Now, before you accuse me of plagiarism, I am “borrowing” the title of this piece from Oscar Wilde’s famous play about pretence and the pickles it produces. Luckily for the protagonists, in the play each gets what they want in the end in spite of all their “bunburying” (or secret double lives).
The question is, how much bunburying of our own are we doing? And I am not talking about the obvious kind (like SA Minister of Health, Manto Tshabala Msimang’s alleged fondness for the bottle, among other things). I’m talking about living one life while vaguely wishing for another. I’m talking about a failure to fully commit either to one’s present course, or a different one. And, worse yet, I talking about actively investing energy in a situation you find yourself in simply because it’s, well, where you find yourself.
Despite the happy endings in “Earnest”, the reality is that this kind of fence-sitting gets you nowhere. I know. I’ve done a lot of it. It’s almost like the universe picks up on our ambivalence and conspires to keep us “stuck”.
The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines the word “Earnest” as firstly “a serious and intent mental state” and then “a considerable or impressive degree or amount”. To live the life you truly yearn for, you need both - a solid dose of intensity in impressive amounts.
I will also buck conventional wisdom and say that in my experience, achieving your goals has less to do with belief and more to do with a compelling desire coupled with decisive action. Personally, I find it difficult to trust I can achieve/win/earn/build my heart’s desire because I usually have no idea how to go about it. If I don’t have a clear map to my destination, it’s very hard to believe I will get there.
Because the things I want are seldom conventional and rarely fit into my formulaic, twenty-first century, suburban South African frame of reference, I have always stored them on my dusty mental "fantasy shelf". But in the last year, as well as exploring my creativity, I have been doing some psychological spring-cleaning (SHIP), and have learned a few key principles. If I am ever going to do anything significant:
1) I must acknowledge my “want”
2) I must let myself want it
3) I must broadcast my “want” to the world by taking action
4) I must relinquish my need to control the outcome
My point is: get out of the garage! Don’t aim for the “perfect” road-trip because there’s no such thing, and self-correcting detours are part of the journey.
“But,” you may ask, “Putting aside all the airy-fairy, new-agey, tell-me-what-I-want-to-hear stuff, does this actually work?” Oh yes! - And it is very specific. A few examples from my own career:
I hated my first job, and prayed every day: “Lord, get me outta here!” He did. I lost my job after six months. I did the same thing a few years (and jobs) later and I was laid off again. About six weeks ago, as a journaling exercise I made a twelve-point, seemingly unattainable list of characteristics of My Ideal Job. Three weeks ago, following a series of unforeseen events, I decided to make some changes, so I updated my résumé, made a few phone-calls and sent out a few e-mails. I start work on the first of next month. The job matches every one of my “unattainable” criteria.
Forget the “how”. Focus on the “what” and then “do”. The results will take your breath away. I can’t explain it, I certainly can’t comprehend it, but that’s how it is.
How important is it to be Earnest? Very.
