awe and progress

Over at Laudator Temporis Acti, a recent post declared: "For this feeling of wonder shows that you are a philosopher, since wonder is the only beginning of philosophy." Wonder - as a point of departure. Wonder, not pride. Wonder, not fantasy.
Ruskin writes: "The pride of physical science is indeed adverse, like every other pride, both to religion and truth; but the sincerity of science, so far from being hostile, is the path-maker among the mountains for the feet of those who publish peace." It is an interesting lens to measure by. How much wonder is contained within a given work?
Awe has been lost in the modern, jaded age, so chuffed to ponder the perverse. Ruskin writes that his age "seemed to love what was ugly" - which figures in, insidiously, to the Baudelaire-Burgess legacy. Surely wonder can't be held in the same breath as Conrad's oh, the horror!
Many, many thinkers blame the secularization of culture for this shift. By secularization, they also mean "consistent methodological principles," professionalization, rationalization and a shift in political economy that moved away from the household.
But while there are some wonderfully creative conversations about the economy - like those of Amartya Sen, I wonder about trying to promote a discussion of awe. One of my favourite such passages is by St. John Chrysostom: "We admire many things; the beauty of a portico, of paintings, of a youthful body. We also admire the vastness of the Ocean; fear will be added to this admiration if we perceive the abyss of the depth of the sea, and it is this fear-admiration which the Psalmist experiences in contemplating the vast and immense Ocean of God's wisdom." Gervase Mathew, in Byzantine Aesthetics, adds, "This is perhaps reminiscent of Longinus on the Sublime, 'that echo that leads to ecstasy'."

And to echo back to a more material concern, one of my college science professors would often bemoan the fact that starvation persists despite there being enough food and transportation to feed everyone. Ruskin wrote the same: claiming that later generations would hate his age despite all of the industrial advances, as it had not solved the problem of famine.
During childhood, mother would often list the number of countries the food on the table had come from (I grew up in a non-agricultural Asian metropolis, what can I say) - and this added a sense of awe to our thanksgiving. What about bringing awe back? And isn't it being brought back? People are traveling out to farms to see all the hard work that is done to grow the food we sometimes take for granted. There is a growing awe for the craftsman, often filmed in short videos, sent around the web.
Couldn't awe also heal our economy? We know οἰκονομία, or oikonomia, means "household, management" - well then, if we infuse awe into all that we partake of each day, wouldn't we "publish peace"?
That said, there is a great difference between the hope in progress that emerged in Victorian society, and the Aristotelian view of the same. In Aristotle's account of an ideal society, which he described by using literary tools he was critical of, he was trying to point out a way forwards while warning us not to take the ideal literally. I wrote about where I got that idea here.
The only time we can jump into the ideal is when we feel that awe that makes us humble, and hear "that echo that leads back to ecstasy" - a voice that is not our own. They are but moments, due to our imperfection - but they bolster us to try to prolong them within ourselves.

 Elements: needlework - minitoko; hand figure - graphics fairy.

Happy thoughts

Dear readers, I would like in this post to gallantly brush away all those little social problems that can pile up. I have been thinking about how friendship works. You know in the initial phase, if you've travelled a lot, you become hyper aware of all the miscommunication that can occur? And sometimes it does, and there comes a moment when you realise, you just have to let it run its course.
And now I will tell you a secret. Let it run its course.
We are often drawn to each other for reasons we cannot quite explain: it is not always very logical or straight forward. There is a lot about communication that is awe-some.
When we are young, our instincts towards others don't work as well as they could. We may be drawn to people for external reasons - who look a certain way or posses what we think we want. They will teach us many lessons quickly, and that can all be quite painful, but the more I look around, the more I see that given that we are not immortal, there may be more meaning and strength in that than we are prepared to admit. Living life to the hilt, being social, does not mean living carelessly, but it means taking responsibility for our lessons, and learning how to see who our friends are.
In so many ways, friendship is illogical. Like the Little Prince's rose, we aren't always the Most Representative Friend to our friends, but they like us because we are theirs! Also, our instincts, or feelings, about others help us sense what the bigger picture is of who they are, so we are not so caught up on their faults, and vice versa.
That said, as we grow as human beings, we learn to be friendly even with those we are not friends with - and this has to do with good will. We realise that life is much more beautiful if we give others the benefit of the doubt. It's a great feeling to be had when we extend this to someone else, even if they don't do the same in return, because at least we know we've tried to do the right thing.
So, if we see miscommunication develop into misunderstanding, this means that it is also being knit that way by the Other Side. Let them knit that ugly blanket if they must, they are unnecessarily complicating their own lives - but let them do it! It's their free will.
If, however, we are given the time to explain ourselves, we have a reason to be thankful. People are busy. Also, sometimes our story simply doesn't fit in another person's story, and there is nothing wrong with that. It's like sowing seeds: not all of them take, it's the law of nature, and nothing personal. Why would it be?
...If we are sociable beings - like little bees - we want to make the best possible honey, which means flying far away to other flower fields. Some of my most valuable lessons have come to me from people far away, or who are far away now, but they have so enriched my life that they are woven into my daily thoughts and experiences.
It is a beautiful life. It is also a short one. We are here to make as much beauty as we can. There is no need to be afraid or sad, just attentive and studious - and joyful. To face the world with a smile is to watch so many problems disperse of their own accord. May we always be filled with love and hope.
You may choose to listen to this, by way of soundtrack!

Elements: flower fram: maybemej; buttons: minitoko;

velvet corners, paper: pugly pixel.

Acting Our Age

As I move forwards, I am trying to embrace certain aspects of my personality. I have given much thought to some of my seniors, some of whom are now dearly departed, that I have deep respect for. One of the most influential people in my life was Maggie Root. I debated whether to write her name on this blog given my penchant for anonymity, but I think that everyone should have the pleasure to know her. She had been an actress on Broadway, where she'd met her husband, John, a wonderful man and esteemed set designer. They lived in a house which he'd designed and built part of; it had a balcony from the second floor beginning just at the end of the stone-walled living room, which had, what was to me as a child, a sky-high ceiling.
I remember the hours I spent in that living room, reading books Maggie would give me to read - everything from Are You There God, It's Me, Margaret, to volumes of hand-pressed poems, written by her friends. Those poems were character shaping for me, in that they were very simple poems about lessons taken from life, and often accompanied by child-like drawings.
I miss Maggie so much. She was my only refuge from a boarding school that I didn't understand and that didn't understand me, and I remember staying with her one weekend as she was getting on in years, and her marvelling at how patient I was with her in the supermarket, and me marvelling at how graciously she went about such a quotidian activity.
Her family made a bookmark in her memory when she passed, with a collection of phrases she often said, such as "I have a passion for oatmeal!" and "Say YES to life!" She would often exclaim, "Marvelous!" and would tell children, quoting Pablo Cassals, "You are a marvel." When she received good news or a visit from a loved one, she would say, "I am up borne."
She was full of love, for life and for all people. One of her favourite verses was the second to last in E.B. White's Queen Bee.
I found her to be a very wise woman, and feel blessed to say that I have known several people in my life who I would call role models. But what I wish to focus on here is the child like capacity to marvel at life. One of the lasting lessons I have taken from The Little Prince is that if one loses this ability, one becomes quite blind and useless, even though one may think they are "important".
But I would say that maintaining this youthfulness takes conscious work later in life, and now I understand my presentiment as a child that the young can be wiser than adults. Social pressure and worries can change a person. Of course, this isn't a problem for the childish, which is a whole other jar of beans.
In recent times, I have come across two blog posts that have meant something to me on this account: Grace at d*s in her revelry of origami wall paper (the smallest details), and a most inspiring interview with Victoria Smith. Who wishes, like me, to "rise and soar and take the blue"?

Elements: sequins, cabochons, glitter: pugly pixel;

frame: fuzzimo; paper: the pretty blog;

retro meal: velma's.

the gift of time

This post was inspired by the Lula Louise free printable 2012 calendars - there is a beautifully designed series of three to choose from, and my close friends will be recipients of them, as I cannot think of a nicer New Year's gift! Last year, I had oodles of fun with the Lula Louise Sketch-It Calendar, which I filled in with collage. (As a side note, Lula Louise became one of my favourite blogs with this reversible tote pattern.)
But the topic of this post is time, and my musing has to do with the fact that I am feeling immense stress at this time trying to juggle my work obligations with socialising.
Connected to this are two problems:
(1) learning to take it easy (it can be hard to find the balance between accomplishing proper work, and yet doing so gracefully; hard to adapt the Chinese adage do more by doing less)
and (2) prioritising.
Time must be set aside for friends. I have written before about how my favourite scientist, J.C. Maxwell, found time to visit his ailing neighbours, while he was decoding the secrets of electromagnetism.  Maxwell had so much greater a mind than mine, this is why he can help me find my way.
When he visited his neighbours, as his mind unravelled - away from all his experiments - he would often come up with great ideas. He would detain his friends in the hall, chatting, unaware of the fact that he was holding open a door, and letting all the cold in, for which he would be scolded by the lady of the house (an anecdote committed to posterity in one of his poems). He just focused on getting on with good work, and being mindful and caring to those around him, like writing letters to his wife every day he was absent marking exams, rich with theological observations.
Today, I read the following advice: Attempt to let go of expectations and learn to share yourself with the world and the people who love you - leave the haters behind you. 
Time is a gift, we should impose no expectations on it.
It is a gift we are given, and like craftsmen, we have a choice of how we use it. When things look gloomy, we can use our imagination to shape it up - like what we do to an art project when we invent creative solutions to cover up our mistakes (and usually something better emerges). When things look gloomy, we can also remember our goals in life, like to not fall into the Wonderland-holes of negativity, but to magnify that which is wonderful - to share, and to bask in the gifts that other share, like this nifty calendar of Beth's.

Elements: calendars: Lula Louise;

glitter circle, stripy paper and bows: pugly pixel.

Much Love Monday

Greetings, friends! This past week, I finished that scarf I started a while ago, and - heh heh - while I knit a scarf with no gaping mistakes, it did not turn out the way it should have! ...because I knit stitched wrong. So I began to think about mistakes, and thought about all the other frustrating mistakes that can occur (like forgetting not to allow oneself to be belittled by the undeserving).
While it is true that sometimes it is great to have a reality check and account for one's mistakes, sometimes these mistakes are not ours to begin with. And, what is a mistake? Isn't it a natural part of learning? In Celtic languages, the word is loosely connected to "forgetting". So, I propose that mistakes are what happen until we remember how to do something the right way.
And today's post will be about remembering. I love remembering to look for the bright side - because there is sunlight even in the darkest hour, making it's way towards us from the other side; remembering that it's all right to keep getting it wrong if one is trying with a hopeful heart; remembering that all annoyances will just get brushed aside, as if they never existed.
Holidays are particularly a time of remembrance, and perhaps because of the waves of nostalgia or memories that can knock on all of our doors, I have become mindful of the little things I can do for others. I'm not in a position to do much, but smiles, ear-lending, and the attempted joke-in-passing, have always been free. Such little things can even keep one's from one's own sadness in difficult moments.
In the end, all we have is what we have done for others - and by that, I don't mean that zealous, proud giving. What we have is the hope that we will be remembered in someone else's heart, and this is true for all of us, no matter who we are. While it is true that sometimes one's gifts are stomped on, it is important to remember that one was giving because they felt it was the right thing for them to do, and that how the gift is received is sometimes not even a relevant part of the equation.
Well, aren't I the philosopher, all words and limited paycheck. This is probably why I prefer to focus on the small things. And you can see the small things in the photo below: the pom poms I wove into the ends of my scarf.
Small things, anyway, can sometimes be the biggest. So for today's Much Love Monday, I love remembering to pay attention to the small things we can do to make life more special.

Elements: photo frame, shipping tag, dot circle: pugly pixel;

lace butterfly brush: surfing ant;  staples: shabby princess;

magazine in background: Marie Claire Idées.