Here in this blog, I'd like to continue writing about how I realized, overtime, how my experience and perspective of something or someone changes such as -- how my experience and perspective of certain holidays change (like Christmas). When I was a child, I loved Christmas because Christmas was a holiday that I expected to receive gifts on. Also, it is a time where I was around family more than any other holiday (except for Thanksgiving which is equivalent in relation to celebrating Thanksgiving with family). Growing up though, there are new experiences that I live through, and with those new experiences come new realizations about life, things, and people in general. And you start to realize how 'fear of survival' makes up a big part of life, and also Christmas.
For instance, growing up, I realized that it takes money to buy gifts, and where does that money come from? It can come from several sources such as working for a company / establishment in order to earn the money, developing a business, or making investments, and earning money from that. So a 'fear of survival' point in relation to money is that I have to either work and then budget the money that I worked for to be able to buy the necessary amount of gifts for the holidays, or that I will have to put in more hours to be able to make the necessary amount of money to buy gifts, and within working more, my need for budgeting my income decreases, and so there is less 'stress' on that end, but the 'stress' is then 'transferred' to the point of having to 'work more'. So there is, essentially, a lot of compromises that have to taken place in order to create financial, temporal, social 'balance', etc. for Christmas to exist as a stable holiday. And what is the very thing that has become our reason for celebrating the holidays? It is the holiday itself because if the holiday didn't exist on the specified day that it exists on, then it wouldn't be celebrated because there would be no reference-point for it on the calendar.
A question that I pose is why is it that each and every day is not equal to Christmas from the perspective of giving to each other gifts that will support us, being with family more, and having the time to relax or do things that one enjoys doing? It is because Christmas has become a day that represents a 'balance' in relation to 'fear of survival', but not a 'true' balance in relation to how we can all be supported in aways that are best for everyone.
If you have a look at the movie 'Into the Storm', there is a man that was taken up into a tornado and saw the 'eye' of the storm which is the place where the storm is most calm and stable. This would be equal to Christmas being the 'eye' of the 'storm' which (the 'eye of the storm') is 'fear of survival'. Once Christmas and New Years Day is over, then we go right back into the 'storm' which is busting our asses to be able to 'survive' / 'make ends meet'.
So this is one thing that I realized about Christmas in relation to how it is a holiday that represents what we want out of 'life' which are gifts, time with ourselves / our family, relaxation, etc. without having to, too much, worry about money (depending on your financial and social 'class'). And this one reason why I've given value to Christmas because I embraced the gifts, the family, and the fun, but I was not aware of this 'equation' in relation to Christmas that I just mentioned: how Christmas is a day that represents 'balance', and how that 'balance' is created by compromises that have to taken place in order to create financial, temporal (relating to time), social 'balance', etc. for Christmas to exist as a stable holiday. One more point to this is in relation to the question, 'What is Christmas representing as a 'balance'? Well basically, Christmas represents all of the things that we'd like to do 'more of' which is rest / relaxation which is the opposite of hard work / survival, getting gifts which is the opposite of spending money, having more time which is the opposite of having little time to embrace 'life' / 'living', being with family which is the opposite of being indundated with 'responsibility' that there is no time to be with family, and etc.
So in the next blog, I will continue with this point and how I can step 'outside' of these polarity opposites which are, for exmaple, work / responsibilty which is perceived / defined as the opposite of being with 'family', and getting gifts which is perceived / defined as the opposite of spending money, and when and as I step 'outside' of these opposite polarity, I then will have the awareness and the ability to look at myself in relation to them, and see them for what they are which are simply constructs that make up 'fear of survival' as a 'tug of war' game that doesn't move forward but, instead, exists in a push / pull movement that only supports it's opposite without any real movement or self-change.
No comments:
Post a Comment