Ten-Finger Exercises

A good day is when you learn something

I started to write, "A good day is when you learn something new," but then I thought of all the times I've had to learn something over and over. And that statement isn't true either, because I can't begin to remember all the times--there are far too many.

What I learned new today was "Save and Edit!" doesn't mean what I thought it did. I didn't expect to see yesterday's paragraph A writer writes... printed out in my blog yet; thought it was just hovering there in the miasma until I had a complete thought in my head to record and then entered it. Oops.

So, ahem, to continue yesterday's thought re ideas...

The application I was filling out asked my strengths and weaknesses in writing. What I was trying to capture is my difficulty coming up with story ideas apart from prompts, ones that are larger than the snapshots of flash fiction.

It does seem to me that wanting to write makes little sense unless I have something I want to write about, some story burning in me or theme I feel compelled to embody with characters and situations. And I think it's down there, I just can't quite grasp it. Like nailing jello to a wall. (Not original, but isn't it apropos?)

I would even hope there's more than one story inside me; but, like the task of untangling the balled up mess of fishing line when you've put your thumb down on the spinning reel too soon, it's hard to know where to start.

One place I thought of starting is my growing dissatisfaction with my job. It isn't because so few of my patients are Christian--Lord knows that isn't the reason! It is partly because, and this isn't nice to admit, many of them are unable to interact or respond at all, due to advanced disease or, more often, advanced senility. I hear the nurses and social workers and the other chaplain talk about how sweet so-and-so is, and how they just love her, and I don't feel much at all. Unless there's family there to get to know, or to hear about the patient from, then there's no reciprocity, and I need some of that. Sure, as they say, "Whose needs are you there to meet anyway? Your own?" Well, if I even had any sense I was meeting theirs, that might meet mine; but I seldom do.

That's still not getting to the heart of the matter. It's deeper than that, and has something to do with my belief, all these years, that there is common ground among most all people in the area of spirituality. Religious words, beliefs and attitudes often get in the way of thinking and talking about the really important things, but I thought most people at least wondered about them.

Here are some of the things I thought people who were dying would wonder about:

         Is there any point to life?

         What is/was the point of my living here and now?

         Was there something I was supposed to do, and did I do it?

         Is there something I still need to do?
(That is an especially important question for a person who has lived longer than the doctor expected.)

         How can I tie up the loose ends and be ready to die when _______?
(Fill in the blank: I'm so young; I have no one to help me; My husband/children need me; I never got a chance to do what I really wanted.)

         What's it all about, Alfie?

         Should I have done such-and-such, and would I be dying now if I had?
          Why did so-and-so treat me like he/she did?
         What did I ever do to deserve this?

Okay, that's one point, but the line isn't untangled yet. I believed that people wanted the same things, the old whatchamacallit pyramid of needs that begins with food and water and shelter. Maslow's hierarchy of needs, that's it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs

The top of that pyramid is "Self-actualization", and the top of that list is self-transcendence. That's the place where I think that everyone, regardless of religious orientation or lack of one, have something in common. At least all thinking, responsible people who are guided by concern for the world and the people in it, who have some sense of a social and personal ideal to work toward. I'm getting lost here, in the middle of the amorphous cloud of birds that keeps changing directions. (See previous entry if you are mystified by that allusion.)

I'm still not capturing what I'm trying to say, but it is interesting to me that in suddenly thinking of Maslow and looking him up, I found he had encountered difficulty with his own theory when he came to the self-transcendent part.

I'll have to do some more thinking about this, but I'll leave it for now with this thought. I believe in God. That is to say, in non-religious terms, I believe there is a force that moves us toward good, sometimes compelling, sometimes impelling, but greater than ourselves.