When do you know a person? Can you ever truly know someone? I've been thinking about this a lot today. I have had a few blogs over the years, and on each one I have tried to write an "About Me" post that tells the reader a bit about me. The same problem crops up all the time however, and it's the same problem you run into when you join a social network, or fill out a dating profile, or to an extent when you apply for certain jobs - how do you describe yourself?
In the case of the dating profile, often the site asks you for a series of statistics about yourself - height, weight, hair colour, eye colour, physique etc, and in some cases a little more intimate than that. In the case of jobs you have often provided a similar list of statistics in the form of work and academic experience too. In both cases when it comes to the free-form text box for you to write whatever you want, that's when you have to start thinking. Social networks are much the same, in a way your profiles end up being a somewhat "social CV" detailing things you like, hobbies, interests, and groups etc that allude to life experiences you have had, where you have lived or studied or worked etc.
In all these cases you come back to that one place where you can write whatever you want with no prompt for specifics. The same thoughts inevitably arise when you are presented with this question, the foremost being "what would they want to know" and "what do I want them to know" - two questions that are not easy to answer. This post for example should be a post about me, but what exactly would people want to know about me? - or even, what do I want people to know about me? The latter is harder to answer than the former because for me my life is pretty much an open book, people that know me can ask me anything, and within reason I'll answer - just be warned, don't ask a question you might not like the answer to.
The problem with the former however is that you are leaving the creativity and imagination to the asker, and most peoples' questions are limited when they don't know anything about you to begin with. Getting to know someone is like a sculptor being presented with a solid block of marble. They can't see yet what it will become, and the only way they'll make any progress is to chip away bit by bit in an effort to shape an image. The more confident the sculptor becomes with the image they want to create, the more ambitious they become with their effort to shape the marble. Over confidence leads to mistakes that can ruin the sculpture entirely. When you get to know someone you are the sculptor, presented with a generic block of marble tasked with creating a sculpture that represents accurately the person you want to know.
Depth inevitably becomes the greatest danger here. Too deep a cut too soon can ruin the entire sculpture, just as too deep a question too soon can ruin your efforts to get to know someone. I think I am guilty of cutting too deep. Ambition gets the better of me and the desire to create a masterpiece leads to mistakes that can't be undone.
Your life is a canvas
What makes you, who you are? Is it defined by how you look? If it is then would a twin be you too? The answer most people will give to that is no. That leads on to another question then, do your personality traits and your characteristics define you? If they do then if someone else shares all of these, are they you too? Again the same answer will be given. The further you follow this chain of questions the more you begin to realise that the only thing that makes you "you" is the simple definition "I am" - beyond that everything else is consequential.
Someone who looks just like you, talks just like you, shares all your interests, even someone who has experienced everything you have been through is still not you. You can be as similar to other people as can be physically possible, they'll never be you. If technology permitted us to flash clone you and in an instant have an exact clone that was an exact copy right down to an atomic level and literally had every single memory you do and acted just like you because you were the person that was copied, they still wouldn't be you.
When you stop and think about this you begin to see yourself not as who you are but as a canvas upon which you paint an image to show the world. You pursue your interests, explore your personality traits, exhibit your characteristics in the attempt to paint a masterpiece. The thing is, as is true with art in itself, what appeals to you won't appeal to everyone. Surrealist paintings, cubist influences, to impressionism as examples of styles all of these are very different, going further than this the medium used can vary greatly too, from acrylics, oils, waxes, chalks, through to poster paints. Your canvas is yours to paint on and fill with what you want to show the world.
Every now and then in life we are forced to stop and take a step back and look at our canvas and see exactly what we have made of our lives. For some people during those moments of reflection they choose to make a change, maybe whitewash the canvas and start again, or cover up parts and start again. Through all of this one thing remains true - the canvas size is fixed and since you only get one, inevitably everything you have done already lingers behind. It's easy to wash over paints that were not extreme. Dull colours are easily hidden and covered with white paint allowing you to start again. If you went too wild in your excitement however those bold colours, and fluorescent hues you once thought were a bright idea become the parts that are the hardest to cover up. Now for some there is the argument that you shouldn't have to cover them up. I like that idea, but for many people the remnants of their failed experiments do not fit into the perfect image they have in their mind. That leaves you with the problem of dealing with your past, asking how many times you have to go back to square one, how many times you have to whitewash the canvas before the past no longer bleeds through.
Then there are the people who during their times of reflection retreat into a destructive mindset. These are the people who instead of whitewashing the canvas they choose to cover it in black paint it instead. As melodramatic as that image may seem, it does perhaps reflect quite aptly the descent into depression that grips the minds of some. Everything about who and what you are is blacked out until you stand before a canvas that holds nothing but darkness. Then comes the question of whether to start again at all or to just walk away - the ramifications of which I am sure you can deduce for yourself.
When you find yourself standing in front of a canvas black or white, with the desire to start again it is at this point you seek to imbue a passion in your painting that you never felt before. To a writer and to a painter there is one thing we share in common - there is simultaneously nothing more exciting and nothing more terrifying than a blank page or a blank canvas. A world of infinite potential stares back at you from that emptiness, and a fear lingers in the back of your mind of "what if" that nags you with pestering glee - what if you can't fill it. Sooner or later you have to start, with something, anything. If you don't do something it will remain blank. The pursuit of perfection can paralyse you from trying to do anything at all for fear that one tiny mistake will ruin the whole thing and you have to start over.
The greatest writers and the greatest painters shared one thing in common, they realised that perfection is an illusion. They realised that there is beauty to be found in mistakes. That life is filled with colour, and darkness. That the artist becomes a master when they take control of their work and create something that they want, for themselves, not for the rest of the world. When you stop trying to please everyone else and start trying to please yourself you find a newfound focus. No longer do you as "will they like this?" instead you ask "do I like this?" and if the answer is yes you keep going, and if no, then you work on it until you do.
After all is said and done there's only one question you have to ask - do you like your canvas? Fuck everyone else, they don't matter. Do you like it? - because it's your canvas, it will never be anyone else's, you are you and no one can ever take that away from you, don't let anyone else tell you what to paint, and above all else don't let anyone else do it for you.
Someone who looks just like you, talks just like you, shares all your interests, even someone who has experienced everything you have been through is still not you. You can be as similar to other people as can be physically possible, they'll never be you. If technology permitted us to flash clone you and in an instant have an exact clone that was an exact copy right down to an atomic level and literally had every single memory you do and acted just like you because you were the person that was copied, they still wouldn't be you.
When you stop and think about this you begin to see yourself not as who you are but as a canvas upon which you paint an image to show the world. You pursue your interests, explore your personality traits, exhibit your characteristics in the attempt to paint a masterpiece. The thing is, as is true with art in itself, what appeals to you won't appeal to everyone. Surrealist paintings, cubist influences, to impressionism as examples of styles all of these are very different, going further than this the medium used can vary greatly too, from acrylics, oils, waxes, chalks, through to poster paints. Your canvas is yours to paint on and fill with what you want to show the world.
Every now and then in life we are forced to stop and take a step back and look at our canvas and see exactly what we have made of our lives. For some people during those moments of reflection they choose to make a change, maybe whitewash the canvas and start again, or cover up parts and start again. Through all of this one thing remains true - the canvas size is fixed and since you only get one, inevitably everything you have done already lingers behind. It's easy to wash over paints that were not extreme. Dull colours are easily hidden and covered with white paint allowing you to start again. If you went too wild in your excitement however those bold colours, and fluorescent hues you once thought were a bright idea become the parts that are the hardest to cover up. Now for some there is the argument that you shouldn't have to cover them up. I like that idea, but for many people the remnants of their failed experiments do not fit into the perfect image they have in their mind. That leaves you with the problem of dealing with your past, asking how many times you have to go back to square one, how many times you have to whitewash the canvas before the past no longer bleeds through.
Then there are the people who during their times of reflection retreat into a destructive mindset. These are the people who instead of whitewashing the canvas they choose to cover it in black paint it instead. As melodramatic as that image may seem, it does perhaps reflect quite aptly the descent into depression that grips the minds of some. Everything about who and what you are is blacked out until you stand before a canvas that holds nothing but darkness. Then comes the question of whether to start again at all or to just walk away - the ramifications of which I am sure you can deduce for yourself.
When you find yourself standing in front of a canvas black or white, with the desire to start again it is at this point you seek to imbue a passion in your painting that you never felt before. To a writer and to a painter there is one thing we share in common - there is simultaneously nothing more exciting and nothing more terrifying than a blank page or a blank canvas. A world of infinite potential stares back at you from that emptiness, and a fear lingers in the back of your mind of "what if" that nags you with pestering glee - what if you can't fill it. Sooner or later you have to start, with something, anything. If you don't do something it will remain blank. The pursuit of perfection can paralyse you from trying to do anything at all for fear that one tiny mistake will ruin the whole thing and you have to start over.
The greatest writers and the greatest painters shared one thing in common, they realised that perfection is an illusion. They realised that there is beauty to be found in mistakes. That life is filled with colour, and darkness. That the artist becomes a master when they take control of their work and create something that they want, for themselves, not for the rest of the world. When you stop trying to please everyone else and start trying to please yourself you find a newfound focus. No longer do you as "will they like this?" instead you ask "do I like this?" and if the answer is yes you keep going, and if no, then you work on it until you do.
After all is said and done there's only one question you have to ask - do you like your canvas? Fuck everyone else, they don't matter. Do you like it? - because it's your canvas, it will never be anyone else's, you are you and no one can ever take that away from you, don't let anyone else tell you what to paint, and above all else don't let anyone else do it for you.
The Forest For The Trees
Every now and then, in the western world at least, the media get obsessed with something. Whatever that is, they become consumed by it, and every story that is reported, every TV show that makes references to current affairs mentions it, and slowly you begin to find yourself overwhelmed by an onslaught of information about this one thing that everything becomes a blur. The things you read become contradictory and confusion inevitably ensues. For those of a conspiracy loving nature this is a time of revelry as others begin to realise how easily people are influenced by the media. Tensions begin to rise and disagreements between people with opposing views become ever more deep and resentful.
When the dust settles however there is often a cooling down period where most people begin to awaken from the night before with a hangover that leaves even more disorientation. When you were focused on one thing for so long and it is suddenly taken away, even when you knew exactly when it would be, you are left with a great gap and that moment of "What did we do before that?" as you try to restore some semblance of normality.
2016 so far for me has been a year of this for many reasons; some of the issues that have consumed me have been shared issues that many people out there are going through too, others only some of you will be going through, and a handful are personal. It is perhaps the latter that I have found the hardest to deal with. Of the former, most are political. Of latter two, the first are a number of high profile deaths that hit home with me because they were people that I looked up to, or that I admired, or who had been a part of my life in the past and evoke memories of those times. The second has been a very personal ordeal that I've had to endure, which some of you will know about others won't. I don't want to give details on here but suffice is to say a very close friend has been through a very worrying struggle health wise and for a while I thought I was going to lose him.
Even now I can feel tears welling admitting that. These 3 issues are in reverse order of their severity and the level of anxiety I've suffered going through them. His struggle was the most important, followed by my grief, and finally politics being the last and lowest on the list. I cite all 3 for a reason however; no matter how insignificant the last one may seem in the long-run, it's hard to remain positive when your vision of the world is clouded by those issues, more so when they have become so overbearing that it's hard to escape them at all. The only place I've been able to get away from them is by watching old TV shows from a time before they were even an issue.
That causes its own problems however, as many of the old shows I used to watch, are just that - old. Inevitably with any TV show that ages, so too do the actors, and sadly death is the inevitability with those too. So on top of a current world filled with uncertainty, and a past world filled with reminders of mortality, and a future that for all intents right now is a black sky with only slithers of light making it through, you can see how it's been very hard to stay positive. At all.
Through it all, I've felt like I have stood in the middle of a forest of life, but the trees have felt like they have been closing in. These 3 issues have created a triangle of negativity that's making it hard for me to see anything passed them. I want out of the forest, I want to lie down in a field and gaze up at the night sky and see the stars and be reminded what hope feels like.
When the dust settles however there is often a cooling down period where most people begin to awaken from the night before with a hangover that leaves even more disorientation. When you were focused on one thing for so long and it is suddenly taken away, even when you knew exactly when it would be, you are left with a great gap and that moment of "What did we do before that?" as you try to restore some semblance of normality.
2016 so far for me has been a year of this for many reasons; some of the issues that have consumed me have been shared issues that many people out there are going through too, others only some of you will be going through, and a handful are personal. It is perhaps the latter that I have found the hardest to deal with. Of the former, most are political. Of latter two, the first are a number of high profile deaths that hit home with me because they were people that I looked up to, or that I admired, or who had been a part of my life in the past and evoke memories of those times. The second has been a very personal ordeal that I've had to endure, which some of you will know about others won't. I don't want to give details on here but suffice is to say a very close friend has been through a very worrying struggle health wise and for a while I thought I was going to lose him.
Even now I can feel tears welling admitting that. These 3 issues are in reverse order of their severity and the level of anxiety I've suffered going through them. His struggle was the most important, followed by my grief, and finally politics being the last and lowest on the list. I cite all 3 for a reason however; no matter how insignificant the last one may seem in the long-run, it's hard to remain positive when your vision of the world is clouded by those issues, more so when they have become so overbearing that it's hard to escape them at all. The only place I've been able to get away from them is by watching old TV shows from a time before they were even an issue.
That causes its own problems however, as many of the old shows I used to watch, are just that - old. Inevitably with any TV show that ages, so too do the actors, and sadly death is the inevitability with those too. So on top of a current world filled with uncertainty, and a past world filled with reminders of mortality, and a future that for all intents right now is a black sky with only slithers of light making it through, you can see how it's been very hard to stay positive. At all.
Through it all, I've felt like I have stood in the middle of a forest of life, but the trees have felt like they have been closing in. These 3 issues have created a triangle of negativity that's making it hard for me to see anything passed them. I want out of the forest, I want to lie down in a field and gaze up at the night sky and see the stars and be reminded what hope feels like.
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