The Fast From Fun and 2015

Wow, 2015. Here I am, having found my way back to my ambitious blog attempt that I began in 2011, and all I can think is, "how time flies when you're... in graduate school." Not really a good excuse for finding these past four years having gone by far too fast, but then again there isn't a good excuse for it, and we all find ourselves there at one point or another. I don't know where to start again. I don't know how. In fact, I don't know if I have to start anything. Instead, I will pick up here, with what I'm thinking about now. These past four years, more like these last four to six years, I've moved on from my creative side and dived into my logical and intellectual self, going further and further in that direction day by day, it seems. However, I feel like I'm at yet another turning point, looking towards my other self and feeling a pull.

My Apostle has recently begun talking about different aspects of the mind. More accurately and precisely, that there are three governing aspects of your mind; intellect, soul, and spirit. Each have a seat at a table in the center of your mind, each with voice and influence - at least, ideally. They take in information from the natural body, the spiritual realm, other voices, Yahweh's voice, their own desires and fears, and process this information together at the table, to take care of business. In truth, there is usually a dominant voice, and for almost all of us it is either our intellect or our soul; our logic, or our emotions. The spirit has been shut up in many of us since we were very, very young. Possibly, it has even been dormant until that point where we recognize that something which is greater than ourselves, and that there is a way to interact with it. So that leaves us then to consider which aspect has the most power in governing our thoughts and subsequently, our actions. For most of my life, my soul was the loudest one at the table, certainly speaking over my spirit and pretending like rationality didn't even factor into life. That's why I needed to let it die. My soul died.

This was not a happy time. But even at that time, when I was making a series of decisions to endure that fate, to hand my soul over to the executioner, I knew there was more that I wanted - that truth was out there, and if I had any chance of ever experiencing  it, I was going to do whatever it took. And to get there, my soul needed to die. It was all wrong. So loud, so confused, and everything in my life passed through its filter of emotion and expectation, like a kaleidoscope of passion and introspection permanently fixed to my mind's eye. A dizzying experience that brought me high when the colors were pretty, but more often brought me so low, when nothing made sense and all that spinning caused me to fall to my knees, sick. Then I let it die. The process was very long - my soul was strong, and would resurrect itself before it was ready, and it felt betrayed. It culminated, I believe, four and a half years ago, with a long period of apathy concurrent with separation from things I loved, or thought I loved. I refer to this period as my fast from fun. And that was essentially what it felt like. Yet, it was my spirit getting more than a whisper at my table for the first time.

So, what has happened since then? As I mentioned, I've dived deeper into my intellect, a product largely of necessity in my current place as a graduate student in a life sciences program, which right at the onset required a lot of investment just to pass first-year classes. Day one of graduate school, directly post the fast from fun, I felt as great as I had ever felt. I felt my mind was in very close proximity to proper order - a time of lucidity. From that time though, the reality is that my intellect has become the loudest voice, taking upon it's shoulders the majority of tasks in my immediate realm - at least in the natural. In this time I've really lost connection with my soul, I think. And when I feel it bubbling up, I am disgusted, and immediately turn my attention away. I have lost almost all interest in listening to music let alone creating music, writing, reading, and largely engaging emotionally and passionately in general. I am not unhappy, and experiencing less of the highs and lows that I had in the time of the reign of the soul has been a great thing. But I do miss the passion I felt. And things change. Maybe that's what is happening now. I really don't like using the new year in terms of goal making, determined that if I am going to make a change of my own volition it can and should start whenever I have the inclination. Still, coincidentally or not, since the new year I've felt a pull towards some things I've found myself having lost all interest in. Here I am, writing in Hold Strong again.

Consider for yourself what voice has the lead at the meeting within your own mind. For me, I would like it to be my spirit, but as was most certainly intended, I would like them all to have a voice.