IT is not expected of critics as it is of poets that they should help us to make sense of our lives; they are bound only to attempt the lesser feat of making sense of the ways we try to make sense of our lives...especially at a moment in history when it may be harder than ever to accept the precedents of sense-making—to believe that any earlier way of satisfying one's need to know the shape of life in relation to the perspectives of time will suffice. - The Sense of an Ending
A guiding light
There exists a light that forever persists, one that witnesses every long gestation period that breaks through the soil, casting everything in its shade.
But how do we find ourselves toward its nurturing luminescence?
Acts as simple as welcoming new members into a community are not merely reflections of days gone by but a light into our future. It's through this act of kindness that we create the future we set out to grow around us. More luminescence.
The unique gift of intuition is something humanity has always wrestled with and the limits to what a deeper level of knowing can do.
We aren't merely beings of the present; we're perpetually drawn toward what lies ahead, and that light forever persists if you look for it.
A tapestry of time and endings
In my constant pursuit, I face the imposing spectacle of the "end." While certain chapters might seem overwhelming, I've concluded it's crucial to differentiate these transient endings from the ultimate "end."
The distinction between the "end" of a chapter and the profound "end" offers some clarity and purpose. Even seeing through a "dreaming lens," time renders every event, person, and chapter significant to the "story."
At the heart of this viewpoint lies progression, viewing events as they transition from past to present and onward into the future.
Mostly running analog to each other.
What are we saying when we say that we are living in an Age of Crisis, and that our crises are radically different than those of the past? Should we accept such statements as accurate descriptions of our "age," or should we ask about the nature and usefulness of the statements themselves? It would seem that we prefer to accept them: the most fashionable theories today (those, for example, of Marshall McLuhan and Michel Foucault) are theories of historical discontinuities, of human time as punctuated by massive cultural mutations. But for Frank Kermode, professor of English at the University of Bristol and a former editor of Encounter, "crisis is a way of thinking about one's moment, and not inherent in the moment itself."
Indeed, Kermode argues that our apocalyptic views of disorder, of crisis and perpetual transition in the contemporary world are contemporary ways of making sense of the world, of giving it an intelligible order. They are variations on a paradigm of sense-making statements which are constant in human history.
"The Sense of an Ending" is a brief history of the paradigm and some of its variations. Kermode's book is an impressively learned, eloquent and brilliant defense of a non-schismatic view of human time. "At some very low level"- biological or psychological- "we all share certain fictions about time, and they testify to the continuity of what is called human nature." Man's position existentially is intermediary; he is born and dies "in the middle of things." What Kermode calls "fictions" (in both literature and the rest of life) are those "coherent patterns" which, by providing or implying an ending, "make possible a satisfying consonance with the origins and with the middle." These temporal fictions "humanize the common death" and allow us to coexist with temporal chaos.
As my gaze shifts, self-awareness intertwines with the knowledge of frightening conclusions. Then, as we play the tape...these thoughts shape my actions, decisions, and interactions, reinforcing that the journey through life is far from passive, instead marked by purpose and intention.
Finding the guiding light becomes even more crucial in this scenario. Because time is no simple construct. It's enriched by our self-awareness, cultural, and philosophical imprints.
Lately, I've come to appreciate the complex interweaving of my perceptions of time – a dance between guiding light aspirations and the repetitive scenarios that gift me a compass for navigating this space.
Together, it demonstrate the value of growth, understanding, and patience in embracing "end" moments. They also serve as a reminder that the most fruitful moments often favor those wrapped with patience, wisdom, intuition, and a guiding light.
Coexisting until the “end.”
One must pass through the circumference of time before arriving at the center of opportunity. - Baltasar Gracián
