“How Do You Define Practical?”
For most of my life I had a fickle relationship with practicality. Or at least with my beliefs about its meaning to me. I wasn’t conscious of this and so I got into a lot of trouble along the way, blaming everyone else for my unhappiness and misfortunes. I remember being expected to choose a major for college and being stumped. If I had allowed myself to believe in following the desires of the heart, I would have chosen theater or dance. Instead I chose home economics — I hear you snickering out there — in the 60’s this was still considered a viable choice for “young ladies.”
Within a year it was the “Summer of Love” — 1967 — and my world was flipped on its head. The rebellious impulses on which I had begun to act rather meekly in my freshman year went into overdrive and my grades suffered accordingly. I dropped out halfway through my senior year. Hey — I didn’t need that piece of paper, man! I was so Mary Tyler Moore meets Janis Joplin — a truly half-assed, reluctant hippie who still had not a clue about who she really was — but now I felt empowered in my cluelessness. Wasn’t I part of a movement? In other words, I still had a very unhealthy relationship with practicality. The only difference was that now, instead of completely buying into my parent’s notion of what’s practical I completely rejected that same notion.
Hello! I couldn’t see that I wasn’t following my own blueprint — or rejecting it. I was rebelling against an image of myself that had been projected onto me by people who thought they knew who I was–or should be. No one, least of all me, realized how far off we all were. I was 40 years old before I began to suspect that my life was little more then a continual allergic reaction to other people’s vision of me, particularly what was “practical” for me. How can we make smart choices for ourselves if we aren’t on intimate terms with our own deepest needs? With our true intentions? Yet I talk to people every day who never seem to check in with their own gut feeling — or, having checked in, refuse to honor it. Why? It always seems to be a variation on “Not practical.”
If we truly are at least as much Spirit as we are matter, can we afford to live our lives as though these vital impulses of our heart are anything less than practical? If they aren’t, then who IS driving our car? Have you ever suddenly just KNOWN something is wrong but you ignored that knowing and persisted in acting on what your head told you to do, only to later regret that betrayal of your own inner wisdom? (Yes–my first marriage, but that’s another story…)
I have a feeling that if we each decided to expand our definition of “practical” to include our gut reactions, within a year we would have successfully steered this planet in a much healthier direction. I know, I know — that would require a leap of faith because most of us still accept the consensus reality that the ego voice is the ultimate authority. What if it turns out to be the other way around? What if our own personal inner guidance system, driven by our intuitive voice is actually the smarter CEO? What do you think? Isn’t it time we try something different?