I came across this image by Manhattan-based writer and illustrator Maira Kalman via Maria Popova, one of my favourite bloggers.
I, too, ask myself this, with tears in my eyes: how are we all so brave? Because, God, we trip. The whole of humanity is constantly tripping and hurting and failing and trying to make things better.
Since I was kid, I’ve done this thing – spontaneously – where I rise above myself and everyone and I’m suddenly looking down on us all like one might look down on ants. There we are, doing our thing, finding purpose and meaning in it all when, in our guts, we know it’s neither purposeful or meaningful.
Yet. Day after day we get up and keep trying, like an ant that will keep trying to find a route back to home base when you block it’s way with a stick or your foot. Over and over.
We are amazing in our tenacity and in our ability to keep the hope alive. Kalman’s image captures this intriguing moment in the human experience so wonderfully, don’t you think?
Yes, we are all so Brave, maybe too brave and too tenacious sometimes
We just keep going, and trying, and it can be exhausting and at times soul-debilitating. I don’t find it hard to keep going, I find it hard to stop and change direction.
3 significantly devastating things have happened in the last couple of months, and I am being brave and still going…struggling on, but the air is thick and I have promised myself that in late October that no matter what happens, I will stop and take a reprieve. Not quite sure how (a local retreat or an o/seas trip), but I will take time out, and then change direction…rather than just taking step-after-step day-after-day…start moving towards the life I want to be living. Thanks for another lovely post Sarah x
[Reply]
after visiting the holocaust museum in tel aviv, i will never again doubt the immensity of a human’s endurance and tenacity.
i’m glad you’ve retained that awareness of the universe, that observatory power…i do the same and always felt like a peculiar person. it’s good to not be alone.
thank you for being you.
[Reply]
Those moments where you are fully smacked in the gut with the knowledge that it’s neither purposeful or meaningful are hard.
I remember as kid having those moments from time to time, and feeling it as a physical pain in my sternum, and being completely, utterly unable to articulate myself and what I was feeling. Just simply overcome with the futility of it all. I’d tell my mum that I felt sick or that I couldn’t sleep or something, so that she’d give me a hug or make me a hot milo, but really, I was just having my first experiences with this particular exquisite agony…
Some people don’t seem to feel it ever, some all-too-frequently. Back when I had depression, I couldn’t *stop* feeling it. Which was pretty awful.
But bravery in others – and sometimes even bravery in myself – does inspire me. Or at least allows me to beat down the feeling one more time…
[Reply]
This seemed a serendipitous piece to come out on the same day as your column. Ted Hughes on our universal inner child.
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/09/12/ted-hughes-inner-child-letter/
[Reply]
September 13th, 2012 at 2:26 pm
Indeed. I just read it. Last paragraph:
“The only calibration that counts is how much heart people invest, how much they ignore their fears of being hurt or caught out or humiliated. And the only thing people regret is that they didn’t live boldly enough, that they didn’t invest enough heart, didn’t love enough. Nothing else really counts at all.”
[Reply]
September 13th, 2012 at 5:56 pm
Loved this article..thAnks for sharing Andrew
[Reply]
Very timely post for me. Today I saw something that literally made me fall to my knees as if I had been kicked in the guts…. I tripped. Yet I picked myself up took a deep breath and decided to be brave and to keep going, not sure if I can keep up the bravery for long but today I refuse to be kicked down.
[Reply]
I don’t feel brave. I feel like an emo sack of crap most of the time for thinking about all this way too much, and getting upset by it all, while people walk around completely oblivious that anything is out of the ordinary.
In relation to Lizzy’s comment about the holocaust museum in Tel Aviv, I had a similar experience in Prague, at the Jewish quarter. I agree with her feelings, it makes you amazed at humanity’s endurance.
[Reply]
September 13th, 2012 at 5:49 pm
That you engage and comment here so openly is brave. I think.
[Reply]
September 13th, 2012 at 8:36 pm
R U OK Mia?
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 12:06 am
Nice Esmerelda!
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 2:15 pm
Aww
It is my honour to share The Very Inspiring Blogger Award with you. Stop by and pick it up at http://www.sallykirkman.com/blog/the-very-inspiring-blogger-award. I’m sharing the love.
[Reply]
Yes, it is thoroughly amazing that we do keep going despite the continuous kicks and trips we might get.
Like Selena, I too find it difficult to stop and take a breath, to stop being brave and just admit that sometimes it is all too much, too hard, too sad.
It took an extremely difficult loss to knock me down and actually take time to grieve. But what I find so incredible is that I have been able to see that there is beauty,love,life worth living, despite having the rug pulled out from under me,not once, but again and again.
I think that is what gives us courage – the beautiful things, the love that we have for one another, the compassion.
Again, thank you Sarah. Your blog is a beacon of light.
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 10:50 am
Thanks Angie, this post elicited a few tears. I am at the point of wanting change; I have realised that the current situation is too much & too hard….but it was your words “too sad” that really hit a chord with me. I can, and have tried to, push through in the past when things are too much and too hard, but the current situation is terrbily sad and warrants time for grieving.
I agree with you about what gives us courage; the last few weeks I have gained a heightened awareness of the depth of close friendships, warmth of family members and compassion that comes from near strangers.
[Reply]
Most of the time, i find it all too difficult to pick myself up and keep marching. I’ve given up. I realized the futility of it all and can’t bring myself to keep going. I tripped and now I’m stuck on the floor and here I sit unable to continue. I wish i could go back to the ignorance because these days everything is just too hard for me.
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 12:15 am
Alanna, from afar, can I suggest a nice read, to make you feel a little less alone? Man’s Search for Meaning by Victor Frankl. I’ve written about it on my blog…
[Reply]
I get this feeling too. It only comes when I’m painting though. When I paint I can think about life, friends and faith, and this thought pops up now and then. Thank you for showing me that I’m not alone in my deep thoughts!
[Reply]
Wow wee- I have had these feelings since being a child too. Have it more now as an adult. Never before have I seen someone describe it. I always think
Of stuff like this? Life purpose etc but I look around and everyone else is just getting on with their daily things. I might grab myself a copy of that book you recommended Sarah. Thankyou so much for this post! It’s nice knowing there are others that know this feeling, I’ve always thought maybe I just take things too deep sometimes. Cassie
[Reply]
I do not beleive it takes bravery to live life on daily basis. Resilience but not bravery. If you need to be brave on a daily basis then you are making very hard work of life. Bravery, in my opinion, should be reserved for the extordinary events such as war, bushfires, major life threatening illness etc. If you need bravery everyday how do you find the additional strength and fight when you may really need it?
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 11:57 am
Bravery and courage is different for everyone. For some it’s brave to go to the shops, for some to try a new food taste, for some to ride a bike for some to jump out of a perfectly good aeroplane.
I have learned what I take for granted is difficult for others and vice versa.
Yes to resilience and yes to reserves of courage for great deeds when called upon. but it often is the incremental small surefooted steps that ensure we can call on the reserves when need them.
This post reminds me of it’s not what happens but how we respond to it. Do we shrivel and retreat or become more human, compassionate and more alive?
Love the illustration and the post. Kalman is great
[Reply]
What a moving post! As an older woman I can relate to those words, however, I really do believe that our lives have purpose and meaning. What has made life worthwhile for me in a very tangible way is my children and now my grandchildren. I sometimes feel I live only for the times that they may need me. They are my main reason, every day, for getting up and working hard to stay healthy. If I did not have them, I would care for others. There are so many who need a helping hand and a shoulder to lean on. I believe we are all here, our purpose, to live out the life we need to live, no matter how long or how hard, in order to fulfill our soul’s destiny.
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 1:33 pm
Oh, Brenda. What beautiful words. I agree with you. I too find most meaning in my children, my family and friends. Life, for me now, boils down to loving and connecting. So I sometimes have to plod, or wade or stagger through the days to be ready and available for those precious moments. Mostly, I try to be grateful for things and not take anything for granted. Often, I fail. But then my son hugs me, or my husband thanks me or a friend says something lovely on Facebook. That’s meaningful to me.
[Reply]
September 14th, 2012 at 1:35 pm
“If I did not have them, I would care for others.” beautiful!
[Reply]
I love Maira Kalman so much. I wrote about my favourite illustration of hers here: https://whereissarah.wordpress.com/2011/12/04/my-secret-treasure/
P.s. “There we are, doing our thing, finding purpose and meaning in it all when, in our guts, we know it’s neither purposeful or meaningful.” Just beautiful.
[Reply]
[...] Sarah Wilson posts about Maira Kalma. [...]
Unfortunately our modern materialistic intellectual thinking is leading to some dead ends for us, individually and collectively with more to come it seems.
Life is absolutely purposeful and meaningful. If one observes,one sees patterns. Even science is testifying to some laws of the universe.
There is sunlight outside the cave we’re stuck in.
To say that ‘there is no meaning or purpose’ is a self assumption that one has learnt enough to decide, which is a kind of conceit fueled by some sense of seperation. In a sense to say this statement, represents a brave honesty that one really doesn’t know much and can be a basis of moving forward towards truth and meaning.
If one lives from the heart one can feel the meaning if not understand it always,
[Reply]
September 15th, 2012 at 2:41 pm
Ah, Trevor you’re a wise man. Too few people like you…
[Reply]
It is easy to fly high, but I don’t like falling at all, but I do. I take skin off all the time, a metephor of course. what is really important to me is, that I’m able to get up again and fight the next round. I look for that quality in others too. But it is just as important to help others that are struggling to get up after they have fallen.
[Reply]
[...] How are we all so brave? Powerful post that I needed to read this [...]
Wow. This is wonderful. So brave and broken, all of us, all the time. Yes. xox
[Reply]
To put it as simply as, the purpose and meaning of life is to ‘make the world a better place’ for everyone. We seem to know this in our unconscious mind but in our conscious minds we are preoccupied mostly with our selfcentredness due to the predominant thinking and behaviours preceding us. So it’s going to take some new thinking. If we can align our unconscious and conscious minds in the purpose then we can ignite our Being and really live life full of energy and meaning. Otherwise we are mostly groping and hoping in the dark,
[Reply]