Paradoxical Musings

Can oppositional experiences both be true simultaneously?

An 8-minute video that encapsulates a potential of death, dying, and rebirth process of the human experience.

A hauntingly beautiful graphic novel adaptation of Octavia E. Butler’s 1993 dystopian novel, Parable of the Sower.

For most of this year so far, I have been dancing in the space of paradox and duality. Truthfully it goes beyond this year. Stretching back over four years ago now, when I felt a strong calling to get married on 02/22/2022 to my partner of 10 years.

I recently learned in numerology that the number 2 represents duality in addition to other meanings. This clicked for me as relationships in my life are often ladened with paradox and duality. Two seemingly opposing forces which in actuality are mutually dependent on one another for existence. I recognize the hard and soft edges exist in each of my relationships. The opposite forces in relationships make them work in flowing fashion by Divine design.

Zooming into this year though, paradox has been a topic which has felt extremely illuminated by the microcosm and macrocosm of life. On a collective scale, observing how daily opposing views fly across the sound waves of communication, both fervently touting ultimate truth.

To the individual level, of feeling myself working daily to align with advocacy and care while recognizing in my every step I have the impact of harm in some way to our planet and world. It daunts me.

I am prone to depression when immersed for too long in the shadow of humanity. And in the wake of times like the Epstein files, the shadows are long and deep, ready to fully engulf a highly sensitive person like myself. I identify with author, Octavia E. Butler’s description of herself as “a pessimist if I’m not careful” deeply.

I have been wading slowly through the beautifully horrifying waters of the graphic novel adaptation of her 1993 post-apocalyptic novel, Parable of the Sower. It’s a bit too real and time-sensitively written to read quickly. Or to heed Butler’s self-reflective warning, I’d become lost in the hopeless paradox of our modern world of war, AI-fear, expanding data centers, and raising global temperatures, literal and figurative. One of the opening lines from the book has been ringing in my ears for weeks, as I dance with paradox in my life.

“All that you touch

You Change.

All that you Change

Changes you.

The only lasting truth

Is Change.

God

Is Change.”

- Earthseed: The Book of the Living in Parable of the Sower by Octavia. E. Butler

The dance of the relationship between change, a person, and Source energy has given me so much food for thought since I first read it. I have returned again and again to the words and how the interplay of change and an individual action are interconnected. This is true paradox to me. Two-sides to the same coin. Mutual interdependence. One only exists with the other. I invite you to naw on this for a while and let me know where your mind lands.

Deeply inspired by the paradox I see all around me, I have been making art to try and process it. Below is a soul-written poem, photos, and a painting about paradox, contradictions, duality, and how we might find buoyancy in a time where sinking may seem inevitable.

A Culture of Contradiction

Can these two oppositions have anything in common?

An axis of paradox dancing in the moonlight.

Paradoxical Growth- Clematis, the queen of the climbers known for continual growth to reach higher potentials of expansion but always in need of a structure to be supported by.

Human limitations be damned.

We are infinite and deeply finite.

Unsettling, isn’t it?

He inspires me and infuriates me at times.

How is this possible?

I sit awake at night, pondering how the body that created me could be gone for so long and, simultaneously, with me more than ever.

I wait in shadowed moments for signs that this isn’t just a craze of grief.

Illuminating the haze of possibilities with delusions residual of loss.

So I sit, I wait.

Feeling great, washes of bliss bathe me in unlimited waves.

Tides carrying the song of duality.

Blossoming buds of unknowing to bloom into a tomorrow of forever.

Spiraling, I learn vertical ascension does not exist for my space and time.

On an ellipsis of experiencing

Learning and un-learning

Integration and destruction

Radically open to hear

Outrageously accepting to embark on the Panthea of what could be

A family of reflecting ponds

Revealing each mystery to one another

If we see it.

What an incredible gift

This life

These beings

To fall so in love and see the ripples it can produce

 Ecstasy in the arms of uncertainty, for she holds each reality tenderly, ready to be plucked

The decision inevitably will result in more 

More of what you may ask?

Paradoxical Human- a person who loves slowing down in quiet, serene meditation gardens and loves going fast on noisy Harley Davidson motorcycle rides. Both loves exist inside of me at once.

Living

From the truth of the present moment

I pray

No longer small and worried about offending

But hopefully, this path will lead to more shared humanity

Pains being integrated

Slowly, with precision, I decide differently

Hoping that sharing a truth rooted in love can only grow more love.

Both And

Yes, there will be more love, and it might breed suffering as well

My mind does not sit with this comfortably

But my soul shushes the angst with a compassion unmatched 

The Love of the Divine shines brightest in  the darkest corners

This is a paradox I can not explain, though

It must be experienced through a  heart open 

Though the absolutism of this statement makes me think there likely are other ways too.

The Divine Order

Impossible made possible

Infinite alchemy of one element evolving into the next.

Some transformations deeply rooted in the physical logic of our world.

Paradoxical Art- 20 layers of the Tao Te Ching painted on top of one another so you can’t read any verse but can feel them all at once.

While others freely bounce in radical, unpredictability defying our ways of knowing, 

Bound by the confines of humanity at every turn.

I call in what I think I need, and then in magical response it appears,

I ponder now,

Do I still want it?

The Holy Hell Yes’,

I act upon it as often as I can muster the trust and courage to.

And what’s not for me, I gratefully allow to float on by. 

How blessed to feel the sunlight on my family.

A miracle that we all belong together.

Puzzle pieces interlocking made from one.

The contrast of opposition can be unsettling.

Shaking the foundation of knowing who we are.

But life is a great teacher.

The perfect person will arise to remind us who we are.

Likely in the most unsuspecting suit.

It brings a smile to my lips, how waking up happens automatically in this human form,

Day after Day

But how the repetition can cause us to forget, as well.

To autopilot through beautiful moments happening in every breath

Gifts raining down around us in immense showers from beyond.

Some see,

Some do not 

A polarity again which can be easy  to judge or dismiss,

But one is no more wrong or right than the other.

This human form clings to pleasure over pain.

This is mentally logical.

Paradoxical Care- The angel of death and a heart beat monitor, one on top of the other. Both there to ensure an existence.

But what if they are the same?

Two sides of the same coin.

A figment of the cerebral being

Layers of sensation piled one on top of the other,

Then systematically categorized by one of the most complicated machines known and unknown to humankind.

Who might say then, what a possibility could be?

Why is one drawn to Sappho's love and another to Herculean proportions?

To die would be a fickle friend.

For in releasing the physical, we gain the universe.

But in doing so, we lose the greatest power of all,

To feel.

The jackpot of Universal design.

Touching, grasping one last time.

Many say, “Wow,” with a far-off gaze.

Returning to a home we have always known but soon forgotten upon arrival.

Though with a sorrow in our sight,

For even in the end, paradox begins again. 

As I understand it in this moment, my soul inhabits a body.

Paradoxical Death- a dead Gingko tree leaf lies beautifully upon it’s own trunk. Many deaths occur all around us, in every moment. Shedding is necessary for change.

Yearning for connection to Source.

When I am liberated from the current animation, I return to the River of Creation.

To the Source, which exists in each body.

Both And, mind-blowing and deeply simple.

Not in the way of a truth that has never been heard before,

But one that has been whispered on the breeze of eternity.

Will I listen this time?

The choice is mine.

While simultaneously, I have already made it a thousand times.

I love you so.

All the pieces of me that have fallen away to the River and all those to come.

Some I still clutch so tightly, unwavering in my attachment to possession

I feel the whisper of the Divine say it’s okay to hold on while you surrender.

To let go of resistance

To believe in reluctance

To hope in doubt.

These are all true possibilities and experiences being had all around me.

This eases a bit of the tension of the unknown.

Not all, of course.

But a tiny sigh releases in response to permission to be fully human and Divine.

Paradoxical Enjoyment- an Iris so beautiful in bloom to look at but poisonous if ingested. Human senses embody duality in the limitations of how we experience the natural world.

A reminder, I never came here to transcend.

I wasn’t missioned with freeing myself from this body.

No more than a flower is tasked to dissolve into a bear.

I am what I am.

We all are.

In this moment and every one after,

Perfectly designed with purposeful room for improvement.

These words feel comforting.

An admission ticket into being.

A hall pass to transport from constant doing.

A guide to hold my hand on a path that will always be unknown.

My heart sings a song of gratitude for living in this evolving culture of contradictions,

A time and space with so very much to teach.

Thank you for your interest in wading through the uncertain quicksand of paradox with me. I hope my artist responses to the concepts of duality and contradictions in our world bring you a bit of peace, inspiration, and gentleness with yourself and others. It’s not an easy world to navigate but I find it is a bit better with curiosity and grace.

With gratitude and love,

Erica