For the past few days I have written, deleted, re-written, deleted...and ultimately walked away from my computer. Sometimes, it seems, there are just too many thoughts flyin' around in my head and everything gets all crazied up. Twisted and rambling and a mass of bramble....just like the blackberry bushes on that little piece of Paradise I once occupied. I used to try to tame them. Each time I tried, I'd end up with blood running down my arms and legs...and a feeling of defeat. Until I got a pig.
HUH?
Turns out that pigs can eat those brambles (and the berries, of course) with nary a scratch. Not sure how that works, but it does. So...I got a pig to help with the mess.
When I got up this morning, I remembered. I remembered how excited I was to learn that a pig could get the job done...and I'd have yet another critter to love. Double bonus. So I'm laying in bed, thinking about that pig and somehow there was a correlation. The pig and my writings. The correlation was a stretch. But then...that's kinda how my brain works.
I know. Weird, huh? What can I say? It is what it is.
So what was the correlation? It occurred to me that before I got the pig I was trying to do something that was beyond my capacity. I didn't have the proper tools nor did I understand the under-workings of the blackberries. It was all too large a job for one little Human. If you've ever been to that part of the country (the Great Pacific Northwest) you know what I mean. I'm tellin' ya, those things are everywhere. And they do this thing where they grow straight up...and then the weight of the branch falls to the ground whereby it then re-roots itself. So, by the time they've grown for a season or so, they're this kind of natural barbed wire. It's really quite impressive. Also quite impossible to undo.
Unless you have a pig.
You see, the pig has some kind of natural talent, if you will. It can eat the berries, root out the roots, and walk away with its belly full and no blood running off its limbs. You could say that those berries are a metaphor for the brain's inner workings. There's just so much going on that getting to the root(s) is like tanglin' with those thorny brambles. Just a big bloody mess. But if we can walk away and allow 'something else' to do the job, pretty soon the mess isn't a mess anymore. It is simply food for that 'something else'. The something else is...
Spirit.
I believe that all too often we rely on our intellect to get the job done. At least that's how it seems to work for me. I try to use my brain to figure stuff out. And when I've rammed my head on that brick wall for too long, I wind up with knots on my head and nothing to show for the pain. But when I can take that moment to step away...and get my brain to shut up...the solutions arrive without so much as a stitch of effort. PRESTO! Problem solved.
Einstein said that no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. In other words, we must change our perspective in order to find the solution. And so, this morning, that little pig came to me and whispered in my ear. She told me to stop thinking and start feeling. She stuck her tongue in my ear and giggled. She said "wee wee wee" all the way home.
HUH?
Turns out that pigs can eat those brambles (and the berries, of course) with nary a scratch. Not sure how that works, but it does. So...I got a pig to help with the mess.
When I got up this morning, I remembered. I remembered how excited I was to learn that a pig could get the job done...and I'd have yet another critter to love. Double bonus. So I'm laying in bed, thinking about that pig and somehow there was a correlation. The pig and my writings. The correlation was a stretch. But then...that's kinda how my brain works.
I know. Weird, huh? What can I say? It is what it is.
So what was the correlation? It occurred to me that before I got the pig I was trying to do something that was beyond my capacity. I didn't have the proper tools nor did I understand the under-workings of the blackberries. It was all too large a job for one little Human. If you've ever been to that part of the country (the Great Pacific Northwest) you know what I mean. I'm tellin' ya, those things are everywhere. And they do this thing where they grow straight up...and then the weight of the branch falls to the ground whereby it then re-roots itself. So, by the time they've grown for a season or so, they're this kind of natural barbed wire. It's really quite impressive. Also quite impossible to undo.
Unless you have a pig.
You see, the pig has some kind of natural talent, if you will. It can eat the berries, root out the roots, and walk away with its belly full and no blood running off its limbs. You could say that those berries are a metaphor for the brain's inner workings. There's just so much going on that getting to the root(s) is like tanglin' with those thorny brambles. Just a big bloody mess. But if we can walk away and allow 'something else' to do the job, pretty soon the mess isn't a mess anymore. It is simply food for that 'something else'. The something else is...
Spirit.
I believe that all too often we rely on our intellect to get the job done. At least that's how it seems to work for me. I try to use my brain to figure stuff out. And when I've rammed my head on that brick wall for too long, I wind up with knots on my head and nothing to show for the pain. But when I can take that moment to step away...and get my brain to shut up...the solutions arrive without so much as a stitch of effort. PRESTO! Problem solved.
Einstein said that no problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it. In other words, we must change our perspective in order to find the solution. And so, this morning, that little pig came to me and whispered in my ear. She told me to stop thinking and start feeling. She stuck her tongue in my ear and giggled. She said "wee wee wee" all the way home.
