The nature of destiny is a force everyone must reckon with if they wish to control it. Whether this planning or goal making is taken seriously or not is almost irrelevant. It also may be illusory. Accidental deaths and mishaps and often the arrival of an unexpected child can make a mockery of plans, but we decide whether they are only detours or a derailment.
The following are two quotes from Joseph Conrad's books (yes, again!) which brings the subject of destiny into sharp focus:
It is a fact that in every man (not in every woman) there lives a lover; a lover who is called out in all his potentialities often by the most insignificant little things- as long as they come at the psychological moment: evanescent attitude, the curve of a cheek often looked at before, perhaps, but then, at the moment, charged with astonishing significance. These are great mysteries, of course, magic signs.
Pairing off is the fate of mankind, and if two beings thrown together mutually attracted, resist the necessity, fail in understanding and voluntarily stop short of the- the embrace, in the noblest meaning of the word, then they are committing a sin against life, the call of which is simple. Perhaps sacred. And the punishment of it is an invasion of complexity, a tormenting, forcibly tortuous involution of feelings, the deepest form of suffering from which indeed something significant may come at last, which may be criminal or heroic, may be madness or wisdom- or even a straight if despairing decision.
The last sentence makes me freeze up inside. In addition, I know perfectly well why I feel that way. The conclusion is that one would, basically, self-destruct I believe. Most people are raised by their parents to do just that- self-destruct. I was not "programmed" that way and so for me the hopeless situation is that of hanging on in quiet desperation. There really is no such thing as a hopeless situation but it can often feel that way.
I see no less than about four destinies lying before me- all manufactured by myself. Then, there is the destiny that everyone believes will become of me, in their mundane formulaic lives. Then there is the one that haunts me every now and then:
I used to take the bus downtown and into very run-down, rough neighborhoods when I was quite young. (A preteen they call it now.) I would observe the old, the very poor, the extremely old, the rowdy youths and what I thought of as freaks back then. I would imagine I was that person- each one in succession and decide how I could change this destiny I observed. How to change the course of time, fortune and attitude?? I wondered all these things and then eventually made my way back home and would settle into the comforts of me. I learned to like being in my skin but I never have shaken the idea that anyone of the destinies I saw before me could eventually be me, my life, my destiny. It has built compassion in me, fortitude that I seldom let anyone see and a strange fear that I keep warmed up so that I never forget.
Many people don't realize that destiny is always in the hands of our Creator. He holds all the plans, whether they come from Him or elsewhere, in hand, like a pack of cards but the ultimate decisions are already made by Him. He knows our deepest desires and He considers them because He made us the way we are and He didn't make us the way we are to change us. He made us the way we are to equip us for the destiny which was already set from the beginning of time. He merely wants to change our attitudes so we can deal with destiny as it happens and cope with destiny when it's done.
Hence this prayer: http://castlelady.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!F29367B89E011214!1853.entry
The following are two quotes from Joseph Conrad's books (yes, again!) which brings the subject of destiny into sharp focus:
It is a fact that in every man (not in every woman) there lives a lover; a lover who is called out in all his potentialities often by the most insignificant little things- as long as they come at the psychological moment: evanescent attitude, the curve of a cheek often looked at before, perhaps, but then, at the moment, charged with astonishing significance. These are great mysteries, of course, magic signs.
Pairing off is the fate of mankind, and if two beings thrown together mutually attracted, resist the necessity, fail in understanding and voluntarily stop short of the- the embrace, in the noblest meaning of the word, then they are committing a sin against life, the call of which is simple. Perhaps sacred. And the punishment of it is an invasion of complexity, a tormenting, forcibly tortuous involution of feelings, the deepest form of suffering from which indeed something significant may come at last, which may be criminal or heroic, may be madness or wisdom- or even a straight if despairing decision.
The last sentence makes me freeze up inside. In addition, I know perfectly well why I feel that way. The conclusion is that one would, basically, self-destruct I believe. Most people are raised by their parents to do just that- self-destruct. I was not "programmed" that way and so for me the hopeless situation is that of hanging on in quiet desperation. There really is no such thing as a hopeless situation but it can often feel that way.
I see no less than about four destinies lying before me- all manufactured by myself. Then, there is the destiny that everyone believes will become of me, in their mundane formulaic lives. Then there is the one that haunts me every now and then:
I used to take the bus downtown and into very run-down, rough neighborhoods when I was quite young. (A preteen they call it now.) I would observe the old, the very poor, the extremely old, the rowdy youths and what I thought of as freaks back then. I would imagine I was that person- each one in succession and decide how I could change this destiny I observed. How to change the course of time, fortune and attitude?? I wondered all these things and then eventually made my way back home and would settle into the comforts of me. I learned to like being in my skin but I never have shaken the idea that anyone of the destinies I saw before me could eventually be me, my life, my destiny. It has built compassion in me, fortitude that I seldom let anyone see and a strange fear that I keep warmed up so that I never forget.
Many people don't realize that destiny is always in the hands of our Creator. He holds all the plans, whether they come from Him or elsewhere, in hand, like a pack of cards but the ultimate decisions are already made by Him. He knows our deepest desires and He considers them because He made us the way we are and He didn't make us the way we are to change us. He made us the way we are to equip us for the destiny which was already set from the beginning of time. He merely wants to change our attitudes so we can deal with destiny as it happens and cope with destiny when it's done.
Hence this prayer: http://castlelady.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!F29367B89E011214!1853.entry
The Castle Lady, sending you off
with hugs and kisses!
a dying chase
led down a corridor
of ultimate choices
a maze of subjugating magnitude
should I return?
and was there ever a start?
wasn't there a time
when the word "choice"
had no meaning?
destiny is the journey toward origin.
- from Seasons of the Heart by Evelyn M. Wallace
Copyright 1988 Saxifrage Books
available from http://www.jeanniemay.com/seasons.html
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