Peering Intently into the Blind Spot

10.01.15

I have discovered a blind spot.

It's been with me since childhood, reinforced by my experiences in school, and is likely in large part responsible, in a subtle way, for my inability to see myself save through the eyes of others. I never got the necessary practice at viewing myself as I am, with all the self-knowledge in place to inform me of my worthiness, validity and integrity. I begin to see that deficiency now and I can start to understand its impact. I have been a mental and emotional cripple, and this need not have been so.

I know that I'm good at what I do, but that knowledge has tended, increasingly, to be based on the opinions of others rather than my own internal criteria. In classes, in school and within the ivory towers of academic art endeavors, I began to follow the lead of mentors and professors and for this I garnered approval, even while I thought I was exercising a unique vision. Once beyond this training at the hands of others, I found myself working with the express purpose of pleasing a boss, but ultimately seeking to please the clients who had contracted for the work I produced. Finally, as a freelancer, I was able to work in full view of those who desired the fruit of my labors, and I lulled myself into feeling that good work was indicated by an invoice paid and some words of approval. I am now becoming aware that there is much more to my equation than these paltry rewards can acknowledge.

I have always been proud of myself for being accomplished at my chosen undertakings. This pride falls short of the self-love and self-embrace I now wish to embody. It only reflects the external world back to me as that world's needs have been met, while my own needs and desires have been shunted aside and falsely labeled unworthy. I now enlarge my self-apprehension to include all the notions, needs and desires that populate my unique psyche and begin to number them as worthy, as they have always been.

With great ease came the convenient tactic of comparing myself to those around me, and the inevitable (superficial) conclusion that I was worthy based on those comparisons followed just as easily. It never became necessary to evaluate my own being without these reflective straw men as a defining environment. I had never looked into this blind spot until now. I see there was always a great deal of Stewart left unexpressed, and if I may be allowed one regret, it is the long-standing omission of the special expressions I have to bestow on this world.

This became habitual, and now, in my later years, I am beginning to recognize that this approach to life and the creative use of it lacks depth because in it I fail to take my own thoughts and emotions into full account - I reflexively evaluate through the eyes of others and miss out on the richness of my own perspective.

For the first time, I now see the absent components in my life and in my art. They are the facets of a Stewart denied and squelched in a desire to please an illusory audience, one which proves fickle and unreliable. That audience was never really present to my efforts in the first place, not with the engagement and attention with which I credited it. I should have been the defining factor when it came to evaluation; after all, it has always been I who have been fully engaged in these processes.

In order to more fully open my awareness to that which I have bypassed, I must turn my attention inward, toward the unseen contents to be found within that blind spot. I'm searching for that special knowing that trumpets my individual authenticity, that loves the clunky way I do things and that provides the spark and flavor in my life. It will emerge, with a little coaxing, and perhaps, some deliberate intentions to revisit my old passions and put them to a fresh spin.

What I can now see, for I am currently in a dark time in my life, is that I was never encouraged by events to make a practice of shifting my focus toward the positive and the hopeful in my future. I've always generally enjoyed a positive and hopeful outlook only because the feedback from the external world was so compelling as it praised me. I have little experience with using my own internal resources to shift my attitudes and beliefs when necessary - and this is now so very necessary.

I am in the process of applying for Disability, because I cannot walk and I have a dramatically diminished reserve of physical energy. Everything I choose to do is hard, and this has come as a complete shock and surprise to me, even as the sad fact has gradually forced its way into my awareness, past my fervent denials. This is a realization for which for which I am rather I find I can no longer even work, sitting in front of the computer, as I have in the past, and the financial resources I have with which to combat this illness have dwindled to almost nothing as of this writing. Having always been self-sufficient and positive in my outlook, I am confronted with the horror of admitting dependency on others and an obvious need for assistance.

I danced around this subject in my earlier writings for this journal, and even put on a brave face, refusing to name or describe my malady so as not to give the condition any additional energy to further manifest. But the time for whistling past the graveyard has passed. I need help and that fact must now become part of the fabric of my current awareness, even as I search my habitual thought processes for the keys that will unlock this cage.

I have no formal diagnosis, as affordable medical insurance has been limited for me to catastrophic only over the last few years, and I have done what I can in terms of self-care: I eat a better diet, appropriately supplemented, I rest when my body demands a break, I have foregone the alcohol, tobacco and recreational drugs of my youth, I avoid chemical exposures wherever possible, and I no longer drink coffee in excessive amounts or ingest any kind of sugar. I try to exercise my legs when they can tolerate it (which is not often) and I make time to meditate and quiet my mind. I try to avoid stress. All this self-care has allowed me to stabilize at my current level, but that's still a far cry from the man I was and hope to be again someday.

This affliction has cost me my marriage of 15 years. Beverly divorced me in early February of 2009. She is still allowing me to remain in the home as a roommate, but we both know that those days are numbered. She just couldn't continue as a caregiver any longer and finally succumbed to her grief at watching the man she had married descend to this sorry state, unable (so far) to clamber out of this hole.

So this is indeed a dark time in my life, as I wrestles with my own grief at the loss of my mobility as well as the loss of a significant emotional foundation. But it has been observed that from a crisis is often born a resolution, that contrast causes expansion, and that to submit to the flow will hasten the arrival of new experiences. In this dark place, I, alone, am responsible for my thoughts and emotional responses to what I am living, and as I peer intently into that blind spot, I can see that I am yet worthy and valid as a human and as a man, and that loving myself in spite of these undesirable circumstances is a crucial step for me now,

I strive only for that self-embrace at this time, knowing that to achieve it will find me feeling a little better, and by feeling a little better I can then find my way a little more easily to the next inflection point along this curve, one that changes direction and turns the tide back toward well-being. I have, in fact, much for which I can be appreciative: I am not in pain, my intellect seems unaffected, if sometimes overcome by fatigue, there are people in the world who have affection, even love, for me and I have the capacity to love them as well. There are solutions available to one in my situation and they can be made available.

So as I examine the things which have populated my blind spot, unnoticed and taken for granted, I am discovering a wealth of growth and education, and while it won't, in and of itself, restore my gait, my marriage or my bank account, it will give me some peace as I go forward from here, as my eyes are opened wider than before and the spot is just a little less blind.