Julia Margaret Cameron: Julia Jackson (1867)

" … I returned an IdEntity with Ego clearly absent."

After bankruptcy took my professional identity, my ego seemed to recede. I became progressively less and less interested in making something else of myself. For the first time, I stopped striving to become something other than I was. I also lost much of my former curiosity for uncovering who or what I actually might be beneath my cloaking exterior. I became more instinctual as I became less purposeful. I began following my senses. I was never skilled at following maps, so I relied upon a kind of dead reckoning to guide me. I'd imagine the topography, then follow where that notion led me. I often ended up very near where I intended. I sometimes ended up in another county, but neither outcome mattered. I usually had no particular place to be. I held few imperatives. I began thinking of myself as more an observer than a player. What I wanted or needed didn't seem to matter very much after we were Exiled.

My therapist friend Carole first noted my ego's absence. I'd apparently failed to respond to some line of questioning as a well-balanced adult male might. She pointed out that it could be okay if I occasionally took into account what I wanted. I responded that I'd be pleased to do that if I only knew what I wanted. The brutal experience of being Exiled had taught me to question whether I really wanted or needed anything, especially if and when my wanting seemed only to create another unresolvable longing. Could it not be beneficial under that circumstance to choose not to want anything for myself or even to become functionally incapable of deciding what I want? Couldn't that not wanting be considered in some ways transcendent? Might it even prevent depression because it focuses attention on something other than an otherwise unresolvable problem?

We chased that idea around for years, but the crux of the matter seemed to be that my ego was underrepresented in my life. At one point, a new doctor asked me to list my healthcare goals. I responded by asking if I needed to be goal-driven to be his patient. I insisted I was satisfied with who I seemed to be. I supposed I could adopt some goals if I really needed to, but nothing seemed particularly problematic. The Muse, of course, always seemed to be working towards a dozen different destinations between her work and her many hobbies and side-occupations. She'd be working on transforming some processes at work while designing and sewing a quilt at home. She'd become a force to be reckoned with while I grew ever more passive and withdrawn. I considered myself an IdEntity, an entity primarily influenced by my instincts rather than my wants.

I applied my instincts in sometimes absurd ways, for in both Maryland and Colorado, the climate and conditions were quite distinctly different than they'd been where I'd lived for most of my adult life. I had no instincts well-tuned to those particular local conditions, so I'd attempt to care for the lawn in inappropriate ways. I struggled to turn our woodland meadow into a well-tended lawn in Colorado, according to my well-practiced English Country Garden instincts. I felt continually frustrated by my neighbors, who mostly just let their yards remain as meadows. I persisted since my instincts insisted. I'm sure I amused my neighbors, who wondered how I thought I could even push that old reel mower through calf-high deer grass. I felt righteous in my efforts, for I was not trying to garner any observer’s appreciation. I wasn't seeking credit. I sought only to do what felt right without very deeply considering the surrounding circumstances.

I remain steadfastly non-self-promotive, even now that we're back from Exile, having achieved that one explicit goal. I do not maintain a bucket list, and I have noticed myself shrinking away from taking on any new or enhanced to-dos. Wanting feels like an obligation rather than any pathway toward greater satisfaction. I deep down believe that the world might be almost perfect enough without another improvement project. Last week, I started a project to publish one of these series, and I'm confronting a serious absence of desire to follow through on all the necessarily self-promotive steps. I will undoubtedly frustrate the best efforts of my publishing assistant, for I probably already appear unresponsive. I'm not acting in active opposition but just doing all I can to pretend that I really want something. The Muse asked after my deeper purpose for deciding to publish that particular work, and I found that I couldn't answer. That was an Ego question to which my Exile-encouraged Id had no response. Whomever I was before being Exiled, I returned an IdEntity with Ego clearly absent.

©2024 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #Exiled, #PureSchmaltz