by Simon
•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind
who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published
every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at
[email protected]
In the 1993 film Groundhog Day Phil Connors, an egotistical television weatherman wearily relives Groundhog Day over and over again.
Unglued by this numbing repetition of a single day the Bill Murray character invents increasingly creative ways of killing himself. But after every suicide attempt he reawakens to yet another Groundhog Day and the wheel of misfortune begins once again.
Mercifully, he eventually breaks the pattern and literally discovers a new day. In real life some of us are similarly transformed while others slog through seemingly endless Groundhog Days.
Truth be told, most of us live somewhere between Groundhog Day and the day after: between tedium and transformation. Yet it is the general direction of one’s life that determines its eventual trajectory.
We need daily rituals and some of the daily grind – they help ground us. But when our anchors become balls and chains we are simply stuck. The routine and the familiar are sometimes prison cells.
DESTRUCTIVE
A friend told me the story of a relative who will reach the half century mark this year, but who has spent a quarter century chained by the same destructive habits and a pattern of blaming others for his problems, and who has achieved virtually nothing new for decades.
The image that came to mind was of someone circling in an airplane over LPIA for 25 years, never being able to land. When our horizons become increasingly narrowed it breeds despair, the parent of hopelessness, the belief that new life or change is impossible.
This is why, for some, suicide becomes not simply a relief but a viable option. Tragically, human beings have the capacity to kill themselves both with a single blow and through a thousand smaller acts of despair.
Of course, we’re all stuck in some ways. This is as true for individuals as it is for larger groups. If it’s difficult for a single person to change course, imagine the difficulty for a country.
Now you can appreciate why tackling a seemingly simple issue like creating a better mass transit system for school children and workers remains a major challenge despite its obvious benefits.
Still, it is the quality and manner of the struggle to become unstuck that tells the difference between a life worth living and one that marks time. Is it not better to fall while climbing Mount Everest at age 25 than expiring in one’s sleep at 80 after a hum-drum life?
Most of our lives do not require a climb up Everest to meet lingering challenges and discover new adventures. Still, like the Bill Murray character, many of us avoid tackling the interior challenges and outer journeys that might help release us from self-absorption, boredom, negativity and sloth.
Moreover, rather than tackle the roots of our discontent, many of us get trapped in some type of placebo: alcohol, workaholism, shopping, drugs, religious fanaticism, food and other retreats.
THE PAIN
None of these are inherently problematic. They become so when used as forms of pain “management” through which we constantly anaesthetize ourselves rather than deal with the underlying stuff that gives birth to the pain in the first place.
The lead character in Groundhog Day finally decides that he is expending more energy to maintain the status quo than is required to change his life.
He realizes that change is now less painful than the coping mechanisms he uses to disguise or repress the unhealthy habits of heart, mind and spirit that have robbed him of endless days and produced within him many sleepless nights.
Murray’s Phil Collins reminds us that while life can be filled with a seemingly endless cycle of Groundhog Days, change is possible. But it doesn’t happen overnight -- conversion takes time and new habits of the heart.
When Phil Collins begins to discover horizons beyond himself, the ground for his conversion begins to shift. He discovers a love interest in his producer Rita (played by Andie MacDowell) and begins to break the time loop by helping as many people as he can in the small town from which he seemingly cannot escape.
He also ends the imprisonment of his self-pity by becoming fluent in French and by learning to play the piano. Through a process of discovery and discipline he masters his gifts and begins to break the cycle of frustration and tedium.
For some of us, shifting the ground requires considerable effort because we have spent a lifetime blaming others for our faults and the mess we have made of our own lives. Tragically, those who fail to escape this delusion will end their days unhappily and filled with rage.
FANTASYLAND
Yet others live in a perpetual fantasyland in which things are always bright and cherry and problems simply do not exist. These are the Dr. Panglosses of the world, similar to the character in Voltaire’s Candide.
No matter the facts on the ground, including a devastating earthquake and war, Pangloss, the classic “optimist” calls to mind those who simply paste on a smile and pretend everything is fine even when they feel like hell inside.
But what we need is genuine hope, not mindless optimism. Everything doesn’t always happen for a reason – but that’s for another column.
For the majority of us, change and the dawning of hope can begin by taking even the smallest next steps. We can jumpstart them by developing a new exercise regime, volunteering our time, turning off the television and picking up a book, honing a talent or developing a new skill.
Or it may require more effort, like seeking counselling for a problem, confronting a relative or co-worker about an issue of which you endlessly complain but have never addressed in a serious manner, or letting go of friends who no longer merit such a designation.
INSPIRATION
While there may always be Groundhog Days in various areas of our lives, there are areas in which we can end many of these days. For all of us who seek to rid ourselves of as many Groundhog Days as possible in 2009 we might draw inspiration from a German poet:
“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too.
“All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favour all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance which no one could have dreamed would have come their way.
“Whatever you can do or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius and magic in it. Begin it now.”
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