Sunday, 17 December 2017

SHACK 198 CONFIDENCE

Skip Prichard


Many people who know me have commented that I have a lack of self confidence and I would agree with them.  Despite all the workshops, the clinics, the one to one's, the football, the martial arts and so on there is a background of lack of confidence.  My mojo definitely takes a dip at times.

Many have criticized me for not being ambitious that is true as well I have never seen the point in material success beyond comfortable for those things that rust and decay and leave one hankering after the next 'goodie' and the for some the constant striving to be top of the pile, the top banana, the man, the boss, the governor and that's OK and I am not jealous or denying their achievement, although in some cases it can rob the environment and nature and cause distinct disharmony.

For me self confidence comes in two stances or layers.  Self confidence in ones intellect, physical achievements, prowess and mental gymnastics can diminish with age and yet can be looked back with pride at the certificates and trophies and yet bring a tinge of regret and loss.

Then there is the confidence of letting go and allowing a sort of laid back approach, feeling that this confidence stems from a greater intellect, prowess and mentality. It is the inner ability to create an inner space as it were in order to facilitate the flow of this invisible energy source to enter into ones life. A confidence of being able to trust the Universal Life Force and all that it brings.  I call this SELF CONFIDENCE and the physical self .

Physically I am not the strongest and never have been, a very sickly child and later on a moderate physical strength, this I had to compensate with technique and mental agility and that often left me.  I can say I was always a consistent second best or runner up third.  I was always someones deputy, had their back as they say, loyal and often a stickler for the rules. Emotionally fragile at times and never good socially, had very few girlfriends and mates and was and am a loner. 

Someone once said of me I was a successful failure, and I am glad of that bestowed title, for all the failures of the material world (self confidence) I made up for in the inner world of space and meditation(SELF CONFIDENCE).

In a way my near death experience in 1942 'ruined' my material life, I new of another world or realm and it was to my understanding so beautiful, peaceful and fulfilling that I always hankered after going back there, wherever there is, so the material world was not on for me, I was not interested in study only in the unknown and so my Sensei and Sifu with Zen Buddhism as the background to the arts was only confirming to me what I felt and thought, all is expedient, transitory, illusionary, dreamlike and then my skirmishes with Quantum stuff, physics and forensics further confirmed this view.  The corpses in forensics and depraved minds of the horror therein, then physics and its ever changing theories, culminating in quantum stuff of 99.99% of materialism is empty and so why grasp at .01% of seeming reality of ---what? 

This is not to say I am introverted, self absorbed(only in the invisible space of meditation) depressed or mentally feel inferior(at one point in my life I felt awkward socially and mentally inferior to academics and physically inferior to athletes, many young ladies frightened me and I was often bullied) then I realized that these things past with time, I witnessed many older people envying their youth and past and couldn't find a hobby or relationship and just distracted by TV, alcohol and such.  I then saw academics who had their degrees and lived on their past achievements, all of this I felt was transient, expedient and in someways dreams and illusions.  I began to realize that for me I had found something that lasts, does not perish and is meaningful to the soul. I no longer felt a loss of confidence or inferior for I had not the pride of ambition, nor the desire for material success and was not a failure or lazy or self motivated------I had found the relationship I sought-----I had found the traces of the SELF and this relationship grows and never diminishes----yes it has its setbacks at times, however it is always there and is renewing and rewarding without any visible external signs, say but feeling content and perhaps a cheerful demeanor. 


SHACK   

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