. It really works.
What I have gathered together here are different lines of counsel and experiences that suggest that the way forwards may come from a temporary resignation of self from the flurry of unthinking narrative. This involves an important differentiation: some thoughts occur, and they go on and on, as if they make sense or are of use, but after following them through, one realises that they are a waste. This is unthinking narrative. Thoughtful narrative has a through line to a clearing, and is constructive.
To return to the problem: it has the seeds of its solution within it because if it is accepted (as opposed to denied, ignored), it leads to broad questions, which lead to a clearing of their own. The problem is entertaining: it is asking something of us we did not have before. As we look at it, we are also looking at ourselves, asking what we need to cultivate within in order to meet the needs of the seed. It asks us to grow with it. It is an invitation to forgo the perfunctory, the same old narratives. It allows us to imagine, if we dare, who we would like to become as we steward its growth.
If we care, we may be met with a flurry of resistance. But if we see it through...
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