Change can be a conscious or it can be a subconscious process. Change can also be a pleasant process, joyful even, or it can be painful.
I’ve grown up with the idea that once I reached adulthood, I would know everything there is to know, and that I would use this wisdom and knowledge I received from my childhood and teenage years, to live a fulfilling and eventful life. And that I would die, knowing that my life was well spent, and I would leave behind a legacy.
My journey to understanding and discovering the person I am, started along time ago, long before I attended my first counselling session. It was while watching the movie, And Your Name Is Jonah, that I realised that there was more to being deaf than disability. Being Gay, played havoc with social expectations of normality. Which has set up enormous conflicts for me, which remain to this day. Meeting my Mountain Man, challenged my conceptions of what it means to be a man, and showed me that men can be close and intimate with each other. In non sexual ways. From him, I learnt what it means to have a relationship with another person. That a satisfying relationship does not come from acting according to label, or holding a person to your expectations, but from being yourself. From also, allowing the other person to be themselves.
And being myself has been, and continues to be, one of the hardest things I do.
My true epiphanic moment came when I started reading the book, The Road Less Travelled, written by American psychiatrist M. Scott Peck, in the early 1990′s. I don’t know what made me choose this book. I had been eyeing it for a while, and I knew vaguely that I wanted to make some changes in my life, find myself, but simply did not how or who to ask. So, I ended up buying a copy. The book, for me, was a revelation. The Road Less Travelled made me realise that growth and learning are lifelong things. And that is its strength. It does not pretend that change is easy. It makes the point, that change requires a committment. A committment to work for change. And that committment has to be for you, which in my case, is me.
And that is fucking hard. [I'm all knotted up inside as I write this].
But still, one must try. And I do.
I am certainly an opinionated guy, and if you have followed my previous blog, i.Mephisto: i.Muse.iAmuse, you will know this. The image I portray, is an amplified version of my natural exuberance.
I enjoy writing. I find it easier to express in print, what I could not say verbally because my mind ran too fast for my mouth to spew forth its inane utterings. I enjoy the persona, Mephisto, that I have created for myself, but it has become a straitjacket. Under the guise of Mephisto, I am constantly eyeing my subjects as targets, upon which to fire. To rain fire and brimestone, and cast them down to nether regions of hell.
It certainly is fun. It allows me to create. It allows me to play with words. Bend them to suit my purposes, perhaps give them new meanings. But being Mephisto, while good for a laugh, is limiting. It is not me. Only a part of me, and I certainly do not want to be on show 24/7!
Hence the discontinuation of i.Mephisto: i.Muse.iAmuse, and a focus on this blog. To continue the process of self discovery I initiated in counselling, the reconnecting with myself, and to strengthen that bond that I have re-established with myself.
Many American psychologists recommend that book. At least the ones I went to did. I never read it. I don’t like reading ‘self-help’ books. Maybe I’ll take another look at it. Psychologists have known for a long time that children went through developmental stages, but it has only been recently discovered that adults continue to develop throughout life as well. When you think about it, it seems odd anyone ever thought adults stopped developing. But maybe that’s because it’s not so noticeable as it is with children who can seem to change from year to year. With adults it’s more like decade to decade. When I think of myself in my twenties and thirties, sometimes I just shake my head at the person I was. I’ve done a 180 on a lot of beliefs and values. Some of that was with the help of counseling but much of it was just plain growth. Again, nice post.
It’s not a self help book as such. But it’s descriptions and stories, really make you think.
I thought it was a self help book. It’s definitely worth a read.
another, similar book of the time that had a major impact on my life was “Passages” by Gail Sheehy. I read that book after I had just turned 30 years old and it was an epiphany and literally a turning point in my life. I realized that I had a limited number of years (hopefully a lot of them, but no guarantees) to live, the clock was counting down, and there were things that I hoped to accomplish and experience. Your life is a book that you write yourself. It was such an empowering, powerful and scary time. Since then, I’ve re-invented myself several more times.
no, it wasn’t always easy. I was broke and poor for years on end, but challenge and adversity are blessings in disguise. They make me appreciate what I have, and continue to set goals every year, including fun ones. Good luck on your journey. Keep writing!