Inhibitions
I am supposed to be writing this week on the topic of Letting Go - with the caveats strongly suggested by the teacher that we look at letting go as an intentional setting aside of inhibitions, a complete loss of inhibitions, perhaps a complete loss of sense in a way that causes the subject to act in a manner (seemingly?) counter to usual behavior. I'm not getting anywhere. Biographically, I can think of situations wherein I chose to act in a way that someone else may have believed to be counter to my usual self, but maybe they were just wrong about me. Or maybe I think my inhibitions are good things that keep me from making a fool of myself (or getting hurt). The poem can have the inhibition-losing event lead to good or ill or no effect, my choice. In general, I'd rather not write about myself, but I'm having trouble with fictional character development too - I'm usually more capable of empathy. Someone else's sadness - ok; divorce, hatred, jealousy - alright; classism, racism, immortality - sure I can contemplate those. I'm not sure I know what drives someone to do something out of character, or at least - impulsive...
How do you get over the uncertainty of outcome? I mean, I can imagine doing impulsive things. I can imagine them going well and I can imagine them going very, very badly. And I can't tell which outcome I actually think is more likely. Or even more interesting. My hopeful - Oprah-esque, do what you love - side thinks it makes sense to go with your gut, follow your heart, take a chance. But my cynical - I went to Jr. High and therefore know that people suck - side thinks that it is far more likely that bad things will happen if you let your guard down.
Of course this is exactly why I was looking forward to this course - to think (and write) about things I'd usually avoid.
How do you get over the uncertainty of outcome? I mean, I can imagine doing impulsive things. I can imagine them going well and I can imagine them going very, very badly. And I can't tell which outcome I actually think is more likely. Or even more interesting. My hopeful - Oprah-esque, do what you love - side thinks it makes sense to go with your gut, follow your heart, take a chance. But my cynical - I went to Jr. High and therefore know that people suck - side thinks that it is far more likely that bad things will happen if you let your guard down.
Of course this is exactly why I was looking forward to this course - to think (and write) about things I'd usually avoid.