Tags
Related Posts
Share This
Forgetting to Remember That I Forget
Do you find yourself forgetting? I have forgotten all sorts of things like my wallet, birthdays, keys, and the like. Yet the amnesia of self – when I forget who I have promised to be is the kind of forgetting that has cost me family, friends and community! I have lived by habit while others have mistakenly thought I was living by design. In those times I can say that life for me was lost in being compliant, avoiding conflict and seeking relief from something, even when I have been accepted as a valuable member of family, team, or community.
“We have all read in scientific books, and indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstasy only means that for one awful instant we remember that we forget.” —G. K. Chesterton
I believe one of the signs of our forgetting is our need to “find” ourselves. A quest that presupposes that we know the self for which we are searching! But, what if what Chesterton says is true? That we cannot know ourselves because we are more than what we appear to be?
More than my judgments can capture about me.
In times of loss and failure we find ourselves searching for justification or some kind of relief from the fire of being wrong, losing anything or being ineffective.
However, we can remember that we do forget we are more than our successes and accomplishment, things we have failed at, forgotten to do, or never dared. While there is no capturing who we are, the spirit of freedom, the ecstasy of being together and the art that emerges from the journey is what pierces our amnesia and opens a view of who we can become.
Fantastic insight and so hopeful … to be beyond what I do, I have or what people say about me … where do I find that???
I have been thinking about this subject matter these last months, within the context of Making an Idol of My Self Image, yet with a couple of twists
What happens when you think you KNOW yourself. No, that is not quite it, as anyone who has a degree of self-awareness KNOWS that he doesn’t and can’t fully know his Self. What happens when you forget that you both know and do NOT know your Self: when that part of you that you have some knowledge about is not held with the awareness that there is much that you have forgotten and, THEREFORE, what you DO know should be held lightly, cautiously, even skeptically?
Metaphor: I am like 100 acres of land, with 10 of those acres being a forest with a stream in it. I know this, see it, experience the reality of its coolness and beauty. But if I allow myself to think that the forest is what/who I am, all that I am–well, what if the other 90 acres are swamp land, or diamond mines, or a desert (with its own peculiar beauty)?
What I do NOT see–what I have amnesia for–totally changes the panorama of who I am. At best, all I can say is, Hey, I’ve got some trees and water … who knows what else … yet.
ALSO
What happens when you confuse the Model for who you wish to be/become with who you ARE in all your mysteriousness?
This is a tad off subject but:
What happens when you confuse the standards by which you wish to live, with the reality of how you are behaving?
OR
What happens when you confuse the roles you choose to play (the armor that you put on in a particular context of life) with who you are?
ANYWAY
What happens, other than the creation of an idol, is that you
begin thinking, feeling, behaving as if you REMEMBER what you have forgotten. It is the awareness of my amnesia that keeps me humble, open to all possibilities, flexible.
Just some thoughts rambling around my head full of mush.
Boy, did you all get me going in my inner being! I have so many magnificant thoughts of light and darkness about mankind’s amnesia.
American Heritage Dictionary – Cite This Source – Share This e·piph·a·ny (ĭ-pĭf’ə-nē) Pronunciation Key
n. pl. e·piph·a·nies
Epiphany
A Christian feast celebrating the manifestation of the divine nature of Jesus to the Gentiles as represented by the Magi.
January 6, on which this feast is traditionally observed.
A sudden manifestation of the essence or meaning of something.
A comprehension or perception of reality by means of a sudden intuitive realization: “I experienced an epiphany, a spiritual flash that would change the way I viewed myself” (Frank Maier).
A revelatory manifestation of a divine being.
A sudden manifestation of the essence or meaning of something.
A comprehension or perception of reality by means of a sudden intuitive realization: “I experienced an epiphany, a spiritual flash that would change the way I viewed myself” (Frank Maier).
Sometimes we call this phenomonum a miracle, luck, twist of fate, destiny, “in the cards”, “sucks to be you, “and the list goes on.
My favorite expressions are “God-cards” and “satan-cards.” God plays them when, where, and why he pleases. His cards pierce my amnesia of self on a regular basis. Satan plays his cards after he gets permission from God. Both sets of cards serve me well to pierce the darkness of my self deception.
Forty-seven years ago I was sexually abused at the age of 10. That betrayal turned into an insanity of darkness for me. Satan played quite the card!
This insanity of darkness, an epiphany not from God, has turned out to be the most incredible gift I could have ever received. It drove me to dig deep and use all my intellect and spirit to seek for a new meaning in life. My 10 year old “raison d’etre” was violently broken into a thousand pieces.
This inner seeking opened my mind up to the seen and unseen world in uncanny ways at a very early age. After 7 years in this seeking posture, I found myself as a senior in high school hours away from committing suicide.
In this state of being, seeking and ready to end my life, God invaded my life, and I got it. He played a card that I had eyes to see and ears to hear at the time because of this posture of inner seeking that the insanity of darkness drove me to assume as a child.
It was a Sunday night in church; God violently invaded my space totally uninvited and unanticipated on my part. Nonetheless, my being like Christ started that night. This new being has been part of my seeking posture and the insanity of darkness ever since. What a ride its been!
So, for me, my vote is for the epiphanies from darkness and the epiphanies from light being two of the most powerful means to break through my personal amnesia and our collective amnesia.