“Death by a thousand cuts”, that’s how the saying goes. A humiliating process of incremental excruciation. Slivers of yourself, your hopes, your dreams, your beliefs, your trust, your faith, sliced away in small sections until nothing remains. It’s hard to think of a better way to describe what it feels like to a person in the world today. To be undone, not by an Armageddon. Not by a single, world-ending, apocalyptic calamity. But a near numberless series of papercuts slowly severing the soul. You can try to hide from the fact that it’s happened. That it happens. That it’s happening, but it won’t keep it from being true.
As maker’s we are, perhaps, more sensitive to it. We feel every laceration that the world has to give, and you never get used to it. You can wrap yourself in caution and detachment. In Kevlar and unfeeling. You can try to hide from the fact that it’s happened. That it happens. That it’s happening continually. You can say that what looks like distance and apathy is just the protection and self-preservation necessary for mending. But healing and safety aren’t the same thing. The latter requires armor. The former necessitates truth, openness, and honesty. In a word, vulnerability.
“The artist is fiercely called to truth”, says John O’ Donohue, and vulnerable exposure is the onus that comes with the call. The maker is tasked with giving shape to the ache of being human. To harness every cut and use it. To allow it to carve out an opening in the cold closedness that develops in response to a culture that cuts deep.
You can try to hide from the fact that it’s happened. That it happens. That it’s happening and that it probably always will. You can build walls and fortresses. You live behind plexiglass shields. Or, you can let it. Let it come. Let it happen. Let it hurt hell. Let it wreck you to bits and pieces. Let it strip you bare and split you wider than you’d prefer. On the other side of ruin is possibility. To turn every wound into a doorway, an opportunity. To “find beauty in the pain”, Says Eric G. Wilson. To show others how to do it. How to look for it. How to have the courage to stay open.
May you be ferocious in your pursuit of truth and honesty.
May your hurts be the place where hope grows.
May every wound become a window opened to a new world of potentiality.
In case no one’s told you today, I love you with all of my everything.
Very enjoyable and an excellent match!
Again, so many thanks 🙏
So true, so important l, all of it