Monday, August 18, 2008

a fairly recent project initiative.. the 'nutshell' version:

{What if we’re not meant to live with only what we’ve got? What if we’re meant to take part in others’ lives in such a way that we let parts of them seep into us. Permeate us enough, so that we get to live by a mesh of experiences, their and ours. Wouldn’t this then equip us to face the world with a little more than we had on our own when we first began? Obvious Tobin, that’s quite obvious.. I know. But I think I’m just re-epiphanizing (I realize this isn’t a word, but I think it needs to be) to myself and to my blog that we were never meant to go this alone. This whole thing this whole process this whole challenge of keeping-on, of pressing forward, of changing things in our path for the better or at least trying to, this whole thing of trying to survive in a place that sometimes seems un-survivable.. all of it, we were just never meant to do it as one against all. Things just get so clouded that it can sometimes look that way.
So at the risk of oversimplifying, would I be selling this thought short? to say that sometimes- asking someone how their day was (and really listening for the answer) could actually change the way we live…}


So blog: I think I’m embarking on a project. i’ve realized that there is too much that people have inside them that never gets let out to be shared. Much of this realization stems from the fact that I understand all too well what it means to have thoughts that go unsaid and ideas that go un-acted upon. So I wondered- if I, just one young person, have so much to give that has yet to be given, then so must everyone else, and probably to an even greater degree! Particularly those who have lived much longer and fuller lives than myself..
So in short, I’ve decided it’s necessary for me to begin writing letters to a variety of individuals, basically prompting them to let out whatever it is they feel they have to say, whatever it is they feel needs to be heard by others before their time on earth should end.
I guess an inherent challenge in my prompt could be this: that many people don’t even know they have something of sparkling value to offer to the world. Don’t know they have something brilliantly unique, be it complex or simple, that needs to be heard.
BUT! It's only logical that if you validate someone (mind you, it must be genuine and not contrived brown-nosing) in their hidden wisdom, it’s more likely that you’ll extract some of it than if you left it up to them alone- i feel the majority of people don't even know that they have things to share and ways of voicing those things like nobody else is capable of. That may sound confusing. But I’ll step out on this limb to say that I’ve felt before like I had something valuable to say, but didn’t. didn’t because I either thought nobody would care or because I myself didn’t care. If someone had been there to prompt me, to nudge me, to kick me in the ass in encouragement then maybe I would have been more willing to open my mouth. Now I don’t think I’ve missed any life altering experiences because of reluctance like this, BUT.. just think- there must have been a devastating amount of lives that have indeed ended on unsaid wisdoms. Unshared perspectives. Unexpressed beauty..
The unheard magic of those individuals is about as tragic as tragic gets.
So I thought well ya know maybe I could do something with a few people sort of as an experiment ya know… just throw something out there, lay the groundwork for someone to bring into the light that which may be standing on the sidelines of their life. I do not believe that I am someone with any sort of prestige, but I think that is irrelevant in this particular venture. I hope to serve simply as a commissioner in this..
Well, I think I’m viewing this little endeavor of mine as small battle in the war against that stifling of humanity that we impose on ourselves and others. This would be the same war that serves to defend the truth of creation, the fact that each individual exists for a purpose having to do with much more than his or herself.

Uncle Will once told me that I need to be interviewed. I said, “I think I’ll have to establish myself as a ‘somebody’ first before anyone would want to interview me.”
“No,” he said, “you just need to find someone who will ask you all the right questions. You find someone who knows what to ask, and it’ll prove you’re someone worth interviewing.”

---well I suppose I am just setting out to be the person who asks the right questions, with hopes of drawing out wisdom offerings, perspectives and words, the life beauty that is another from me, because the truth is, everybody is worth interviewing.




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