![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
add your stone to the pile...
Nov. 21st, 2007 07:56 am"I am grateful for what I am and have. My thanksgiving is perpetual. It is surprising how contended one can be with nothing definite - only a sense of existence."
- Thoreau, in a letter to a friend in December, 1856.
In 2004, I visited Dale![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bikerbaer and Les nashobabear in Massachusetts for Thanksgiving. I had just finished the rough draft of House of Wolves - and in visiting the original house site of Thoreau on Walden Pond - I left a stone from my home in Boise on the pile at his house site. It is a writer's tradition that when you have an unpublished manuscript (be it a script, a novel, or book of prose) - you should visit Walden Pond and add your stone to the pile.
Just before waking this morning - my subconscious mind had taken me back there - right where this picture was taken - - looking south towards Walden Pond, and the rounded pile of literary dreams in the making.....
Which brings us to the Thoreau quote I started off this post with... last evening before bed - I did a little net surfing and found this letter Thoreau wrote. At this point in his life - he was already diagnosed and dying from tuberculosis. So his writing had taken on a certain pleasure in enjoying each moment. I really liked his statement that his thanksgiving was perpetual. He wasn't writing about the holiday - but about how he approached each day - how he approached life.
I've learned a lot of lessons in the last year. The biggest - and probably the most obvious - is to learn to be thankful for what I have in my life - and not spend time worrying about what I "didn't get or don't have."
Now, of course, that is all easier said than done. It's hard to undo disappointments or to "be zen and let it go". there is no big "undo" button like when you are working on an spreadsheet and make amisteak mistake.
It's hard to accept sometimes that nothing in life is definite - that the best layed plans sometime wash away in a instant of springtime rain - clearing away what took days, weeks, months or even years to create.
It is a real shift - to start looking at life the way Thoreau might have - enjoying the now rather than what might come down the road. Oftentimes we spend tons of money, shopping, going out, watching movies, eating out … without really enjoying life. And when we stop to think about it, we never have time for the things we really want to do. Well, that’s probably because we can fill our life with things that aren’t very important to us - simply to give ourselves a "full life" - we have accidentally given ourselves a very unfulfilled one.
This year - I took a step back and really think about what’s important to me. I got rid of the expensive stuff, and focus on what’s important.
Listen to some stuff on my list: rekindling the relationship with my Mom and family, re-energizing my friendships, reading, writing, exercising, volunteering, spending quiet time in contemplation. When I say expensive - I'm talking just as much as expensive emotionally as much as the traditional definition of expensive - money type stuff.
If you find yourself burning emotional currency on something - it might be time to cut that from your budget. Emotional investment is best saved for the things that really return on the investment.
I've spent a fair amount of my emotional time over the years in the dollar store of gay relationships. There is something to be said to the thought that if all you spend is a buck - all you get is a buck's worth. So I've slowly retooled my life in the last year - to really reinvest in the solid friendships and family relationships in my life. I've concentrated less on being everyone's pal - everyone's buddy. (sometimes causing little explosions here and there) It was the right thing to do - because "dollar store" friends or relationships are simply not a good investment for me any longer.
When I catch myself saying "all this change and realignment is going to make my next..." - I simply stop myself. It's not about making my next ANYTHING better. It has become about making right now better. It has become making the friends, family, professional life and everything in my life RIGHT NOW - the best it can be. Tomorrow will take care of itself.
This is all easy to write about - and much harder to do on a day-to-day basis - and we all falter here and there - and splurge on something we shouldn't (it's so easy to go for the easy holiday-relationship for instance) - or catch ourselves wondering about the past too much (why am I alone at Christmas when WhatsHisFuck has a new "life partner" blahblahblah) - or wondering where all this is leading. (see a pattern here?)
All the more reason - to just add your stone to the pile - and get on with today.
That is really all we can do.
and just keep that thought close to my heart - to make sure my "thanksgiving is perpetual."
- Thoreau, in a letter to a friend in December, 1856.
In 2004, I visited Dale
bikerbaer and Les nashobabear in Massachusetts for Thanksgiving. I had just finished the rough draft of House of Wolves - and in visiting the original house site of Thoreau on Walden Pond - I left a stone from my home in Boise on the pile at his house site. It is a writer's tradition that when you have an unpublished manuscript (be it a script, a novel, or book of prose) - you should visit Walden Pond and add your stone to the pile. Just before waking this morning - my subconscious mind had taken me back there - right where this picture was taken - - looking south towards Walden Pond, and the rounded pile of literary dreams in the making.....
Which brings us to the Thoreau quote I started off this post with... last evening before bed - I did a little net surfing and found this letter Thoreau wrote. At this point in his life - he was already diagnosed and dying from tuberculosis. So his writing had taken on a certain pleasure in enjoying each moment. I really liked his statement that his thanksgiving was perpetual. He wasn't writing about the holiday - but about how he approached each day - how he approached life.
I've learned a lot of lessons in the last year. The biggest - and probably the most obvious - is to learn to be thankful for what I have in my life - and not spend time worrying about what I "didn't get or don't have."
Now, of course, that is all easier said than done. It's hard to undo disappointments or to "be zen and let it go". there is no big "undo" button like when you are working on an spreadsheet and make a
It's hard to accept sometimes that nothing in life is definite - that the best layed plans sometime wash away in a instant of springtime rain - clearing away what took days, weeks, months or even years to create.
It is a real shift - to start looking at life the way Thoreau might have - enjoying the now rather than what might come down the road. Oftentimes we spend tons of money, shopping, going out, watching movies, eating out … without really enjoying life. And when we stop to think about it, we never have time for the things we really want to do. Well, that’s probably because we can fill our life with things that aren’t very important to us - simply to give ourselves a "full life" - we have accidentally given ourselves a very unfulfilled one.
This year - I took a step back and really think about what’s important to me. I got rid of the expensive stuff, and focus on what’s important.
Listen to some stuff on my list: rekindling the relationship with my Mom and family, re-energizing my friendships, reading, writing, exercising, volunteering, spending quiet time in contemplation. When I say expensive - I'm talking just as much as expensive emotionally as much as the traditional definition of expensive - money type stuff.
If you find yourself burning emotional currency on something - it might be time to cut that from your budget. Emotional investment is best saved for the things that really return on the investment.
I've spent a fair amount of my emotional time over the years in the dollar store of gay relationships. There is something to be said to the thought that if all you spend is a buck - all you get is a buck's worth. So I've slowly retooled my life in the last year - to really reinvest in the solid friendships and family relationships in my life. I've concentrated less on being everyone's pal - everyone's buddy. (sometimes causing little explosions here and there) It was the right thing to do - because "dollar store" friends or relationships are simply not a good investment for me any longer.
When I catch myself saying "all this change and realignment is going to make my next..." - I simply stop myself. It's not about making my next ANYTHING better. It has become about making right now better. It has become making the friends, family, professional life and everything in my life RIGHT NOW - the best it can be. Tomorrow will take care of itself.
This is all easy to write about - and much harder to do on a day-to-day basis - and we all falter here and there - and splurge on something we shouldn't (it's so easy to go for the easy holiday-relationship for instance) - or catch ourselves wondering about the past too much (why am I alone at Christmas when WhatsHisFuck has a new "life partner" blahblahblah) - or wondering where all this is leading. (see a pattern here?)
All the more reason - to just add your stone to the pile - and get on with today.
That is really all we can do.
and just keep that thought close to my heart - to make sure my "thanksgiving is perpetual."
