White paper and a pen
wish for me,
on a birthday of many returns
passed, yet to come.
So a thought I will,
and a thought
I may, descend
into self,
my self-maintained, renewed self,
my pattern of self.
Together and with,
I feel out
an infinite creativity,
I do now
experience my stability.
Ever change,
never never.
Am.
I am dependent,
Yet I am identified.
One in once.
Always a memory,
always a surprise.
Scenes change,
familiar feelings.
Known to life,
stranger to my own.
Allowed to feel all,
but not my own.
Hold on
known stranger, hold on.
I hold on to my breath.
I hold on.
The Paradox of Being
Isn’t it intriguing how our sense of self can feel both constant and ever-changing? This piece beautifully captures the complex dance between stability and transformation that defines our inner experience.
In “Critique of Pure Reason,” Kant writes, “Though all our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it all arises out of experience.” This fundamental idea of a priori knowledge is reflected in the title and its exploration of self-knowledge that seems to precede or transcend immediate experience.
The image of white paper and a pen as birthday wishes reminds me of what Virginia Woolf said about writing and self-discovery: “I am not one and simple, but complex and many.” Our attempts to capture our essence often reveal our multifaceted nature.
The concept of descending into a “self-maintained, renewed self” echoes what Carl Rogers meant when he spoke about the “actualizing tendency”: “The organism has one basic tendency and striving – to actualize, maintain, and enhance the experiencing organism.” We are constantly in the process of becoming ourselves.
The poem’s lines “I feel out / an infinite creativity, / I do now / experience my stability” echo Kant’s concept of the synthetic a priori – knowledge that is both independent of experience and informative about the world. Kant argues that such knowledge forms the basis of our understanding of space, time, and causality.
In addition, the lines, “an infinite creativity” alongside stability, it brings to mind what Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi wrote about flow: “The best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times… The best moments usually occur if a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.” Our creativity and stability often coexist in these moments of flow.
Furthermore, the exploration of paradoxical states (“Ever change, / never never. / Am.”) aligns with Kant’s antinomies – seemingly contradictory statements that arise when reason goes beyond the bounds of possible experience. As Kant states, “Human reason has this peculiar fate that in one species of its knowledge it is burdened by questions which, as prescribed by the very nature of reason itself, it is not able to ignore, but which, as transcending all its powers, it is also not able to answer.”
This paradox of being “ever change, never never” also reflects what the philosopher Heraclitus meant when he said, “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.” We are constantly changing, yet there’s a thread of continuity in our identity.
As the psychologist William James put it: “The stream of thought flows on; but most of its segments fall into the bottomless abyss of oblivion. Of some, no memory survives the instant of their passage. Of others, it is confined to a few moments, hours or days. Others, again, leave vestiges which are indestructible, and by means of which they may be recalled as long as life endures.”
So what does all this mean? Perhaps it’s about recognizing the beautiful complexity of our inner world. It’s about understanding that our identity is not fixed, but a dynamic interplay between continuity and change.
Remember, every moment you spend in self-reflection is an opportunity to both rediscover and reinvent yourself. As the philosopher Søren Kierkegaard said, “Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”
If you ponder your own nature, consider: How can you embrace both the familiar and the surprising aspects of yourself? Because in the end, isn’t that what makes our inner journey so fascinating? This constant interplay between the known and the unknown, the stable and the evolving aspects of our being. Your self is both a memory and a surprise. How will you explore its depths today?