A woman awake — a woman with a fierce and awesome commitment — is a fearsome confrontation to our mediocrity and casualness. Most of us, myself included, would rather defend ourselves against our own potential greatness, because we know the sacrifices that living such greatness would require.
— Regina Sara Ryan in The Woman Awake
To Practice This Thought: Identify the sacrifices you would have to make if you stepped into your own greatness.
I came across this quote the other day. It really struck me deeply. I don't think it has to be just about women, of course. I think the word that stands out most for me is "casualness". It says to me that we can be offhand about our gifts. We might even recognize them as gifts but can't quite bother to expend the energy to cultivate them or offer them up to a world in need of gifting.
2 comments:
This is very thought-provoking. I suspect mediocrity is allied to being accepted as one of the gang, just hanging out. As much as we in America admire individual freedom, there is still the species pull toward conformity, and the fear of difference.
Greatness is visibility, and that makes you a target.
This reminds me of the well-known line from Mandela, "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure." It also reminds me of Doris Lessing ideas in The Prisons We Chose to Live Inside:
"We are group animals still, and there is nothing wrong with that. But what is dangerous is not the belonging to a group, or groups, but not understanding the social laws that govern groups and govern us."
"This is a time when it is frightening to be alive, when it is hard to think of human beings as rational creatures. Everywhere we look we see brutality, stupidity, until it seems that there is nothing else to be seen but that—a descent into barbarism, everywhere, which we are unable to check. But I think that while it is true there is a general worsening, it is precisely because things are so frightening we become hypnotized, and do not notice—or if we notice, belittle—equally strong forces on the other side, the forces, in short of reason, sanity and civilization."
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