INEXPERIENCE / FEAR

Think about one of those optical illusions where you see something … and see something quite different if you look at it again. It’s the same image but you see it differently. Most importantly: it feels very different.

Ask yourself: does your life feel worth it? If the answer veers towards yes then we might assume something happened in your early life where your carers regularly and helpfully mediated whatever life threw at you. If the answer is less certain than perhaps an important sense of protection was never granted you. You learned to live in FEAR.

Living your life in FEAR means somehow remaining hidden, protecting yourself by not being quite ‘there’: presenting a facade, existing in other places (for example in your professional work or in your art. These can be places where you can more safely be yourself because different rules apply compared to the unpredictability of everyday life).

Live your life as if it is absolutely worth protecting. Live it as if you believe this. You need the feeling that comes from such an experience; not, to begin with the experience of believing in the thought of your life being worth protecting

With the feeling that comes from the experience of living your life as if it is worth protecting you can lead a life where you might then feel yourself. Without an experience of this feeling you may never feel yourself.

See life differently to feel it differently.

Life begins properly for you when there is barely an as if. There’s a feeling of you and felt from this place life will seem so different. Possibilities, opportunities, connections and experiments will occur to you that would have remained hidden when you were.