To quote Samuel Becket:
‘Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter: Try again. Fail again. Fail better.’
Wow. Now that is risk. Now that is owning your balls like small blocks of flats. That is truly knowing that life, if fully lived, is bursting with a cacophony of failure. Some days it may feel like it is hailing failure … for about 90 days, smashing your car, your outdoor furniture and smashing the fuck out of you should you dare to get out there amongst it.
It is time I grew a ball and got out there amongst it.
Today Kat talked about how when she was a little girl she had wanted to win a date with a particular actor in a competition, but was so nervous about the entry that she never actually put one in. But then she convinced herself that someone must have magically put one in for her and was still stunned when she discovered that she did not win the prize!
This has been me in life and love on too many levels to count. I’ve definitely has some delusional ideas about the ‘right’ ‘natural’ ways to meet a partner. That I should meet him in my every day life. That I should not have to do anything special about it. And when I questioned this and for the first time, joined an internet dating site and was contacted by about 20 men in two weeks, I had a complete freak out, dismissing them almost faster than I could read their profiles. I was terrified that getting back out there, actually meant getting back out there. This would involve real interactions with real humans. God help me.
So I only agreed to communicate with one of these twenty and after our first date, I created by mammoth Peruvian bug drama, thus giving me the perfect excuse for no further contact. Convenient is one way to put this. A slippery slidey run away magician is another way to put it. 🙂 I ran so fast I’m surprised I didn’t create new fault lines between the two of us.
Kat described my life so painfully that it gave a sad little tug to my heart. In her words ‘Until you embrace failure, loss, and disappointment as part of a life well lived then you will most likely have a life that doesn’t really light you up or inspire you very much.’ BINGO! This is my life. I take few risks and have few failures but God it feels so empty. It’s like I’ve learned to treat life like a China shop. Things could break. Tread carefully. When what I want to do is put roller blades on ( NB: I have the coordination skills of a rhino on roller blades) and to fly around the shop, touching things, breaking a few here and there and maybe having to work a few hours at the shop in my spare time to pay for the damage. But either way, this is life.
It is only when I put the roller blades on that I discover that it is actually not just a china shop but an all purpose everything shop. Some things are fragile but others are incredibly sturdy and lots of stuff has padding anyway. Breaking the occasional things could just be an opportunity to become a super glue Wizard, or a glue gun Master. New party tricky for creating even more fun. It’s all about perspectives.
The thing about living life in fear that you will break something is that it is … desperately boring! It’s like watching grass grow and wanting it to do something faster or more exciting that its natural upward motion, slow and steady. But when living a full life, suddenly you see magic everywhere. You realise that you can roller blade out of the multi purpose shop where you have torn up a storm and that you can fly past a million bits and pieces of life’s quirky miracles. Fun is everywhere. For me, things like singing workshops, tantra workshops, creativity or acting classes, theatre groups, fun games nights, talking with strangers. The world is choc a block full of good humans to play with. But I don’t even see those cos I stay stuck, tip toeing around some crusty bullshit china shop (that is not even a fucking china shop but I am in a cute little safe delusion where I thing everything is a fucking china shop!) BLESS!
So, as has now become a repeated mantra by Kat, beating this message into my skull subliminally with her cute etheric 10 foot sledge hammer, over this 7 week process: You can’t find magical super swoon love when youa re tip toeing around a china shop like a dark ninja (my words, not hers! :)). You have to drag your sorry arse out of the shop and look around at life. And join it. For real. Not just pretend to join it (I am good at this!). You have to risk looking like a dickhead in order to risk failing and opening up to the true juice that life has to offer. You have to risk noticing that life is messy and people can be … odd… and that is ok! That is part of the juicy bit of life. We are all a bit odd and quirky, but still , we have to grow a ball and get out there and frolick amongst one another!
I love love and yep… looks like there is no other way around this but to learn to roller blade like a rhino through this next chapter of my sweet life. Wish me luck! Tomorrow is our last day with Kitty Kat so let’s make it a biggie!!!!!
"Calling in the One" Journal 