Wow, wow, wow! What an amazing piece of writing, and I couldn't agree more with what you're saying. I've been on that magic roundabout more times than I care to remember! It can be very hard to go against the grain of a society that is geared towards activity and productivity. It's the mindset that says you must get up at the crack of dawn, toil all day long and show off the fruits of your labour. Just look at how disabled people who take part in the paralympics are applauded because they're DOING something! Behind it lies the systemic intolerance against people who can't or won't DO something all the time. I have a hidden disability - ME = chronic exhaustion and Fibromyalgia = chronic pain. Apart from the obvious frustrations this brings in everyday life, what is hard to deal with is people's ignorance and prejudice. People who can't do things have no purpose in our society, and are hence regarded as slackers and parasites. A friend of mine thought I was living a life of leisure, until I told her otherwise in no uncertain terms. What am I to do? Write a book and add to the zillions already making choice a chore? Just the thought exhausts me! My saving grace is Zen which gives you the freedom to be nothing - no thing.
Thank you! I’m sorry to hear about your struggles and all the more grateful for the effort you make to make my day better with your comments. Have you read Still Life by Josie George? A gorgeously written book about a life where disability means simple actions are incredibly hard and a model for how the small things we can manage in-between times of sheer exhaustion are startlingly meaningful and important and how tiny actions can add up. But it’s not that she had persevered and written the book itself that makes her life noteworthy it is her attitude in the living of her life its self in which she does what she can and notices the beauty in what she has. People who modelling how not striving and not doing works is actually doing a lot of good if you see what I mean.
Yes, I have that book. I started reading it a while ago and will revisit it. Thanks for mentioning it. I read a book quite a while ago about personality types and their work life. I've forgotten the name of one type. They're the kind of people who choose one thing and stick with it for the rest of their lives. The other type are the Leonardo Da Vinci type. They have many interests and pursue them at different points in their life. Sometimes they can find something that combines several aspects. It looks like the former type is still treated as the norm we should strive for. We need to promote the Da Vinci/ renaissance type and highlight their many and varied interests and talents.
This essay resonated with me in many ways. First: I read Gilbert's Big Magic book in my 50s and felt a bit defeated because I had yet to discover my singular purpose. I remember a bit later that some readers challenged this notion, suggesting the hummingbird drinking from many flowers as another way explore our creativity. This essay also reminded me of the most common fear among young people I served as an academic advisor at a college: declaring a major! Most of the students I worked with were undecided and were pressured by parents and a culture that said, "Get on with it, now!" When I would explain it was ok and quite normal too not yet know, they would still fret. Many expressed dismay at the thought of "doing" the same thing for the rest of their lives and I agreed with them. It was a challenge to convince them that most people don't commit to one purpose in their lives I taught career exploration to these students and the #1 focus was always wealth accumulation.
I am the hummingbird with many creative interests and when I turned 50 I left the safe and conventional life I had created to live a more natural and creative lifestyle on a bit of land, growing food and medicine, always learning and pursuing my creativity through writing and art. But every damn day, I fight the internal noise around achievement - am I wasting time by spending the day reading, or knitting, or thinking?
I am going to ponder this thought-provoking essay more on today's hike. Thank you, Helen.
The other topic I had in mind to write about today ( which I still might one day) was how many acts of creativity are completed by the active receiving of the act. Reading completes writing- it’s not a waste. It’s an act of creative collaboration.
I love the hummingbird imagery by the way. Just before I retired from the judiciary at 50 a guy who had mentored me from when I was a student in work experience also retired from the judiciary at I think 70. . We went for one last coffee and he says to me: I worry about you. You‘ve been a solicitor and a barrister, a conference speaker, a writer and an artist then a Judge now you are talking about coaching. You keep moving on.!
And I I thought : and I’m exactly where you are now with the same security but younger and how much more of life have I experienced and how much more to come? I don’t regret a single decision.
Thanks so much, Helen, and also to those in the comments. Such reassuring and helpful thoughts. I struggle so much with all of this, especially with the way our world defines value and purpose. What if it's OK to live a life that looks small, but has depth and meaning? What if we are actually enough as we are?
The answer to that lies in your question: it ‘looks small’. Not it is small … just that in comparison with bluster and aggrandisement it is smaller in comparison. It’s not small in the sense of being insignificant. It’s small in the sense that a perfectly cut diamond is tiny compared to a circus tent. And you know what - we are the world too. We can change it just by refusing to drink the Kool Aid!
Thanks Helen for another great piece of timely writing.
I have been reflecting recently on presence as purpose. Along the lines that it is who we are, through our being, that we live our purpose.
With a belief that more kindness and compassion is desperately needed in the world, perhaps my 'purpose' is to embody that for myself, then my family, community and on as an extension and natural outflow.
We are, as you touched on, multi faceted beings, and the ability to refer to our internal compass and determine the path or course of action that feeds and nourishes us in that momnent is something we can struggle with as external validation or expectations take precedence.
Noting that this nourishment can look very different for each of us and at different times of our lives. (Enter the hummingbird analogy.)
There are many stages of a life and in my observation of working with women in a spiritual healing and soul nourishment capacity over the last 25+ years, the type of nourishment we require and how we desire to express in and what we offer to the world changes as we progress through life.
My engagement in the world is different now as I head towards 60 than it was at 30.
Astonishingly more recently I was invited to stepped back into the corporate space part time (after a 20yr hiatus) and am relishing the joys this brings such as team work and connection and a different sense of achievement and mental engagement whilst my mentorship and healing work continues concurrently alongside. And I know this will continue until it doesn't!
The gift to the world of our nourished, radiant selves is sorely undervalued. I think this is what Elizabeth Gilbert's writing initially offered - a potential path of hope out of the pain of constriction to joy as we leant into and honoured ourselves (and latterly) nourished our creativity.
To nourish the soul may well be the most important 'work' we do.
My hope is that we give ourselves the permission, freedom and courage to follow those soul promptings.
Thank you for your reflections. They are always a treasure.
PS I love that you refer to the Hebrew root of words.
As an aside in Chinese Medicine the emotion associated with the kidney meridian is fear and it is also associated with willpower, strong long term goals and purpose 😀
Thank you for leaving such a long comment! A pleasure to read it. I am indeed learning how to be in the world in a very different way than I have been previously.
The Chinese medicine info was fascinating. I had no idea! Though interestingly ( to me at least!) I did more reading after I published this piece and found that the Rabbis in their discussions in the Talmud treat the kidneys as a seat of our innermost desires and also as a sort of inner counsel in that they say the kidneys advise us! I did say I wasn’t saying anything new!!!!
Thank you for capturing and clarifying this issue. It has become such a relentless drumbeat in our “wellness/def-actualizing culture. Phew… what a easeful way to hold ourselves.
Thank you so much for this! I need to make a decision soon about an intensive volunteer role I’ve held since 2017. “What is the next right step?” is so much more interesting to me (and less confounding) than the yes/no question I’ve been wrestling with: “do I stay or do I go?”.
So much less binary isn’t it? That’s what I lived about doing family law - people would come in with opposing questions like that - two extremes- and usually there was a creative and very satisfying solution inbetween the two. I hope you puzzle it out for yourself soon!
Helen Conway, you are simply brilliant. Once again, your observation and writing and humility is…awe inspiring and my day is significantly enhanced having read this post. I’m so grateful to you 🙏
Your essay and the comments remind me of an essay I wrote years ago (just for myself). The gist of it: Society worships at the altar of busyness; thinking and contemplation are not valued because they look too much like doing nothing. At 59, I have been struggling with finding my purpose after retirement next year, and with trying to figure out what all my many different interests have in common. This essay gives me a lot to think about in that regard; maybe I can just enjoy my interests for what they are and let my life’s purpose take care of itself! Thank you for the food for thought.
I usually see Liz Gilbert when she is in the UK. I couldn't go this time. Thanks for some feedback on her talk.
It was my first time but I think I’d go again.
Wow, wow, wow! What an amazing piece of writing, and I couldn't agree more with what you're saying. I've been on that magic roundabout more times than I care to remember! It can be very hard to go against the grain of a society that is geared towards activity and productivity. It's the mindset that says you must get up at the crack of dawn, toil all day long and show off the fruits of your labour. Just look at how disabled people who take part in the paralympics are applauded because they're DOING something! Behind it lies the systemic intolerance against people who can't or won't DO something all the time. I have a hidden disability - ME = chronic exhaustion and Fibromyalgia = chronic pain. Apart from the obvious frustrations this brings in everyday life, what is hard to deal with is people's ignorance and prejudice. People who can't do things have no purpose in our society, and are hence regarded as slackers and parasites. A friend of mine thought I was living a life of leisure, until I told her otherwise in no uncertain terms. What am I to do? Write a book and add to the zillions already making choice a chore? Just the thought exhausts me! My saving grace is Zen which gives you the freedom to be nothing - no thing.
Thank you! I’m sorry to hear about your struggles and all the more grateful for the effort you make to make my day better with your comments. Have you read Still Life by Josie George? A gorgeously written book about a life where disability means simple actions are incredibly hard and a model for how the small things we can manage in-between times of sheer exhaustion are startlingly meaningful and important and how tiny actions can add up. But it’s not that she had persevered and written the book itself that makes her life noteworthy it is her attitude in the living of her life its self in which she does what she can and notices the beauty in what she has. People who modelling how not striving and not doing works is actually doing a lot of good if you see what I mean.
Yes, I have that book. I started reading it a while ago and will revisit it. Thanks for mentioning it. I read a book quite a while ago about personality types and their work life. I've forgotten the name of one type. They're the kind of people who choose one thing and stick with it for the rest of their lives. The other type are the Leonardo Da Vinci type. They have many interests and pursue them at different points in their life. Sometimes they can find something that combines several aspects. It looks like the former type is still treated as the norm we should strive for. We need to promote the Da Vinci/ renaissance type and highlight their many and varied interests and talents.
This essay resonated with me in many ways. First: I read Gilbert's Big Magic book in my 50s and felt a bit defeated because I had yet to discover my singular purpose. I remember a bit later that some readers challenged this notion, suggesting the hummingbird drinking from many flowers as another way explore our creativity. This essay also reminded me of the most common fear among young people I served as an academic advisor at a college: declaring a major! Most of the students I worked with were undecided and were pressured by parents and a culture that said, "Get on with it, now!" When I would explain it was ok and quite normal too not yet know, they would still fret. Many expressed dismay at the thought of "doing" the same thing for the rest of their lives and I agreed with them. It was a challenge to convince them that most people don't commit to one purpose in their lives I taught career exploration to these students and the #1 focus was always wealth accumulation.
I am the hummingbird with many creative interests and when I turned 50 I left the safe and conventional life I had created to live a more natural and creative lifestyle on a bit of land, growing food and medicine, always learning and pursuing my creativity through writing and art. But every damn day, I fight the internal noise around achievement - am I wasting time by spending the day reading, or knitting, or thinking?
I am going to ponder this thought-provoking essay more on today's hike. Thank you, Helen.
The other topic I had in mind to write about today ( which I still might one day) was how many acts of creativity are completed by the active receiving of the act. Reading completes writing- it’s not a waste. It’s an act of creative collaboration.
I love the hummingbird imagery by the way. Just before I retired from the judiciary at 50 a guy who had mentored me from when I was a student in work experience also retired from the judiciary at I think 70. . We went for one last coffee and he says to me: I worry about you. You‘ve been a solicitor and a barrister, a conference speaker, a writer and an artist then a Judge now you are talking about coaching. You keep moving on.!
And I I thought : and I’m exactly where you are now with the same security but younger and how much more of life have I experienced and how much more to come? I don’t regret a single decision.
Thanks so much, Helen, and also to those in the comments. Such reassuring and helpful thoughts. I struggle so much with all of this, especially with the way our world defines value and purpose. What if it's OK to live a life that looks small, but has depth and meaning? What if we are actually enough as we are?
The answer to that lies in your question: it ‘looks small’. Not it is small … just that in comparison with bluster and aggrandisement it is smaller in comparison. It’s not small in the sense of being insignificant. It’s small in the sense that a perfectly cut diamond is tiny compared to a circus tent. And you know what - we are the world too. We can change it just by refusing to drink the Kool Aid!
Thanks Helen for another great piece of timely writing.
I have been reflecting recently on presence as purpose. Along the lines that it is who we are, through our being, that we live our purpose.
With a belief that more kindness and compassion is desperately needed in the world, perhaps my 'purpose' is to embody that for myself, then my family, community and on as an extension and natural outflow.
We are, as you touched on, multi faceted beings, and the ability to refer to our internal compass and determine the path or course of action that feeds and nourishes us in that momnent is something we can struggle with as external validation or expectations take precedence.
Noting that this nourishment can look very different for each of us and at different times of our lives. (Enter the hummingbird analogy.)
There are many stages of a life and in my observation of working with women in a spiritual healing and soul nourishment capacity over the last 25+ years, the type of nourishment we require and how we desire to express in and what we offer to the world changes as we progress through life.
My engagement in the world is different now as I head towards 60 than it was at 30.
Astonishingly more recently I was invited to stepped back into the corporate space part time (after a 20yr hiatus) and am relishing the joys this brings such as team work and connection and a different sense of achievement and mental engagement whilst my mentorship and healing work continues concurrently alongside. And I know this will continue until it doesn't!
The gift to the world of our nourished, radiant selves is sorely undervalued. I think this is what Elizabeth Gilbert's writing initially offered - a potential path of hope out of the pain of constriction to joy as we leant into and honoured ourselves (and latterly) nourished our creativity.
To nourish the soul may well be the most important 'work' we do.
My hope is that we give ourselves the permission, freedom and courage to follow those soul promptings.
Thank you for your reflections. They are always a treasure.
PS I love that you refer to the Hebrew root of words.
As an aside in Chinese Medicine the emotion associated with the kidney meridian is fear and it is also associated with willpower, strong long term goals and purpose 😀
Thank you for leaving such a long comment! A pleasure to read it. I am indeed learning how to be in the world in a very different way than I have been previously.
The Chinese medicine info was fascinating. I had no idea! Though interestingly ( to me at least!) I did more reading after I published this piece and found that the Rabbis in their discussions in the Talmud treat the kidneys as a seat of our innermost desires and also as a sort of inner counsel in that they say the kidneys advise us! I did say I wasn’t saying anything new!!!!
Love that!
And yes it was a bit of a tome in the end 🤩
I’m 100% in favour of tomes!!
So much wisdom to digest in this essay. Thank you.
Thank you for capturing and clarifying this issue. It has become such a relentless drumbeat in our “wellness/def-actualizing culture. Phew… what a easeful way to hold ourselves.
Thank you so much for this! I need to make a decision soon about an intensive volunteer role I’ve held since 2017. “What is the next right step?” is so much more interesting to me (and less confounding) than the yes/no question I’ve been wrestling with: “do I stay or do I go?”.
So much less binary isn’t it? That’s what I lived about doing family law - people would come in with opposing questions like that - two extremes- and usually there was a creative and very satisfying solution inbetween the two. I hope you puzzle it out for yourself soon!
Helen Conway, you are simply brilliant. Once again, your observation and writing and humility is…awe inspiring and my day is significantly enhanced having read this post. I’m so grateful to you 🙏
>Blushes< Thank you!
absolutely love your perspective. Thank you for eloquently putting my feelings into words.
You are welcome. Thank you for taking the time to read.
Your essay and the comments remind me of an essay I wrote years ago (just for myself). The gist of it: Society worships at the altar of busyness; thinking and contemplation are not valued because they look too much like doing nothing. At 59, I have been struggling with finding my purpose after retirement next year, and with trying to figure out what all my many different interests have in common. This essay gives me a lot to think about in that regard; maybe I can just enjoy my interests for what they are and let my life’s purpose take care of itself! Thank you for the food for thought.
I think you indeed can do just that. Blatantly enjoy the variety. Or else decide that the common thread is ….you!