The Lake Effect

I feel... interested in everything. One might say that this makes it difficult to become very knowledgeable about or good at any particular things. And I think it is very true that to deep down excel at something, to thrive at something, we must give ourselves over to it, accept it and ourselves in it. For most of my life I have believed "should" is some major part of this equation, but the more I believe there is no necessary virtue to excelling other than joy or satisfaction or fulfillment, the more "should" drains out of it. We cannot choose what to do in this sense, only discover it and let ourselves take to it in our natural deep down way. This seems all very easy, I think, when applied to other people, but not so much when applied to ourselves. When I follow any of the thousands of seductive threads of who I might be and what I might accomplish and do I don't really have to let go of any of those myriad possibilities because I pursue that one through choice and will and effort. I have a control and so at any time I am free to start any other choice, any other thread. I am free to write my journey. But, to inhabit myself, to follow the light that leads into the deep woods, that makes me a creature of the wind,  the follower of a never before walked path. It makes me me, just one thing, no threads, no varied futures, just one thing, for all time, a thing I can know nothing about ahead of time and that I cannot finish.

And so what can I excel at if I am going to be so omnivorously interested? I have given over the chase. And yet giving it over I lately find that everything I get interested in I put carefully in a glass jar. And I bring them back here. I line them up in their dozens and dozens in the sun. And I start to wonder that this, this, is it.