A few words from our friend Niels
Outside the Castle Walls
Life is too much. We have bad experiences and we become afraid. We get hurt and invaded, so we build The Wall.
We feel safe behind our wall. So we keep building until we have our Castle.
Then you see her and you decide to lower the drawbridge for her. She steals your gold and children, shit.
Time to build the bunker beneath the Castle. Bomb proof, the highest tech!
In the daytime you ride around in full armor so noone can recognize its you, the fool at the kings court.
Ok, enough of the confusing metaphors. Where am I going with this?
Life is tension between defending yourself and getting close enough to people to be able to work together and enjoy their company.
If we dont have any defences then we get wrecked. We need an immune system to deal with illness, roof above our head and walls to protect us from the elements.
We need to check peoples intententions with us before we get too entangled, by being guarded with our inner world.
But defences get out of hand. Before you know it you have a gate, two locks and a security system.
You;re alone, locked in, or locked out, or whats the difference really?
Often we find that we hold on too long, or in the wrong situations to behaviors that no longer serve us.
We find sometimes that the walls built to protect us are really keeping us alone and isolated when really we wanna reach out.
It’s time, people you can trust are at your door, they want you to come out and play.
Do you open the door and come out to meet them? Do you leave the armor and the rusty helmet at home so you can mingle?
One mistake could get you hurt badly, but most of the time its the heavy armor that’s overkill.
The crazy thing is that when you truly meet another person, both not wearing armor, its almost always deeply transformative.
It’s easier to stay ourselves just a little longer, to indulge in gossip just once more, to stay inside our walls and hear the news secondhand and rage on about the state of the world.
I do that sometimes… and that’s ok.
Outside the Castle walls, life goes on all around. There is nature, immense beauty, adventure. The real tragedy would be to grow old inside my self built castle as life passes me by.
Lets give it another chance, shall we?
|