A Larger Becoming

Since this new job involves reading all day (I mean, literally, all day. Finding stuff to put in anthologies. It's not a bad life, I tell you.), I've been posting things on the other blog that catch my eye/heart. But somehow, this belongs here. Maybe because of subject matter.

Anyway, my dad loves this book, Eternal Man, by Truman G Madsen, and he got me reading it. It's short, but fathoms deep, and I feel like I'll have to read it seven more times to "get it." But this part, I think I get. On freedom and commitment:

"We talk as if freedom consisted in having the greatest variety of options and that a 'once-and-for-all' decision coerces our initiative. But is freedom increased by every new flavor of ice cream?

"Actually, it is only when we rise above trivial options and ask ourselves in the depths, 'What do I want to be?' that we emerge from the bondage of a flitting and faceless mode of life. The most majestic wonder of our freedom is that we can make all-time binding decisions, eternal covenants. Once made, once 'renewed and confirmed,' they free us from the life-wasting torment of 'bringing it all up' over and over. The decisions, as it were, reverberate through the whole galaxy. And even the lesser roles of life, its distractions and setbacks, take on color and creativity as instruments of the larger 'becoming.'"




A "flitting and faceless mode of life" is pretty much what I'm feeling over here. Want so badly to have a "larger becoming." Working on it. Seriously working on it.

Comments

belann said…
He says it so well. Hopefully, we can all get to the point of "a larger becoming."
Terry Earley said…
True, true true, Madsen needs to be savored instead of gulped down. Your patient reading will continue to enlighten.

This whole idea of choices/agency is so misunderstood, that we need to think about it more often and deeper.

There are too many choices which hem us in and just a select few which just open up oceans of opportunity and light.
Kitty said…
This comment has been removed by the author.
Amara said…
OK, how do we intelligently decide what we want to be? The eternal options once you have a testimony of their validity are almost easy which is what he's talking about I guess, but how do we find the decisions that "open up oceans of opportunity and light?" versus just make us crazy as we take on too much for us to handle happily? Help me understand because I do this over and over over again.
meg said…
is it just a late winter thing? i've been feeling flittery myself. thanks for sharing this quote--i'm hoping whatever i'm going through passes quickly (for you, too). i do know it will pass.
and i'm intrigued by the "bread" you posted about. hmmm...

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