Guilty as Charged

I was reading a blog about how some young girls were selling cookies to raise money to give to some people in Lebanon, who have been displaced. Commendable. I’m not sure what their motivation was, but I think it was a belief that they could make a difference.

If I were to do it, it would be to assuage guilt. I would feel guilty that I don’t live in a war zone and they do. I would feel guilty that I always have more than enough to eat and they don’t. I have a safe and secure roof over my head and they don’t. I can walk the streets and fields without worrying about being shot or blown up. I would feel guilty that I have so much and give so little. So if I give to the people effected by the tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, fires and wars; a one time gift because it feels good; does it count, does it change things, does it make the world a better place, does it make a positive connection, cause a universal moral shift to the good.

I’m trying so hard to not feel guilt, to not be motivated by guilt. I rather not give at all if the exercise is to nullify my guilt. Of course then I have to deal with the overwhelming, paralyzing guilt of doing nothing.

When I live my life in a way that allows connections to be made with others, with Nature, with Spirit; then my giving, my living seems right.

Wordlessness

YES, THE HIGHEST things are beyond words. That is probably why all art aspires to the condition of wordlessness. When literature works on you, it does so in silence, in your dreams, in your wordless moments. Good words enter you and become moods, become the quiet fabric of your being. Like music, like painting, literature too wants to transcend its primary condition and become something higher. Art wants to move into silence, into the emotional and spiritual conditions of the world. Statues become melodies, melodies become yearnings, yearnings become actions.

Ben Okri, from the book, A Way of Being Free

I have been wordless lately and not in a profound sense. Intimidated by the blank page more like. Even in speech, not using the words that would best describe how I'm feeling or what I've experienced. I want my words to move and shape and connect.

I've read some amazing writing. It fascinates me how an author can string some words together and move me to tears or laughter or thoughfulness or action. It's not in the words themselves but how and where they put them.

Years ago I read the Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. It was one of the first serious pieces of literature that I had read, not counting the required high school English class book list. I remember the exact moment when I figured out who was the father of Hester Prynne's illegitimate child. It wasn't said in words, it was discovered in glances and undercurrents and subtle body movements. Nothing like a "who done it" genre. It was like I was in the room, a participant in the drama. It was an epiphany.
I wonder if it would hit me the same way now, if I was reading it for the first time.
Since then, I have read beautiful prose about life and love and humanity. I used to write down lines from books in my journal. "Good words that entered me and became moods, became the quiet fabric of my being"