:: an artist rising :: (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} anamacha) wrote,@ 2008-03-19 17:59:00 |
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| Current music: | Peter Gabriel - In Doubt |
| Entry tags: | confessional, self |
on specialization
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.
This is one of the quotations of Lazarus Long, a fictional character created by the science fiction writer Robert A Heinlein (goddess rest his soul). I found this quotation and many others in a beautifully illuminated book I purchased from my teenage job at Laguna Books.
Little did I know it at the time, but this quotation set the course for my life. I found a certain sense of ego superiority in consciously (and vocally) refusing to specialize. My parents were little help, because they never really encouraged me to pursue things that were interesting to me. To be fair, they did fund certain ... escapades, but after those failed, that was it. There was nothing left to fill that void.
This quotation taught me to be afraid of specialization. I rationalized that specializing would mean closing doors, and I didn't want to do that. I wanted to have all the options open to me all the time.
Much later in life I am learning that it doesn't work that way.
I turned that quotation into justification for not pursuing my own interests, for letting fear rule me. I turned it into a treatise on What Good Men Do. I turned it into a personal manifesto of what I should do with my life.
I'm tired of it. My birthday is soon, I am staring middle age in the teeth and I have precious little to show for it. I have not yet made my mark on the world. There is a mark to be made, I'm sure of it; why else would I have survived my accident 23 years ago? But right now I am fairly content to sit and write, read LJ and play games.
Content, that is, except for the growing sense of discomfort and unquiet. To what end do I do these things?
Of course, I learned how to do all those things in the quotation to varying degrees. I learned to do more, as well. But it wasn't enough. It didn't make me happy, and I don't know what will.
