It's that time again, when the nights get chilly, and the winds start to blow, and the leaves start to fall away, and the trees all start to glow.It's AUTUMN!!
The thought struck me this morning, as I realized, and I mean REALLY realized that it wasn't summer anymore. Sure, I figured it out, closing my window at night, the extra blanket, all those assured signs that it was here. Yet tell me why, it only really clicked when I stood standing outside waiting for the bus, watching the sky, the clouds moving heavily, and feeling the pronounced chill of the season. First time in a long time I'd stepped outside in my thicker hoodie sweater, and it took me a good few minutes to realize what it was that I was noticing.
The best thing was that growing feeling of joy when I realized that the season was changing. It was a brilliant moment of pure bliss just for nature's sake. If you haven't felt it before, you are definitely missing out on one of the most natural insticts God has given us - the ability to experience His creativity.
As fast as my mind moves, it went on to another realization at the same time. Why do I thrill in the changing of seasons so much? When in fact, it appears that change in most other things are what give me most angst. Change in friendships, change in relationships, change in life. Yet at the same time, I seek out most types of variety. In dressing styles, in mental faculties, in imagination, in the expansion of one's own person. All these varieties seem to add more dimensions, more colour, more vibrancy to life.
So, what differentiates one type of change from another? Would it be the obvious factor of negative consequences? Of course we are conditioned by what outcomes we encounter, but does it have to be such a primitive negative-positive inclination? Why can't we surpass this basic tendency to move above and beyond whatever it is that drives us from the inside.
Attachment. Maybe, just maybe, we cling on to what we know, because we don't in fact know what we may have when we let go. It's observed often enough. Why though, is it mostly in our dealings with others, and less often with 'things'?
Superficiality. Things, they come and go, we know that we can get something or other of its kind again, in principle. Of course, there are those things that mean more to us that we can consciously know. Imagine your house burning down, and never possessing some of the things you have ever again. I know I would feel some pang of despair or regret over losing my books, my teddies, say even my makeup! Yet I'd come to terms that I've got to accept it.
Then comes the things with a higher level of personification. Diaries, journals, notebooks, cell phones, birthday cards, gifts. The things that attach us to other people assume a higher level of importance to us. Once again, it comes down to when our space crosses with the spaces of other people in our lives. That crossover grants us an attachment of some form that alters how we perceive everything else around us.
One of my timeless favourite quotes came back to me a few days ago by one of these important people in my life. "No love, no friendship, can cross the path of our destiny without leaving some mark on it forever."
Maybe it's a form of habituation. We know that the seasons change. It's inevitable. When summer leaves, as much as I feel a pang at saying goodbye to the warm weather, I know that months later it will be back. With this knowledge, I can embrace the coming changes of autumn. But then again, too much of one thing creates some type of longing for something different. Too much of cold weather imbibes a longing for the hot sunny months. Vice versa.
So what is it about relationships that causes all this confusion? Growing attached to a person, well that's a dynamic relationship as opposed to relationships with other 'things'. You get feedback, you get emotions of all types, one even has some sort of mental dependence on the presence of certain people. So, when this presence is removed it, it 'hurts'.
Then comes the question of overcoming this imbalance, or is it just against human nature to even try?
In any case, will resort to searching for more answers in another blog.
