My last post put me in mind of another one of my favorite poems, this one by Raymond Carver:
Shiftless
The people who were better than us were comfortable.
They lived in painted houses with flush toilets.
Drove cars whose year and make were recognizable.
The ones worse off were sorry and didn't work.
Their strange cars sat on blocks in dusty yards.
The years go by and everything and everyone
gets replaced. But this much is still true--
I never liked work. My goal was always
to be shiftless. I saw the merit in that.
I liked the idea of sitting in a chair
in front of your house for hours, doing nothing
but wearing a hat and drinking cola.
What's wrong with that?
Drawing on a cigarette from time to time.
Spitting. Making things out of wood with a knife.
Where's the harm there? Now and then calling
the dogs to hunt rabbits. Try it sometime.
Once in a while hailing a fat, blond kid like me
and saying, "Don't I know you?"
Not, "What are you going to be when you grow up?"
I love this poem because it so clearly expresses what I was trying to say in the previous post: we seem to operate on the assumption that doing something has an inherent value and is somehow invariably superior to doing nothing. But look at all the harm that comes from the impulse to DO. We push ourselves, force ourselves, become unhappy, use precious resources, and often end up with nothing more profound or worthy than the specious claim to have DONE something. I think we need to far more often ask the simple question, "So what?" or, even simpler, "Why?" Have you asked yourself that lately, about anything that you do because you feel duty-bound to do it? Why? Or, says who? Or, you and what army?
Of course, I am not arguing for indolence, as other posts in this blog make clear. But I do think that such questioning may tease out the places in our lives where the voices of grandparents, parents, teachers, siblings, aunts, and uncles are tell us we must do this or should do that without any clear justification for these demands.
I insist on this clarification because it can set us free. It is also a way we can open our hearts to a new sense of ourselves in the world, can lead us toward the realization that we are suffering from our sense of obligation, torturing ourselves with shame for what we have not done. No one is more deserving of love than you are. The Buddha said so. So let's start acting like it, what do you say?
Shiftless
The people who were better than us were comfortable.
They lived in painted houses with flush toilets.
Drove cars whose year and make were recognizable.The ones worse off were sorry and didn't work.
Their strange cars sat on blocks in dusty yards.
The years go by and everything and everyone
gets replaced. But this much is still true--
I never liked work. My goal was always
to be shiftless. I saw the merit in that.
I liked the idea of sitting in a chair
in front of your house for hours, doing nothing
but wearing a hat and drinking cola.
What's wrong with that?
Drawing on a cigarette from time to time.
Spitting. Making things out of wood with a knife.
Where's the harm there? Now and then calling
the dogs to hunt rabbits. Try it sometime.
Once in a while hailing a fat, blond kid like me
and saying, "Don't I know you?"
Not, "What are you going to be when you grow up?"
I love this poem because it so clearly expresses what I was trying to say in the previous post: we seem to operate on the assumption that doing something has an inherent value and is somehow invariably superior to doing nothing. But look at all the harm that comes from the impulse to DO. We push ourselves, force ourselves, become unhappy, use precious resources, and often end up with nothing more profound or worthy than the specious claim to have DONE something. I think we need to far more often ask the simple question, "So what?" or, even simpler, "Why?" Have you asked yourself that lately, about anything that you do because you feel duty-bound to do it? Why? Or, says who? Or, you and what army?
Of course, I am not arguing for indolence, as other posts in this blog make clear. But I do think that such questioning may tease out the places in our lives where the voices of grandparents, parents, teachers, siblings, aunts, and uncles are tell us we must do this or should do that without any clear justification for these demands.
I insist on this clarification because it can set us free. It is also a way we can open our hearts to a new sense of ourselves in the world, can lead us toward the realization that we are suffering from our sense of obligation, torturing ourselves with shame for what we have not done. No one is more deserving of love than you are. The Buddha said so. So let's start acting like it, what do you say?
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