Breaking Patterns

[The Stage is on Fire] is a page-turner in which, much like life, there are no easy answers and yet each step of the journey yields insight and hope. This work of heart must not be missed!

Melanie Faith

Creative Writing Teacher, Essayist & Poet.

Katie Steedly’s first-person piece [The Unspeakable Gift] is a riveting retelling of her participation in a National Institutes of Health study that aided her quest to come to grips with her life of living with a rare genetic disorder. Her writing is superb.

The Society of Professional Journalists

In recognition of receiving the Dateline Award for the Washingtonian Magazine essay, The Unspeakable Gift.

I thank you … It is the authenticity of your “class notes”; and it is the delicacy and skill with which you present the nuances of classroom life and the actuality of your students’ and fellow teachers’ lives.

Maxine Greene

Philosopher and Education Scholar

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If I contradict myself, I contradict myself. I contain multitudes. – Walt Whitman

We are all a composite of beautiful contradictions and multitudes

This is exceptionally hard when my triggers, which may not be triggers for others, are set off and I have a choice. Do I immediately explode in a Vesuvian way that unleashes destruction, or do I approach the situation with a sense of calm and from a growth mindset. I profess to be a person who chooses calm and growth, so of course I will build not destroy. That is not necessarily the case. The truth is I am both the person who seeks to understand and the person who only cares about being understood. I am the person who builds bridges and sometimes blows shit up. I am the person who values listening and the person who tunes out what I don’t want to hear. That is the basic terror and glory of my contradictions and multitudes.

Breaking patterns of contradictions and multitudes

It is important to break the patterns of contradictions and multitudes. We must embrace our multitudes to live authentic lives. Embracing our multitudes cannot happen without naming our contradictions: when we say one thing and do another, when our deeds don’t live up to our words, when the story we tell ourselves and others does not match the facts of our lives. Naming our contradictions allows for forgiveness of ourselves and others to happen. It opens the door to making amends when we have hurt others. It allows for honest conversation to occur. It is the basis of humility and courage, qualities that are the foundation of intimacy. Embracing both our multitudes and our contradictions, and living with them in honest and thoughtful ways, is the key to breaking the patterns that keep us from deep relationships with others, from appreciating our unique gifts and the unique gifts of others, and from the being the creators we are meant be.

https://kitt.global/may-20-breaking-patterns-mark-nepo-the-book-of-awakening/