hesitant...will you be my colorman?
this post comes to you absolutely colorless, as my pinks and purples have been critiqued as abrasive to your eyes, as if a simple glance at them might induce yellowed and puss-ly sores upon your eyeballs. gross. plus, i don't really have the emotional energy to post colorfully; black requires much less effort and i'm not sure i'm capable of more than it for tonight.
that said, i'm not even sure what i want to write about here. i titled my entry 'hesitant' for some reason yet unbeknownst to me. and so i will start with a description of the past few hours of my life: alone in my room, i ate my roommates lunch for tomorrow (dammit) and had to cook her more, but i burned the rice and my kitchen filled with smoke. where is my head? i spilled water on the floor. i've been researching grad programs and seminaries and the like. basically, my internship is over and it didn't turn into the job we all hoped it would. and so my existence is amorphous right now, lending itself to plenty of contemplation. too much contemplation, in fact. i'm hard on myself, especially when left to my own devices. i resonate with what my friend kris said earlier, 'i am my own worst enemy.' and Christianity is the only religion that offers relief from self, i say. which leads me to my 'currently reading,' which has been my sustainance of late: st. teresa of avila's 'the interior castle.' a summary of thoughts thus far, in various fonts for aesthetic enhancement since color is absent from this evening's menu.
st. teresa's definition of 'the interior castle':
'it is that we consider our soul to be like a castle made entirely out of a diamond or of very clear crystal, in which there are many rooms, just as in heaven there are many dwelling places. for in reflecting upon it carefully, sisters, we realize that the soul of the just person is nothing else but a paradise where the lord says he finds his delight.' (from the chapter on 'the first dwelling place')
the basic premise of the book:
...on moving inward toward the center of our souls, where the fullness of god resides. there are seven 'dwelling places' which we move through non-linearly, cyclically, holistically. and this journey inward is the process of sanctification. in the first chapter, teresa makes an argument against the 'anthropomorphic concept of sanctity,' against sanctity as 'primarily a moral concept' and instead argues for sanctity as 'an ontological reality' which becomes those of us who are in Christ. the ontological reality leads to moral purity, but moral purity is secondary. primary is a discharging the static of self until our consciousness is largely neutralized toward self and instead is charged with the presence and goodness of Christ (credit to my physics degree for all scientific analogies). see below for more on 'self':
the first dwelling place in the castle of the soul is self-awareness. , notes on the pitfalls of becoming self-aware, namely that in our introspection we become anthropomorphic and then turn to self-deprecation, in the midst of which we lose our sense of the blessed ontological reality that our souls are god's paradise :
'if we are always fixed on our earthly misery, the stream will never flow free from the mud of fears, faintheartedness, and cowardice. ...oh, god help me, daughters, how many souls must have been made to suffer great loss in this way by the devil! ...the fears of not understanding ourselves completely distort self-knowledge; and i'm not surprised if we never get free from ourselves, for this lack of freedom from ourselves, and even more, is what can be feared. so i say, daughters, that we should set our eyes on Christ, our Good, and on his saints. there we shall learn true humility, the intellect will be enhanced, as i have said, and self-knowledge will not make one base and cowardly. even though [self-knowledge] is the first dwelling place, it is very rich and so precious that if the soul slips away from the vermin within [that dwelling place], nothing will be left to do but advance.'
and to end, i return to my hesitance. i'm twenty-two and daunted by the great bit world i'm encountering post-college. i wonder what the play-by-play a colorman might be telling would sound like. when i'm my own colorman, i'm just plain hard on myself. and so i learn to worry less about myself, to find ways to distract myself from me, to savor the words of those who know me who are my colormen and give a play-by-play that is a far more objective and/or gracious toward me than is my own analysis of the situation. and then i remember, my soul is a paradise.... yours too, friends. yours too.
that said, i'm not even sure what i want to write about here. i titled my entry 'hesitant' for some reason yet unbeknownst to me. and so i will start with a description of the past few hours of my life: alone in my room, i ate my roommates lunch for tomorrow (dammit) and had to cook her more, but i burned the rice and my kitchen filled with smoke. where is my head? i spilled water on the floor. i've been researching grad programs and seminaries and the like. basically, my internship is over and it didn't turn into the job we all hoped it would. and so my existence is amorphous right now, lending itself to plenty of contemplation. too much contemplation, in fact. i'm hard on myself, especially when left to my own devices. i resonate with what my friend kris said earlier, 'i am my own worst enemy.' and Christianity is the only religion that offers relief from self, i say. which leads me to my 'currently reading,' which has been my sustainance of late: st. teresa of avila's 'the interior castle.' a summary of thoughts thus far, in various fonts for aesthetic enhancement since color is absent from this evening's menu.
st. teresa's definition of 'the interior castle':
'it is that we consider our soul to be like a castle made entirely out of a diamond or of very clear crystal, in which there are many rooms, just as in heaven there are many dwelling places. for in reflecting upon it carefully, sisters, we realize that the soul of the just person is nothing else but a paradise where the lord says he finds his delight.' (from the chapter on 'the first dwelling place')
the basic premise of the book:
...on moving inward toward the center of our souls, where the fullness of god resides. there are seven 'dwelling places' which we move through non-linearly, cyclically, holistically. and this journey inward is the process of sanctification. in the first chapter, teresa makes an argument against the 'anthropomorphic concept of sanctity,' against sanctity as 'primarily a moral concept' and instead argues for sanctity as 'an ontological reality' which becomes those of us who are in Christ. the ontological reality leads to moral purity, but moral purity is secondary. primary is a discharging the static of self until our consciousness is largely neutralized toward self and instead is charged with the presence and goodness of Christ (credit to my physics degree for all scientific analogies). see below for more on 'self':
the first dwelling place in the castle of the soul is self-awareness. , notes on the pitfalls of becoming self-aware, namely that in our introspection we become anthropomorphic and then turn to self-deprecation, in the midst of which we lose our sense of the blessed ontological reality that our souls are god's paradise :
'if we are always fixed on our earthly misery, the stream will never flow free from the mud of fears, faintheartedness, and cowardice. ...oh, god help me, daughters, how many souls must have been made to suffer great loss in this way by the devil! ...the fears of not understanding ourselves completely distort self-knowledge; and i'm not surprised if we never get free from ourselves, for this lack of freedom from ourselves, and even more, is what can be feared. so i say, daughters, that we should set our eyes on Christ, our Good, and on his saints. there we shall learn true humility, the intellect will be enhanced, as i have said, and self-knowledge will not make one base and cowardly. even though [self-knowledge] is the first dwelling place, it is very rich and so precious that if the soul slips away from the vermin within [that dwelling place], nothing will be left to do but advance.'
and to end, i return to my hesitance. i'm twenty-two and daunted by the great bit world i'm encountering post-college. i wonder what the play-by-play a colorman might be telling would sound like. when i'm my own colorman, i'm just plain hard on myself. and so i learn to worry less about myself, to find ways to distract myself from me, to savor the words of those who know me who are my colormen and give a play-by-play that is a far more objective and/or gracious toward me than is my own analysis of the situation. and then i remember, my soul is a paradise.... yours too, friends. yours too.
1 Comments:
i would like to wager that you do know why you named it hesitant. i need a box here. what is the definition of a colorman?
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