Self-to-self
“To accept that there can be no happiness without despair is to recognize that, rather than a malady of the spirit, despair is the rudder course-correcting the ship of the self, steering it from the actual to the ideal.”
And so, I lean into this experience of despair. After a period of intensified hope, or at least bubbling imaginations and recognition of longings, this is the moment to surrender to its counterpart. I am not particularly fond of this phase of emotional waves, to be or not be anchored in some sort of development. My body aches and is tired, my mind is heavy and angered, loss is in every limb. At the same time, the heaviness is bringing me back to my body. It’s demanding my total attention, and even though this is what is challenging amidst everyday duties, it is not to be denied. It can’t, reality wanting to birth itself will break my resistance by any emotional means, I know. I know birth, and I know birthing.
Kierkegaard writes:
“The self is a relation which relates to itself… A human being is a synthesis of the infinite and the finite, of the temporal and the eternal, of freedom and necessity… A synthesis is a relation between two terms. Looked at in this way a human being is not yet a self.
[…]
Despair is the imbalance in a relation of synthesis, in a relation which relates to itself.”
As I grew up learning to suppress certain powers, and my voice, not seldom a strong one, got partially dimmed, some vital aspects of my relationship to my-self sunk into the unknown, the unreachable. Or did not yet develop into what they could, or even should (do I dare?), be. The last few years, the external circumstances of my life have changed quite intensely. There is nowhere to hide anymore; without those vital aspects, my-self mourns enormously. In the at times suffocating but also determined walls of a home that I finally call my home, my-self demands a relationship. With me. Here and now, utterly intimate, with no other intention than to be who I am at this moment.
Kierkegaard again:
“This then is the formula which describes the state of the self when despair is completely eradicated: in relating to itself and in wanting to be itself, the self is grounded transparently in the power that established it.”
Life's energy roaring through my veins fuels a new kind of discernment. A blooming ‘third factor’ Dabrowski might have called it. While so many old conditionings pop up in my doings as a friend, mother, partner, entrepreneur and creator, something must give. And this something is what is left of me when I leave aside all hasty motions and quickened thought patterns once needed to assure attachment. It must give into authenticity, but not without seeing the tough structure of egoic and learned tendencies. Or the uncontrolled emotional peaks challenging loved ones to be ever more present.
Once I do give into authenticity an undemanding hope is everywhere, convincingly pointing the way, stating that I should repeatedly breathe life into what is worth despairing for - determined without hesitancy or anxious haste.
I like to lay down on the floor, imagining and feeling the earth responding with strength and presence, particularly when grieving. What a mentor. Although, mind us, so much more than that.