Stuck. Seems most of us have been there, in some area of our lives: broken dreams; ill health; lost relationship; missed direction. Sometimes a trauma is perpetrated upon us. Other times we regret words or actions of our own doing. And sometimes things just happen. But we re-live that experience in our mind and body, allow it to dominate our present, tense. As one psychologist put it, “The cognitive difference between humans and animals is animals can forget.” Humans remember. And humans have the power of imagination, which allows us to create. We create connections with others, we create objects of use or beauty, we create things or ideas to make our lives better. Untrammeled, our creative power may dominate, taking us for a ride or locking us in a dark mental prison. Or it may be far less dramatic: the doldrums of habit or routine can sink into malaise over years or decades. Stuck.
In The Spitfire Grill we meet a young woman with a troubled past (stuck) who wants to start anew. She chooses a small town from a travel book picture: “Fall colors over Gilead Wisconsin. . .” A new image, a new idea. And very soon we learn that the people of Gilead are (also stuck).
Growth requires change.
We humans (some of us) court ambivalence to the tension between stasis and change. We want security, to know some thing for certain. Yet change is part of the universal design: things constantly are born, grow, move, decay, die, and are reborn into something new. If we harness the power of imagination we can change, grow, re-imagine & re-create ourselves. I like to call it forgiveness work.
If there is stuck-ness, there is forgiveness work to do.
Forgiveness of others, of oneself, of actions or events. Forgiveness is a choice. To let go. Move on. Open to something new.
We humans. . . our essential nature… is it bad?
Or. . .
THE SPITFIRE GRILL
Sept 21-Oct 27
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