January 2024
I am exploring January. I am exploring a changing of a calendar year. A year, an encompassing body of time, byte of data, used to define our civilized events. What did any of this even mean? Was it time for an existential crisis? Why am I asking myself that in a snarky tone? That feeling is resentment from stifling myself ... Am I too much in my head? Or, should I push myself further into this creative space? This is my inspiration, unrestrained. Endless possibilities. What does it mean to explore what that is? At some point I have become overwhelmed by my options, and felt the need to carve out some space and organize possibilities and explore them.
At my core I want growth. What does growth mean to me? Creating to produce positive outcomes. An experience not deny the negative need for a charge, but understanding a balance needed for overall growth. That is a great deal of deep thought that sometimes overwhelms me. It is the repeating experiences of floating in space with endless possibilities. It is too much too digest all at once; I need bite size pieces to chew. This analogy naturally led me down the rabbit hole of why am I even imagining I am eating steak in this moment? Matrix steak eating scenes flash in my memory. Focus, (I snap my mental fingers.) My focus is everything within range. These are the times I am watching out the windows, lost in thought.
Right now, watching out my windows, is an experience, if I allow it. I love the sky this color of blue. I love the fresh, crisp air. I love seeing the bare branches contrast against the sky. And small white planes have been floating by in the air as I have sat here, typing, exploring what creativity feels like to me. I remember these same experiences of daydreaming out the windows in elementary school. I can remember being in a church, making my own windows to daydream out of. Another plane is gliding by, it is beautiful. I love watch them fly in overhead at Osage Park. I was taught awareness of focus through these experiences. The urgency of needing not to "daydream" but GET FOCUSED!
So I focused in, and now I have my full attention. Who am I? How do I define myself and my experience? What pieces make up the whole? In my mind's eye, I see me scooping up stars, to look at them closer, and compare them. It feels a little chaotic to do that, so I imagine just taking dividing what is in view, into sections. These are all the stars in my current view. If I section them off, I can tale a closer look at each section. I immediately thought of constellations and marking time.
I honestly, rarely see the entirety of the night sky. Even when given opportunity, I do not fully participate and engage in reverence as I would want. I take for granted it is all there and that we have defined this much of the sky, divided it into sections and exploring each section. I envision myself, running through the woods, in fear and chaos. I stop to catch my breath, and see a waterfall. What am I running from? Why am I in fear? Can I take a moment to process what is happening and not be in a reactionary state? Can I take a respite and reflect? It is the end of a marked cycle, and a beginning of a new. This calm space of reflection feels like January.
My time here is defined by these chunks of time. My identity is tied into the time and date of my arrival into this world. My gestation existence was timed from conception. Cycles of time, unfolding and marked. Outwardly, when defined, I am a human, arriving into this world on this date, to this family, I am called by this name and now I am an expression of an experience with identifying markers. Do these markers define my experience? Who am I in relation to them? Another white plane just drifted across the sky.