Chrisonomicon

Thursday, October 4, 2001

Peter called last night and finally got a hold of me. We've been playing phone tag for the past two weeks. In a recent email, he had said something about needing to finish a conversation we had on Outward Bound, and that he'd be in touch, but never explained what it was. Very mysterious. But anyway, like I said, after many messages and many missed calls, he finally got a hold of me and revealed said topic right as I was getting ready for bed.

At some point on our camping trip, we were discussing his job and turns out he's a "Life Coach." What does this mean exactly? Well, he coaches people on how to take advantage of their talents, get the most out of life, and pursue their dreams. Sounds interesting, I thought, despite being a bit on the Yuppie-Motivational-Speaker side (then again, I suppose I'm more of a yuppie needing to be motivated than I'd like to admit). After articulating my interest, he indicated that he'd talk to me about it after the course is over, since he didn't want to promote his business on the trip.

I'm really looking forward to it, if not for gaining greater clarity or direction, than simply to talk about where my life's heading with an interesting individual. Peter is a really insightful guy (from what I remember of my 10 days spent with him), and it will be good to get an outside view. For our first discussion, I am to think of a few points in my life that I'd like greater clarity on. I can think of a few: work, my living situation, school, love, family, friends... damn, pretty much my entire life now that I think of it.

But as I was stuffing clean socks into my dresser this morning, I realized that everything in my life has been clearer now than ever before. I have clarity. I know where I am heading and where I want to go. I suppose what I really want now is reassurance that everything will turn out okay. And even then, I need to just slow down, forget worrying about the future, and concentrate on Now. Stop living in the future. Focus on living the current moment fully.

Perhaps my writing is holding me back in this sense. I write to keep connected to my past, and I enjoy reading about my past. I write to keep my past alive. And instead, maybe I should accept it for what it was and the effect it had on me. Move on from there. Realize that the past is not now, and that the person I am now IS what has resulted of all the nows before it. Perhaps I should be shedding the past like a shark sheds its teeth.

Speaking of sharks, I had a strange dream about 'em last night. I dreamt I was jet skiing in an ocean bay, the water turquoise and clear to the ocean floor. Among the boulders and seaweed that composed the bay, I saw large white sharks, swimming agitatedly to and fro in the water. And funniest thing, their mouths were coated in blood. Okay, so it wasn't funny at the time, but I started to panic and tried to dock the jet ski near the pier, but every direction I turned, there was a shark. They never saw me and, eventually, I woke up, but I kept fearing that they'd notice me and attack.

John wrote me a really reassuring email on fear and describes a dream he had:

I dreamt that this demon was menacing me. My first response was fear. I stood my ground with him (maybe because I realized that there was no escape) but still tried to find a way to make him go away. Then something in my mind said to embrace him. So I did. I held him and felt him flinch then relax and then dissolve away. After thinking about the dream I thought that the demon represented the demons in our lives. If we try to fight with them, they will never be conquered. This is because they know how to fight, they understand the fight. If we approach them with love, they succumb to it, just as we would. Maybe we really are princesses in dragons clothing. ( in reference to Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet" )

Are we put on this earth to fear? I think not. I believe we are put on this earth to know fear and to understand it, but at the same time, realize that there is no reason to fear anything at all. Living with fear is simply living in the future based on what has happened in the past, as John succinctly put it. By doing so, we are letting life preclude our actual living.