This week has been another busy one. Life moves quickly here. I've spent most of my days being diplomatic. Talk of fairness and honesty and positive communication. Sometimes its hard to take my own advice. My communication as of late oscillates between platitudes and making it all better and telling people what they want to hear and arguing with people who I want things from about prices and amounts and times. How about telling people the truth that they need to hear or finding the closest thing to truth when you want what they've got and don't want to pay more than everyone else for it?
Maybe that's too much to ask. I have so many questions sometimes. Is it worth my energy to do this? Is it going to make anything any better? Is this going to be a lasting solution? Is there such a thing as a lasting solution or will I find more satisfaction looking at everything as an ongoing journey full of dilemmas and slight relative progress? The funny part is that I'm not even questioning the big picture. The big questions are out of my control: Why the street kids are hungry when I'm full. Why women work so hard and are ok with their husbands playing games on the street corners all day. Inequality, unfairness, and suffering are inherent pieces of the system. I know that I'm here to do the best I can with what I have. I pay women to make necklaces and tailors to make bags. I create and motivate dynamic, beneficial programming focused on education and self-empowerment. I can do that.
How does my personal satisfaction play into this? How can I make the choices each day that will bring maximum benefit to the myself and the group? I know that the martyr thing doesn't work. I can't bring anymore joy or happiness into the cosmic equations if I don't have those things in excess. How do I get there everyday? My basic needs are met. Lord knows I am well fed and I sleep and I read and I get to be creative and I have time to work hard and time to rest and I even get to dictating my general schedule for each day. I am not dissatisfied. Is turmoil part of the game? Do I make myself a better person when I critique and second-guess and ruminate over my choices and attitude? Does it help or hurt when I practice having difficult conversations in my head?
Some days I can address these issues. Some days I am diplomatic and level-headed and eloquent. Some days I am avoidant. I will turn away from issues that should be addressed. I let them sit and get bigger because I am unwilling to have those difficult conversations. Is the struggle not to take the easy way out unending? I know the answer to that one. I know that I should make the best decisions I know how to make each time I am presented by the choice even (especially) when it is difficult and doing the right thing requires more effort and follow-through.
I am allowed to be lazy. I am allowed to make mistakes. Am I allowed to be lazy in order to avoid potentially making mistakes when I know that's what I'm doing? Coping skills be damned. Avoidance is my dilemma.
That and I've been having this recurring dream about a wilderness park with elephants and bears in separate, large holding areas on two sides of mountains. I am walking in between. Think Jurassic Park the movie without the electric SUVs. I can see the bears on one side and the elephants on the other. They come tumbling down the mountain and stop at the fence and look at me. I am definitely avoiding that one. I've decided that I don't have to decide between elephants and bears. Longing for one is not longing for the other and it doesn't make a difference which one I'm longing for. They are two sides to the same coin that both exist at the same time. You can't see both sides at once, who wants to walk on the edge of a coin? I have to pick just for the sake of picking. Just for the sake of deciding and being decisive and not being avoidant.
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