reality

Yesterday I collided with two deep forms of reality (amongst the swooshings of everything around me). Firstly, I felt lost. Writing this down in the middle of the day made me somewhat comically feel immediately found. Secondly I wanted to rest, but it was not the moment to rest. This did not have quite the same impact but it softened the fretfulness that I was experiencing between my longing to collapse and not being able to.

Earlier this summer I found myself staring at two stark truths; unavoidable and uncontrollable they were. Two things I long for but cannot simply procure.

There is something about deep reality (I make a distinction between that and the confusions of everyday life, a kind of reality of their own, but often too entangled with delusions to easily pick out the truth from the fictions) which is mysteriously comforting, even when unwelcome. It is freeing in a certain kind of sense because it will not suffer manipulation and is immune to control-strategies.

I am not sure exactly what I am doing with this insight, but in a way I somehow stay close to it, and it is strengthening me for the demands of the moment.

summit day

I am so close to the summit now that I see it all the time, it’s not a glimpse anymore.

I’m working with each step towards something immense. It is my destiny.

Last night I messaged my friends for support. Today I feel it and the extra measure of power, love and reassurance I need for being brave.

I let go of some last things that needed to be left behind. Towards a summit you must not carry anything unnecessary, as you are weaker and energy reserves are depleted. No personal idols can be taken to the summit, nor any false responsibilities nor undue lament.

There are a few final practical things to be done. I will do them steadily, trying to make sure to prioritise them correctly, although my mind is affected by the thin air and intensity.

Thank you for what your own silent watching has meant to this moment.

a glimpse of the summit – discipline

I’ve glimpsed the summit, and yet I’ve not reached the summit. This is a moment where discipline seems somewhat unwelcome, yet it is essential.

Who wants to be disciplined when one can see dreams unfolding ahead, just beyond the summit in the realms of now-a-possibility?

Yet if the energy needed for the summit completion is dispersed into illusions, then the very possibility of the summit comes under threat.

It’s a work of wonder to hold steady with focus, diligence and discipline when under the surface thrills of delight are shivering too and fro in the inner waters.

It is strange that even this bit has its own difficulties and temptations, when so much hope and joy is present. But it does. You have not reached the summit until you have reached the summit.

Yesterday: lists. Today: chores, communications, work.

a glimpse of the summit

I will make it.

I’m not there yet, I’m not nearly there, but something has arrived within me, ahead.

Certainty.

It’s hard to put the feeling of it into words, but it is deep, a plunging power of thrill, resolution, satisfaction and desire.

Yesterday evening as I wrote to a friend I recalled a theory from my research; in a moment, I could see exactly where I was, and exactly where I was about to be.

In the writing of one of my favourite mountaineers, there are sometimes climbs where this sudden advance knowledge arrives. It’s mysterious as it does not always occur. But when it does, it contains a thrill of power and hope which cannot be concocted. Even more mysteriously, sometimes it is this very power and hope which actually enable the achievement; without that vital last shot of energy, it might never have been reached.

It is also something to take care of. The thrill of certainty carries its own risk of intoxication by euphoria. The very relief can make one careless. The precious substance of conviction needs itself to be channeled into ways both focused and diligent, to enable it to fulfil its own promise.

Today: lists.

defiance

Things are getting more intense…

Sometimes it’s hard to know if the feeling of intensity are merely the effect of personal failings: Is it really circumstances that are so difficult or it is my own immature refusal to accept things as they are?

I’ve had another day of frustrations. Some things have been good but it’s wearying to find that in yet another day my places of replenishment have somehow been turbulenced and tangled.

I’m squiggling around wondering whether to give up on my beautiful hopes, if my relentless insistence on believing in the beautiful, the good, in the unfolding in certain places of something different to what has gone before, is itself the problem.

Or am I squiggling with that or just with the part of myself that is severely reluctant and unable to be dissolved by chaos? It is so utterly astonishing to me what people talk themselves into settling for.

Or am I meant to surrender? An act of humility?

The things is this: I am not seemingly called to make up abstract theories and self-hypnotising stories about why this or that has not happened, will never happen. I’m called to persevere into things that have not been seen before. And that in this world, things are needed that no-one has seen before. Or perhaps things that have been seen before, but that need to be resurrected for the current age.

I’m getting nearer to a point of breakthrough, a rip in the fabric of existence (my own at least, and since my life is part of existence, I call it ‘existence’ plain and simple). This, I’m afraid to say, almost always coincides with situations becoming more impossible. Why is this? I don’t know, but I’ve seen it before. In such circumstances, persistence in itself becomes miraculous long before whatever is being sought arrives.

A note to myself: don’t fall into self-pity. This bit is always rife with traps. Your lovely friends let you down; they didn’t realise that they were being sucked into the maelström that precedes the new. Forgive, forgive, forgive, keep going.

Something stronger, somehow than perseverance: Defiance. Dis-trust of the visible in the pursuit of the unseen. Not relying on that in which security is commonly sought.

Believing in another reality, trusting that, letting it take the weight of risk, believing.

A week to go until the daring act. Stay with it; focus.

These are the things I tell myself.