On Views, Beliefs & Experiences

I cannot speak for everyone, but I can speak for myself - when I say that the beliefs, views and perceptions that I today call my own, are but build-ups slowly formed by the many experiences that had hit the shores of my mind, heart, body and soul from the day I opened my eyes in this world till this moment.

A case in point would be the belief I hold today of how I looked like as a newborn. With no photographs taken of me in my infancy to provide visual proof, the vague picture that I have in my mind today is the manipulation of the pliant images that my parents, sister and brothers helped create by way of transfer from their minds, via their words, to my mind's eye. And so, what I believe today to be how I looked is really my view of how I "could" have looked.

When I was about 7 or 8, I believed that my father's arm was the warmest, softest "pillow" that I had ever slept on. And that the smell I exhaled from my his body as I lay on his arms on the bare cement floor of my childhood home, was the loveliest smell in the world. When I reached puberty years later and was reminded by my mother that I was not to have too much physical contact with men, I believed that my father was "a man now", and no longer the bearer of the lovable pillow that I ran to and rested on the moment I saw him lie down to catch a quick nap.

When I finished school in my teens, I believed that the word career revolved around 3 words alone - doctor, lawyer, professor - the latter contributed by the praises I heard from my sister of her immediate boss who was a professor in the university she worked at.

...and so on and so forth.

Belief after belief - mostly based on others' beliefs.
Much lost as a result, and yet, not without its' fair share of gains.
Beliefs which were later disbelieved, and disbeliefs that were later believed.

How do I sum all that up to arrive at what I believe to be true today?
For that matter, what is true and what is not? And what is right and what is not?

Even now at this age, whenever I hear something new and inspiring, I wonder if that's the new way to go about in life. And months later, I would read a profound book and begin questioning if that is not what I really needed to get me to where I intend to head.

I am not sure about others - but I readily allow myself to be constantly influenced by new ideas. I welcome almost every new theory of life as a possibility that will get me a little closer to my dreams. I even write them down in my little notebook hoping that I'd someday be able to digest it fully and use them somehow.

Would you say that doing all the above makes me the least original person you have come across?

What is life, really, but a recycled version of the past. And what are we without each other's influences?
Isn't that what makes us human - the fact that we have the intelligence to learn from the past, recycle that which we have learned, and reproduce it in a presentable, acceptable form?

All said and done, isn't it true that our experiences are what shape our views and perceptions? And what if they were good or bad experiences - does all that matter? Shouldn't the real questions be - how openly we experience our experiences, and how effectively we reflect on them afterwards, or as we grow older?

No experience is really all that bad (as bad as it makes us feel), and some good always comes out of all that we go through. This is purely a personal view - one that I live by, and one that resulted out of the reflections of my past.

It was because the "pillow" was taken away from me at the age of 11 that I found the strength to steadily love my father despite the "distance", despite the physical presence - it taught me that there was no need for any "display of affection" to "feel" one's real affection.

...could that be the lesson (on "attachment with a tinge of detachment") that my mother probably wanted to teach me...?

Any views from out there to "influence" me otherwise..? :)

A little diversion will be good at this stage, I figured :) Find out what Khalil Gibran had to say about relationships, and why a little detachment is always good in life :)

I don't remember seeing my mother read Khalil Gibran when I was a kid. :) Intuition, perhaps?

MARRIAGE (The Prophet) - Khalil Gibran

Then Almitra spoke again and said, "And what of Marriage, master?"

And he answered saying:

You were born together, and together you shall be forevermore.

You shall be together when white wings of death scatter your days.

Aye, you shall be together even in the silent memory of God.

But let there be spaces in your togetherness,

And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.

Love one another but make not a bond of love:

Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.

Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.

Sing and dance together and be joyous, but let each one of you be alone,

Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.

Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.

For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.

And stand together, yet not too near together:

For the pillars of the temple stand apart,

And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.



CHILDREN (The Prophet) - Khalil Gibran

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children."

And he said:

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts.

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;

For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.