Richard Pierce

Richard Pierce – author, poet, painter

Life

Day 207

Let’s start the day the right way round for once. The last few days I’ve been going to bed and getting up again, and staying up much too late. I’ve been too negative, railing against the end of summer already, which is ridiculous. The summer holidays here have only just begun, and summer, in the old (and right) way of measuring the seasons, goes on until almost the end of September. Just because we’ve had a great holiday (and have been back for three weeks) doesn’t, and mustn’t, mean that summer is gone. And I have to accept, right here, right now, that the English summer is different from Southern European summers. As simple as that. I do know what else has got me thinking so negatively, so I need to put that to one side, or at least try to. Smartphones have a lot to answer for, and our addiction to them is really counter-productive.

The sun is shining, for the minute, the air is fresh, which is refreshing, and I’m trying to wake up my mind by coming straight in here and sitting down and writing straightaway. I just looked over a poem I wrote after midnight this morning, and suffice to say it will never see the light of day. When output is high, some of it will be garbage.

We did have a conversation yesterday about how easy it is to feel trapped by life, by the vicious circle of having dreams but needing enough money to make them come real, and then being imprisoned in the need to keep earning money so that the dreams actually gradually fade. But it doesn’t need to be like that. There has to be a balance somewhere. And over the last few days (weeks) I’ve forgotten what probably is the most important lesson of therapy – that the middle ground is the most fertile. I’ve been veering off into that country where everything is black and white, indulging in the extremes, and in that land lies self-destruction, actually. So I’m going to make an effort to pull it back, to tread the middle path where I feel more settled and happy, where real fulfilment lies.

We make a mistake when we think life owes us something, a mistake when we expect things to change without us changing, when we expect our paths to change without us changing direction. Even if we are of faith, we can’t expect whatever gods we believe in to be the sole makers of our destiny. Our destiny is in our hands, perhaps not entirely, and I need to grab a firm hold of mine.

Compromise is not a weakness; it’s a strength. And, most of the time, compromise is the only way to realise our dreams.

 

AGGIE’S ART OF HAPPINESS – CHAPTER 160

 

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