Forgive me, James, because I am going to rattle on a bit to try and sort out what I want to say. Every time we write something and send it out into the world, we take a risk. A risk that others will not understand us, might even attack us for our views. But along side that risk is the fact that others will take something completely different away - perhaps something we may not have thought of. And often, we may never know how our words impact others. And I just want to say that I have been in a bit of a low, dark place for a while, and this line really spoke to me today. Thank you for that. I wanted to say more but i can't quite get there. Something about being autistic and camouflaging and how shame has a habit of getting compounded when we compare ourselves to the pain of others. And especially when we have what so many others crave - financial security in my case.
WAIT. I think I have found what I wanted to say in a quote: Philosopher John Macmurray explains one of the dilemmas of life:
“In imagination we feel sure that it would be lovely to live with a full and rich awareness of the world. But in practice, sensitiveness hurts. It is not possible to develop the capacity to see beauty without developing also the capacity to see ugliness, for they are the same capacity. The capacity for joy is also the capacity for pain. We soon find that any increase in our sensitiveness to what is lovely in the world increases also our capacity for being hurt. That is the dilemma in which life has placed us. We must choose between a life that is thin and narrow, uncreative and mechanical, with the assurance that even if it is not very exciting it will not be intolerably painful; and a life in which the increase in its fullness and creativeness brings a vast increase in delight, but also in pain and hurt.”
Oh dear. I did go on. I'm tempted to delete this now because I think I was writing for me, more than for you! Oh what the heck. I'll click that green button. Who knows. Maybe someone else will get something from this. A🙏
