Like Rivers

Whether I am  working on a book or real life -- especially when (like right now) I am faced with making choices that test who I am and what my values are (as myself or as my character) -- it helps to keep this quote from Tolstoy in mind:

One of the most widespread superstitions is that every man has his own special, definite qualities: That a man is kind, cruel, wise, stupid, energetic, apathetic, etc. Men are not like that… men are like rivers… every river narrows here, is more rapid there, here slower, there broader, now clear, now cold, now dull, now warm. It is the same with men. Every man carries in himself the germs of every human quality, and sometimes one manifests itself, sometimes another, and the man often becomes unlike himself, while still remaining the same man.

We change, we flow. Sometimes we're shallow and mucky. All of us -- me, her, him, you. Putting yourself or somebody else in a box, with a label on it, is both stifling and untrue.

My yoga teacher talked about it yesterday in a different way -- about striving for union, or balance: trying but accepting; fortitude in working on what needs to change but serenity about what can't be changed; strength and flexibility.

Walt Whitman said, "I contradict myself? Very well, then; I contradict myself. I am large. I contain multitudes."

Everybody wise seems to agree with this basic idea. So why is it so difficult to accept how complex we all are? I guess the fact that we need to learn it from so many teachers in so many ways shows how hard it is for us to learn it.

We are all so miraculous, and so flawed.

My character is shocked by her own passion, her jealousy, her weakness AND her strength, none of which she recognizes as authentically her, though they all are. Me? I am trying to flow -- to evolve and yet remain true.

How about you?

Love, 

Rachel Vail