Thankful We Met
In this life
Sometimes we meet
Very special souls
They can be animals
Or humans
They can be with us
Briefly or for a long time
We don’t know how they
Came into our lives
We just know that
It feels like we have
Known them since
Long ago
I met a friend like this
Recently
He was furry
He was old
But my god he was
A strong little thing
In the loneliest days
Of my life
He kept me company
His head nudging into
My thigh as he fell into
A deep sleep
Prayers giving him
Some peace
That at last
He found a space
That was safe
And in a brief but long
Rhythm of our days
He and I intertwined into
A homely comfort
I worked and he slept
Prayers giving us
Some peace
That at last
We found a space
That was safe
But life is strange
Sometimes those we
Want to keep close
Can never be fully protected
From danger
And danger, he found
In those he thought
would protect and give
Him a home
I lost him overnight
Without a goodbye
Out of my sight
I wept I wept
Knowing karma is always fair
But too fair sometimes
Knowing of life’s impermanence
I am just a human
Whose list of good and bad in
Humanity grows as I age
Whose skin becomes shaped
By scars and kisses of memories
How I wish I could have
Kept him away from danger
But it was his time to go
Too soon but time waits
For no one
And when it is time
Yours and my
Karma will come
So I said goodbye to him today
Feeling that our mutual exchange
Of our way of loving
Will live forever in my heart
In this life, sometimes we meet very special souls
We have indeed known them
Since long ago
In The Studio
This week’s poem is dedicated to a furry friend I lost this week. In reflecting on the first truth I would write about, I found myself reflecting on this very topic: Alone but Not Lonely.
And this is exactly what my first unexpected truth is in committing to my dream. On the outset, it looks very lonely indeed. I am spent long hours on the computer and phone. Editing, writing down ideas, planning. But taking out the modern context of our very real relationship with technology, I want to remind you of the days a painter or a poet would have spent since we as humans ever had the privilege to daydream.
Indeed I am also standing in front of my canvas or my book. It starts with a blank easel and a blank page. Most often it consists of messy paints and imperfections that I see week by week through to completion. I don’t aim for a finish line; I trust that a painting or a poem will end when it is time to end. And so, I spend time with them.
Being firmly into my first year of being so committed to my dream, I’ve realised that I cannot run away from myself. No matter if I am in front of a computer, a canvas or a page, they are all a mirror back to me of whether I distract myself to remedy the discomfort of starting a new piece of work or to dive into the unknown and give myself fully as creative tasks seem to demand from us.
I spend many hours alone, working on my craft. Painting, writing, video editing. They are all an extension, my tools for expressing my creativity and learning. And I might call it my work.
And as any work does, it demands of us something that we can’t at first quite give yet. But internal satisfaction as an artist is the biggest drug of all when this is the reward for giving into our craft.
I am not lonely because although I may seem outside to be alone, I am indeed conversing with an internal voice and the muses of inspiration. This to me is so much more rewarding than an hour spent socialising in a setting that drains and takes me away from myself.
Society rewards extroverts and fitting in. And yet, a conversation with a very good friend will feed my soul for months to come until I come out of my hibernation again.
Work gets a bad reputation when it is paired with obsession. But I so badly want to make others understand how deeply I am in love with my aloneness. I so badly want to make them understand that I am indeed very ok. Very ok than I have been in a long time because finally I am filling my cup fully.
That I am aware of myself to seek out small social interactions without giving over completely to everyone who wants or needs my attention.
The first antidote in this truth is acceptance. If you are someone like me, someone who can spend long hours being by themselves and having a single point of focus, I want to let you know that this is ok. You are not a freak. You are not a mutant from Mars, though it would still be very cool if you were.
I am done with giving into societal expectations that a life has to look a certain way for us to find belonging.
The second antidote is to find your people. Or find examples of those like you. Who are either on the same journey or have been there and done that, and know what it was like to be in your shoes. In fact, seek out both. I personally like social media and the online world for this.
Despite its vices, like everything in life, it also contains a lot of goodness if you wish to seek it out. After all, I met a few of my most meaningful connections there, not to mention my boyfriend.
You with your work is not lonely. You with your work is not strange.
You don’t always need to fill so many cups, especially in this path of committing to your dreams. Because absorbing yourself into new learnings is already no small but a fun feat.
Know that everybody has their own idea of fulfilment.
Don’t mistake aloneness for loneliness. And don’t label it as a weakness nor like a disease to be diagnosed.
So in your aloneness, ask yourself - what it is that you find fulfilment in? And go forward with that unapologetically.
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With love,
Win
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