‘[Ideas and poetry] come out of an elite experience, the experience of people particularly gifted whose ears are open to the songs of the universe.’*
(Joseph Campbell)
“With sloth, you will live a longer, happier, and more rewarding life by removing the nagging tug of passion, creativity, and individual desire. … Comfort is much more important than any social achievement or social contract.”**
(Wendy Wasserstein)
Mythologist Joseph Campbell speaks of an elite experience but I believe this to be our choice not the privilege of some.
Playwright Wendy Wasserstein, parodied the self-help genre when she wrote a guide to non-committal inertia.
There remains, however, something tugging at us, a pull from beyond us. It comes to us every day, reminding us that when it comes to bringing our art of hoping, imagining and creating as our contribution or gift to others, it is still our turn.
(*Joseph Campbell from Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers’ The Power of Myth.)
(**Wendy Wasserstein, quoted in Patrick Dodson’s Psychotic Inertia.)
Other resources to connect to today’s theme include It’s Your Turn – a wonderful, illustrated encouragement of a book from Seth Godin. His thesis Stop Stealing Dreams explores what education can look like towards this. Ken Robinson’s TEDtalk on education is an entertaining uncovering how education lets us down; his books The Element and Finding Your Element are serious guides to identifying individuality. Elle Luna’s essay The Crossroads of Should and Must takes a look at look at some of the things that get in the way; it is also available in a longer form as a book.
THIN|SILENCE 