Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Thoughts on the word 'constancy'

Another 'daily writing task' wherein I attempt to allow the words to flow through me - whatever comes (that is, no changes or corrections; my 'stream of writing' consciousness typed.):
'Life is a bit like being a forest. When one is in the forest it is hard to see any sort of shape or pattern; a beginning or an end. Things happen,things change. We don't necessarily know why that is so or when things will change again. It is only when we get to walk out of the forest - to take time to pause and think - that we begin to see what it was all about. There was a flow to events; change happened to us as naturally as the river bends and twists as it goes along. Life rarely runs in a straight line. There is little constancy.
Yet, in an uncertain and dynamic landscape such as encountered on Earth we can crave constancy. We want a continuity and commitment to love. We strive to feel safe; loved. We seek devotion; commitment;  a constancy of purpose in both ourselves and those around us.
For those people who are passionate about achieving their goals, no matter how difficult they may be, there is a certain level of constancy required. It's truly a fine line between being obsessively compulsively driven (disordered?) and being passionately driven to achieving a goal. How does a person get their movie made, become a top tennis player, write and publish a novel, build a house, transform a life, transform someone else's life without some constancy of purpose; without being driven to succeed?
I think you may have to dream it first. I think you have conjure up what you want and in doing so those positive mental images will aid you to make something happen. Somehow, we have to have the drive and courage to take it out of the realm of daydream and turn it into reality.
Life wasn't meant to be easy. So said Malcolm Fraser, a statement for which he is still famous. Life needs to be balanced of course but there must be purpose. We have to prove ourselves to ourselves. There must be challenge and there must be constancy of purpose. Life doesn't stay the same but some things must.'

2 comments:

  1. An expectation of challenge, and the desire to meet and overcome that challenge, are I believe in everyone's DNA. If one considers Darwinist theory then it's plain that this must be inherent in almost all sentient living beings to a significant degree; those that were not motivated to meet and overcome challenge would be more likely to succumb before they could pass on their DNA through mating, therefore over time this trait must pervade more and more of the gene pool. Kahlil Gibran refers to this in his work "The Prophet" as "life's longing for itself" - the force within all of us that strives to ensure that life continues after us.

    When one boils it all down, I believe that we are inherently motivated to make something of our lives in order to satisfy that longing. This must ultimately be the most common, most powerful motivating factor in all sentient life and is the constancy that you allude to. In ancient times the challenges to day-to-day life were immediate and pressing - food, shelter and the opportunity to bond and mate. These days where many of the basics are easier to come by, we seek higher goals on Maslow's triangle. How this desire manifests itself is based on our personal value system but in the end we all crave success in a way that has meaning to us. We cannot help but desire it and we can only recognise it as worthwhile if there has been hard work expended in acheiving it. In some primordial way, we are all just little wriggling creatures swimming constantly upstream.

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  2. Rollymo: The thing with 'stream of consciousness' writing is that it can be hard to remember from where the idea originated. I think I was thinking about how there is such constant change in relationships and in life but that if there isn't a level of constancy it is all one long 'Days of our Lives' drama. And, I think I was thinking about regularity in life - that life often flows better when patterns and order are laid down; that, probably the more routines we establish the more we can produce/get done/achieve.

    I do think that we are programmed to care what we leave behind for the next generation - be that children or something else - and I do think that we all crave success in one way or another.But I also think that so many of us don't get around to actually doing things we'd like to do and that commitment to success of whatever kind needs to be acted upon. That's the hard part for many people.

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