Marylinn Kelly: Saying no to foolish consistency

Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Adjustments and revisions

Time is a dressmaker specializing in alterations. ~Faith Baldwin

The ability to change our minds has to be one of the great gifts of being assigned life in human form. There is no rule or requirement that we continue to be who we were yesterday. If we can't change our spots, we can alter the way in which we judge them.

Revisions, adjustments, reconsiderations and about-faces are not signs of uncertainty but of awareness. I know discomfort is quantifiable and our wish to escape it, universal. Nothing else works quite as well as doing something - or everything - differently.

Think of these words as a kiss on the forehead, a blessing to go forward with a growing suspicion that not all of this is engraved on non-returnable marble. We are allowed, without being fined for littering, to leave ill-fitting notions, opinions, by the side of the road. Many of them will reappear to haunt and hector when we are vulnerable, but their visits will grown less frequent, their forms less substantial.

It may be foolishness taken to the extreme, but I have grown to believe that life, and our untidy, idiosyncratic ways of living it, are not meant to be sources of chronic disappointment. Whether we find happiness because of or in spite of our circumstances, a measure of peace and optimism is the goal.

Regardless of what you've heard or where you heard it, there is no such thing as too old to change. A feeble excuse at best, I can no longer even sell it to myself.

11 comments:

Angella Lister said...: Marylinn, you are a modern philosopher and this post is exactly EXACTLY what i needed to hear today. Every word here is simply perfect, thank you.; November 22, 2011 at 11:08 AM
Laoch of Chicago said...: Well said.; November 22, 2011 at 11:52 AM
Marylinn Kelly said...: Angella - Thank you. I am always reassured to know what is tugging at me is also loitering on the doorsteps of others. xo; November 22, 2011 at 3:32 PM
Marylinn Kelly said...: Laoch - Thank you. Happy Thanksgiving.; November 22, 2011 at 3:32 PM
Yvette said...: I'm trying to agree completely. Definitely trying. :)

Ah, what the heck, I do agree. You're never too old. I think sometimes I bash myself over the head with that and wonder if I mean it. Especially when I'm feeling especially fed up.

Enjoyed reading your well thought out post. Really.; November 22, 2011 at 3:49 PM
Yvette said...: And by the way, forgot to add: Have a GREAT THANKSGIVING!; November 22, 2011 at 3:50 PM
Elisabeth said...: I've been thinking about the need for change, too, Marylinn so I find your post helpful. It's so important to remain flexible and not to resist the inevitability of change, but to embrace it.; November 22, 2011 at 6:06 PM
Marylinn Kelly said...: Yvette - Thank you. No, when I try to tell myself some of the reasons (read: excuses) why change is no longer possible, I am not very convincing. Happy Thanksgiving to you. We will be enjoying our holiday video fest.; November 22, 2011 at 7:56 PM
Marylinn Kelly said...: Elisabeth - Thank you. My feeling, too, which is why the quote was so appealing: alterations go on forever.; November 22, 2011 at 7:58 PM
Claire Beynon said...: Another wonderful post, dear Marylinn.

Change (and sometimes we know this only once we are through it) is vital, a gift, our human imperative?

Yesterday, I heard the words 'Happiness is a result of gratitude, not the other way round. . . ' So much begins and ends in gratitude - and so much, in wonder. I lose sight of these truths at times but deep in my bones I know. Thanks for this permission-giving message, Marylinn, esp. 'We are allowed, without being fined for littering, to leave ill-fitting notions, opinions, by the side of the road. Many of them will reappear to haunt and vector when we are vulnerable, but their visits will grow less frequent, their forms less substantial. . . '. Yes, and thank you.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING dear friend. xo; November 25, 2011 at 8:52 AM
Marylinn Kelly said...: Claire - Thank you. Oh, it took me so long to learn that it all begins with gratitude, for every thing, in every moment. And when we notice the gifts, we find wonder and love. We have more choices than we realize, certainly more than I realized, and began to choose points of view, beliefs, emotions that made everything less fraught. If we never had those moments of conscious forgetting, we would be sages, holy women, not the creatures who go about turning over rocks with sticks that we are. Love to you, Marylinn; November 25, 2011 at 11:48 AM