Welcome to Day 26 of the July Intensity Project!
31 Days Toward Living with More Intensity & Creativity
Kazimierz Dabrowski offers this advice, of particular importance in our busy, sensory-overloaded 21st century life, for those in the midst of the emotional and “creative tension” we discussed yesterday:
“[A] great help at this stage may be an isolation in peaceful conditions, which helps to order one’s sensations by an interruption of actual sensations and by a deepening of certain elements of the internal milieu. The condition of ‘satiating oneself’ in such an internal ‘constellation’ with plastic sensations, music, and primarily calmness would be compatible with the impressions and opinions of Aldous Huxley as to the importance of these sensations for the spiritual life of man.”
Finding that quiet time and spot, away from distractions and “actual sensations” allows us to “order one’s sensations,” to make sense of them and put them in perspective, to deepen our intensity rather than watch it spin out of control. However, such ordering is impossible when we are bombarded by external stimuli, the noise and rush and blur of everyday life.
Where do you find isolation in peaceful conditions? The photos in this post are from my family’s farm in South Dakota, where I grew up and visited last weekend. Whether I am there in the flesh, or visit in my memory and imagination, I always experience that interruption and ordering that Dabrowski mentions.
On a more frequent basis, bedtime also is a source of isolation in peaceful conditions. I go to bed rather early, in part because I seem to need my full eight (or more) hours of shuteye, and in part because I love those moments in bed, before falling asleep, when I can think about my day, free from responsibilities and action and interruption.
“Night, the beloved. Night, when words fade and things come alive. When the destructive analysis of day is done, and all that is truly important becomes whole and sound again. When man reassembles his fragmentary self and grows with the calm of a tree.” ~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Related Posts:
- Reflections on Being Away from Normal
- The Slower Choice
- Slowing Down, Changing Directions
- Who Would Be a Turtle? More on Slowing Down
Previous July Intensity Project Posts
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My hubby took me camping up in the Boundary Waters of northern Minnesota and it such an amazing time for reflection and getting in touch with nature. My only interaction (aside from my hubby) was bathing next to a moose in the lake–it didn’t even seem to care that I was there! We want to take the kids when they’re a little older, because it’s such a magical place (even w/ the mosquitoes).
I haven’t been to the Boundary Waters, but I have seen photos that friends took there–breathtaking images. Bathing with a moose would be a great scene in a short story!