Will you take me as I am?
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"Will you take me as I am?"
-Joni Mitchell
I saw the movie Wild this week.
The premise of the movie: a daughter goes off the rails after losing her mother to cancer. The movie centers around the daughter's journey, but it was her mother's that stuck with me. She was one of these people who'd had a hard life and yet an irritatingly positive outlook. When she received the news that she had cancer, she literally said "Oh well" with a smile on her face, albeit through tears.
It got me thinking.
We're all dealing with something. Some big, some small. But if we could shift our focus maybe not to "oh well" but to "this isn't about me, this is about something bigger, about being a part of something bigger" than maybe we could live lighter. Maybe we wouldn't feel so burdened with the heaviness that comes with wanting answers and not always having them.
I don't know.
The movie quotes Joni Mitchell lyrics from her song, California, “Will you take me as I am? Will you?” And I wonder if this couldn't be said of life. Will we take life as it is? Will we let it be? Will we not try and make it more than what it is?
Our pain isn't punishment. It comes as the result of living in a broken world.
LIKE LIST
It's a sadder life now that Rdio has gone the way of the flesh, and, although I'm giving Spotify it's due try, I'm also on Apple Music and starting to dig it. In particular, it's playlists. In particular, this playlist.
Forever fascinated with the creative process, I really nerded out on this talk from John Cleese who argues that creativity is not a talent, but a way of operating.
I took over the Share Love Everywhere Instagram account last month. It was a lot of fun speaking some encouragement into the internets. You'll have to scroll back a bit, but check it out!
WRITE LIST
I've been writing like a maniac. It feels good. Here are some of my more recent posts:
Action and Feeling
Radical Honesty
Begin Again
Okay. Thanks for reading, friends.
Happiest New Year!
♡,
Joce