Today as I glanced in the review mirror on my drive home my eyes were caught by the “Colorado State University” sticker that adorns my back windshield. Despite the fact that I no longer live in Colorado, didn’t graduate from CSU and have in fact attended several other higher education programs since my good ole green and gold days, the sticker prevails. When asked if I miss Colorado or if I reminisce on those first years of college, the answer is no to both, and yet to look at my old Chevy one would certainly think otherwise. As I poked around all these facts what emerged was an even bigger piece of the puzzle: Identity. I realized that the reason the sticker is still on my car is because it locates me and adds to the definition of “Amber”. As if to put a push-pin on the map of my personal trajectory, stating “This is where I’ve been, this is who I am.” It adds flavor to my sense of self, and I realized that even if it is a flavor I think of being particularly attached to or fond of, I deeply relate to the belief that being flavorful is always better than being bland. WOW! When that thought crossed my mind I felt like I had been hit with a truck. Why? Because as long as I am more interested in identifying myself as someone or by something, I will never have the space or freedom to consciously co-create.
Of course it is impossible to be completely free from our sense of identity, but I think it is possible to be unbound to it. When I free myself from the bindings of my own sense of self-definition I can feel the abundant splendor, the unlimited sense of possibility and positivity come rushing in and through me. It is the blissful kiss, the ecstatic joy of perfect Freedom. The moment my attention snags on an idea of who I am or who I should be, what I should do, how I should behave, the liberation fades to the background and my mouth is quickly filled with flavors- flavors that compared to the taste of Freedom are no longer interesting, rather they are bland and mundane. Bland because they have no purpose other than to please my own senses and mundane because they are flavors that I have already tasted before. Salt and pepper will always be just salt and pepper. Without the spice of something new there is nothing to tug on our capacity for creativity. And yet isn’t it odd how caught up we get in the bland and mundane?
As I cruise through the web and listen to peoples comments about food, I’m finding that what we choose to eat, and more often what we choose not to eat, carries a lot of weight on our sense of who we are. This isn’t to diminish the hierarchy of consumption but it is to bring into question how heavily we lean on the conclusions and definitions we draw about the self from these choices. Do we make choices to eat or not eat something because it fuels our capacity for consciousness? Or are these choices made to fulfill a small sense of self?
-Amber
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