I used to live in the real world.
It was a terrible experience.
A sense of alienation is something we all go through from time to time. It’s a natural part of being a sensitive person. And sensitivity is an often misunderstood aspect of being intelligent.
When we’re just starting to make our way in the world we look to others for guidance. We seek to understand ourselves by gathering the opinions of others–our family and friends, authors, other creators, and so on.
This is an important part of the process of individuation.
But we can stay in this early phase too long.
And entire industries are built around those who do.
What should be a quick survey can become a lifelong pattern of feeling like we need someone else to guide us on a path only we can know and only we can walk.
For creative and intelligent people, the goal isn’t to find what the world says is most acceptable, or to find the right coach or mentor. It is to find what we individually enjoy–what we’re wired for. And this can only happen through what sometimes appears as aimlessness.
We unabashedly enter society’s fold.
We wonder, laugh, moan, cry, and rage.
We let the world lie to us and bamboozle us.
We let the world open our heart and steal our mind.
We experience a range of the best and the worst things.
We must have a variety of experiences and explore. Otherwise, we won’t know what makes us tick. But, at some point, we have to ground ourselves and diverge from the crowd. And a difficult transition hopefully begins.
We may feel isolated, like something is wrong with us for no longer being able to fit in. It seems strange, but a sense of alienation is a sign we’re on the right path. The more we explore our interests, wherever they take us, the less we will care to fit in and be normal.
Our interests will begin to sustain us.
Our inclination to create will grow.
Our connection to others will shift.
Something unexpected happens.
We become self-sustaining and sovereign. Some relationships may break away, and others that were difficult may heal. Life starts to require less energy from us.
We continue.
The plot thickens.
Suddenly, it is known, that our struggle to find out where we belong–and the alienation that arises from it–isn’t a sign that we don’t belong. Au contraire, it is a sign that we belong most completely. Not to the age-old problems of humanity, but to something far more intrinsic.
It becomes glaringly obvious that we are deeply interwoven with the fabric of reality. Our need to create is a byproduct of the subtle but ever-flowing energy within and around us. It is those who followed their own interests that we still talk about.
While the world raged on, they fell in love with something that others never noticed.
