Beyond Negative Capability: Fulfillment

Fulfillment

Recovery, Awakening, Purposeful

 

Tell me what you yearn for, and I shall tell you who you are. We are what we reach for, the idealized image that drives our wandering. James Hillman, The Soul’s Code

A Bear eating from the bouquet of Lotus-dendron is a portrait of a being in alignment with an Essential Identity. What lights up this Bear and is purposeful resists being contained in language. It’s not a behavior nor an activity, not a habit, not a job or even a career, not a role or an obligation, or an expectation. Putting labels or even words to it is a fool’s errand from the start. As soon as we apply a name, we have probably obscured as much as we have revealed.

It’s a state-of-being in which will arise a directional force that points us toward our hopes and dreams, a drive for fulfillment. This state of being-in-the-world requires daily practice. Maybe many daily practices to start…until we can embody the Inspired bear living with intention in a landscape of Lotus-dendron. Suddenly it makes sense why we have not been able to find a quick remedy to this feeling that we are living someone else’s life. First, we need to become a simple Bear of being and take the time to be reminded of who we are.

 Why This Painting?

Rather than spinning in a familiar reactive cycle, the ego is silent in the Child’s mindfulness and the Artist’s flow. What is important reveals itself, and she can formulate crucial questions. What is her intention? What is worth her life? What is worth doing? What will fulfill her?  When she begins to intuit an answer beyond her fears, this is a sign of another capacity of the Artist that has become activated—Fulfillment.

As you continue the Loving-Work of your Artist, now is the time to consider (remember) your purpose, and align your thoughts, feelings, and actions to your Core Identity. This Core is something worthy.  Essential. Creative. Or Inquisitive. Or Adventurous. Or Nurturing. You alone must find the word(s) that best fit.

But how do you remember your purpose if you are lost? Your left-leaning intellect alone will not be able to think your way into realization; at best it can be selectively honest or will tell you what you already know. First, like the Bear you must inhabit the energies that allow for Inspiration. Our deepest knowledge of Self (insight) requires we are open, Enlarged, allowing connection with our bodies and gut feelings; we must invite what is less known to come up from the bottom, to peer out from behind the appearances, to be revealed outside our rules and roles. This takes a willing heart and an effort to express and create (in Flow), to acknowledge our Truth with curiosity (in Mindful inquiry), and to remain fearless in our explorations of intimate relationships (in Attunement).

Being-in-the-world (in a state of spacious awareness), you will be reminded of your persistent sensitivities and tendencies. In a Jungian sense you came into the world as a seed that has the potential to grow through your experiences and reveal your Essence. This can be hard to see clearly, perhaps even seems lost to you at times, but, if you reflect on your history, you are likely to see glimpses of the Soul, the quintessence of your Heart in patterns and repetitions.

Since an Essential Identity is not your career nor a role, nor your skills, nor your habits and behaviors, it may seem abstract, but it is not incorporeal; indeed, we see and sense it in the tangible and the corporeal. Often our first awareness of it is mirrored to us from a person who noticed us, an attentive teacher or a grandparent, someone who took the moment to communicate “I see this and see the value in you.” Of course, they may not have used any such words. They may not have used any words at all, but you knew.

Delve into your positive memories. If you are successful in remembering, prepare yourself for insights that can alter the trajectory of your life.

Inside Out:

Many of us act as if genuineness is secondary, subordinate to our connection to others. Because we are mammals, our very survival has depended upon care from caregivers, and so we had to adapt to whatever they required from us.  Born into this world so extraordinarily vulnerable, the most impoverished delusional attachment was better than nothing. We learned to call the cruelest places “home.” The alternative (abandonment) would literally kill us, and so we needed to stay unconscious to our needs, to distort reality, to suppress what was too confusing, to reject who we have come into the world to be.  A wise Bear knows you need time alone. If you have refused the call previously, prepare yourself for a dark night. If lost, relentlessly seek a way back home to a place that can hold your Heart. There you will find people, a community if you are lucky, who resonate with, recognize, support, and help protect your Essential Identity.

Upside down:

The talent lies in the choice. Stella Adler

So many of us have lost awareness of anything bigger than driven busywork. A singular uninspired focus feeds compulsive, meaningless and dehumanizing activity. Living in the Upside-down, we will be encouraged to become product, which is in essence an Outcast to yourself. In the Upside-down, the Artist must take time and frequently consider the trajectory that she has been on. Consider taking a clear inventory of the pressures that rob you of your Truth and Beauty.

Sit with yourself. And when you are making your art, mix in the tints of Love, Play and Work.  There’s also potential for wisdom: to engage in work that reveals institutions and suspicions. Though it may feel you are pushing against the societal streams, find the deeper pools where you are away from others. Be innovative. Play in undertakings that develop out of deep feeling and purpose.

As the Bear reminds us, if the way has been straight, you have likely been on someone else’ path. Or, if the river grows straight, you are probably headed toward a creative dam or are being funneled toward the sawmill. Maybe you have become a Worker rather than the Artist, a shadow-version of yourself more driven to seek acceptance than Inspiration. Take time away from the world. From family. From the demands of your career. From the expectations of the culture. Practice Lotus-dendron states of Mindfulness and Flow. Allow yourself time to meander on those winding inspired Desire Paths, sometimes known as Bear trails.