Heroes Not Zombies

In my monthly themes, February is the month of love. It was, therefore, serendipitous that, on the train, on my way to work this morning, I read about the four different words the Ancient Greeks had for love.

Eros, for physical love, sensual love, the love we feel in our bodies.

Storge, for affectionate love, the love we feel in our hearts.

Philia, mental, or intellectual love, the love we feel in our heads.

Agape, unconditional love, the love we feel in our souls.

It’s nice to take these four concepts and relate them to the four elements – Earth (body), Fire (heart), Water (head), Air (soul)

So, here’s a great exploration for you this month, the month of love – reflect each day and maybe write in your journal, or take a photo, or sketch a drawing, paint, or make a playlist of music which captures, or at least suggests, for YOU, the sensuality of the love you feel with your body, the affection which is heart felt, the conscious love of your thoughts and your intellect, or the times when you feel that soul connection with a person, a place, or some other….

By the end of the month, you’ll have a wonderful collection of memories and inspirations which connect you to the essential Earth, Fire, Water and Air of Life and Love.

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In the A – Z of Becoming, the fifth verb, is EXPLORE.

Targets, goals and plans……how do you set off into the future? Do you set yourself some targets or goals? Do you draw up a detailed plan? Or do you decide what or where you would like to go and explore?

What’s the difference?

Well, think of taking a walk over the hills. You can either work out in advance where to start from, where to finish, and which particular path on the map you will follow. Or you can decide where to start, but then decide which particular paths to take, and where you would like to go, once you are there.

Or think of going to a gallery. Maybe you hear about a particular work of art (Rodin’s The Kiss has been on display in the Galleries of Scotland in Edinburgh in recent weeks) and you decide to go and see it. So you plan your trip, go to the gallery, ask at the door where the particular work of art is being displayed and then follow the floor plan to go and see the work you want to see. Or instead you can decide to go the gallery for a few hours and wander around…..explore the rooms you’ve never been in before, see the works of art you’ve never seen before, or stumble over some old familiar works you haven’t seen for years.

For my next holiday in France, I’ve booked a flight, and a hire car. But that’s all. We’re going to explore an area we’re not familiar with, and might find our way into some neighbouring areas to see some old friends, some previously visited towns. I like these explorations. You can’t predict what you might find.

Exploring isn’t the only way to encounter life, but it is a different way. It maximises serendipity, surprise and wonder.

What, or where, might you begin to explore this week?

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Fear drains the colour from our world, hope paints it back.

Fear is used in such a controlling way in our world…..it’s the major tool used to produce conformity, uniformity, compliance, and obedience. Yet no life can be lived without hope.

Every day that’s my job….to help dispel fear, and instill hope.

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In the A to Z of Becoming, the third verb is C, for “choose”

Choose….hmmm, what will I write about choosing? I’ve got a few ideas rattling round my brain, so I’m going to share several of them, and then YOU can choose which inspire you most, or which you want to explore further for yourself.

The first thing I thought about was “choice theory” – the work of William Glasser. I like Glasser’s emphasis on how we create our own experience of reality through the choices we make. I like how he rejects the “external control theory” which suggests we are just puppets or automatons having our buttons pushed. I like his holistic approach to psychology, and, most of all I like his emphasis on verbs.

Secondly, I thought of how empowering it is to move your brain from default reactive mode, to response mode, and how a crucial step in developing that skill is to consciously, mindfully make choices. In reactive mode, we are pretty much on autopilot, blindly following the scripts of others, and it can feel like that. It can feel like we are the trapped victims of circumstances, of society, of others’ choices. Developing response mode, creates that little gap (see “getting neutral“) which allows us to become more conscious of what is happening, and, thereby, to take the opportunity to choose which response we want to make.

Thirdly, I thought of “Amor Fati”, the ancient teaching to “love your Fate”, which is actually advice to fully accept and enjoy the reality of the present, rather than suffering through wishing things weren’t the way they are (see the “suffering gap”)

Fourthly, I thought of choosing a path (like in the photo above which I took in a garden in Japan), and of how every path takes a different route, even if it leads to the same destination. I saw a TV programme during the holidays in December where a regular rambler walked from the West to the East of Scotland up in the far North. He came across countless old drovers paths (where the cattlemen would drive their cattle from the Highlands down to the markets in the South), and shepherd’s paths, and the paths the crofters would take to go from one croft to another, and the hiking routes, and…..well, you get the idea……the wild, open, sparsely populated areas of Scotland are criss-crossed by a myriad of paths, so when you want to walk from one coast to another, you have plenty of choices. Each of those choices will bring its own experiences and its own discoveries.

Fifthly, I thought of how sometimes I deliberately choose to walk down a different road, or to visit a different cafe, or to catch a different train, just to wake myself up and keep me aware that today is indeed a unique and amazing day.

Does any of this inspire you?

Which of these five explorations of choosing appeals to you most?

Which will you choose today?

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