Puzzles
Flying thoughts
Calm the mind. Breathe in, breathe out. It is a roller coaster where two characters fight. Constantly. One pulls, the other pulls even harder. Only in different directions, not necessarily opposite ones. Enough to cause turbulence, stress, a sense of restlessness, hurry, chaos. So many pieces of the puzzle — a puzzle — flying around and I trying to catch them all… No, trying to keep them all in the air and catch one at a time while not letting the other ones fall. So clear in my mind, this inner canvas, initially blank, empty, only to become crowded as soon as my eyes open in the morning.
“Calm the mind”, I say. And then I reply, “I am calm”. As if that changed the motion picture running non-stop in this inner theater.
Today, the pieces in the air, the chaotic background, has been really rushing, moving around and around, with my inner voice, the one of reason, claiming seamlessly not to give in, to take it easy, let the pieces fly, they won't fall, and if they do, they won’t go further than the floor, the dark wooden floor in my living room. And when that happens, I only have to pick them up. No need to hurry or feel in a hurry, because they won’t go anywhere. It is an illusion, a sensation, recovery is possible. Nobody is expecting me to do something about it. Nobody asked me to. So why all the tension and hurrying? Why all the restlessness? Can I slow down the film? Can I change the plot and the characters? Or, maybe even easier, can I just sit down and relax while I see them playing and flying around, crashing, pulling, running, falling?
It is as if something is pulling me… pulling my strings and making me do things I didn’t intend or hadn’t planned to do. An external being versus an internal one. An outsider versus an insider?
I was enjoying the image of the thoughts as pieces of a puzzle. A puzzle that can’t be completed in its entirety. You ask me how I know this? I just know. Maybe it will be completed with my death, but even so, it won’t. So many pieces will be missing, so many pieces won’t match any other. Every decision I take, will bring another set of pieces for another puzzle, another universe, another path, another journey. What does it matter wanting to complete a puzzle or at least, a part of it? It will change again, with the next decision, the next change of direction. And it doesn’t take much to change direction and therefore, the whole set of pieces I’m given. The smallest decision will do that. The most insignificant one will do that. No continuity thus, not a constant one in harmony or gender, kind. Continuity exists at the highest level, in the general big picture as time doesn’t stop and keeps moving forward. That is the continuity I can count on. And that means my overall journey from the beginning of my life, my birth, until the end of it, my death…
It is the very first time I mention my death. Maybe I mentioned… The closest I have been to mentioning it was when I wrote I understood why some people want to die. I referred to suicide and understanding its motivation when I, myself, was in a very dark place, dwelling in pain, uncertainty, an unknown world full of shadows and closed doors. Now that I mention matter of factly my death, I am quite surprised at myself. The flow of thoughts is so intense that it doesn’t allow me to feel deeply what I write and that is very likely the reason why, my death, these two words, ended up on this piece of writing in so an impersonal manner. So cold. So dry. So black and white.
Written in May 2021
Picture: Door detail, Sintra (Portugal)
