Author Archives: Joe Armstrong

Labyrinth

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I have a labyrinth in my garden. Unlike a maze, there is no frustration in walking it. There are no cul de sacs. Walking the labyrinth is very interesting when done with a degree of self-awareness. Do I spend my time looking at the weeds? How do I feel when the pathway leads me out and seemingly further away from my goal of arriving at the centre of the circle?

Each turning point tells a tale. What matters, what matters always, is to keep going. To take the next step. Turning around and exiting it without having completed it is not an option. The first time I ever walked a labyrinth I was struck that at one point, having walked for ages, I returned to a point only inches away from where I had started out from. As the crow flies, I was just as far away from my goal of arriving in the centre. However, the lesson for me that day was that while I seemed as far away in fact I had walked a long way and simply by taking the next step I would arrive before long at my goal.

Recently when I walked it again I was struck by the confusion one can feel in the middle of the pathway. One has been walking a long time and one still seems far from home. From this vantage point one can survey the varied directions one has come, forth and back, back and forth, turning points here, there and everywhere. It isn’t clear when I might arrive at my goal nor is it apparent if the route I have taken was walked as well as I might. There’s a sense of displacement. The is no guarantee of success. Yet, unless I keel over with a heart attack I have no intention of doing other than to proceed.

Walking a labyrinth can be a profound learning experience. Some might call it a spiritual experience. It is often a metaphor for how one treads through life. Lessons are to be learned, easily, for free. It’s as simle as putting one step in front of the other…

Voltaire and Bees

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Voltaire’s Candide intrigued the book club not least by the realisation of two apparent endings. One with ‘cultivate your garden’ and another where he said ‘Sod it. I’m bored. I’m off to Lisdoonvarna’ – or something like that. As evening turned closer to dawn and one member was in danger of missing a flight, The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (not a prescribed text) evoked lots of chatter of matters profound, as did contemplation of the miners in Chile. As for the Secret Life of Bees, two members (one absent) hated it. War was averted – just about – as a clash of Titans threatened to disturb the cosmos given the diametrically opposed appraisals of the said buzzing book.

Irish PEN

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I was asked to become chair of Irish PEN, the writers’ association affiliated to international PEN. Humbled and honoured by this trust, I have accepted the voluntary role depending, as I must, on the support of many.

Stepping up to the plate is a phrase that means more and more to me. I hope that I do a good enough job.

Also during the past week I completed the first full draft of my new book. It is gestating now in the bottom of a filing cabinet for a week before I take it out again to do the second complete draft. This is a book that has been in the making for twenty years. Finally proceeding towards its completion is another moment of ‘stepping up to the plate’.

Leaving safety

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Taking a risk is what keeps us alive. Leaping – leaving behind the familiar – may not come natural to us. But a wise guy I know told me that he never met anyone who regretted making life-changing decisions such as moving from one job to another, one career to another, when it was only fear which kept them where they were.

I am fascinated by the process of decision-making in such situations. What keeps someone in an unsatisfying situation for years? The fear of making a mistake? The fear of the unknown? The fear that faraway hills are green and they will be just as dissatisfied elsewhere? It can be easier to stay and complain than to take the leap of faith in oneself, take responsibility for one’s own life and head into the unknown. It can be hard to believe that security is only real when it relies on oneself. Giving up the security of a role, income, etc. often leads to excitement, adventure, an expansion of consciousness and a life better lived.

‘Time, gentlemen, time’  as they may cry in pubs when it is time to clear the premises. Knowing the time to go, to move on, to leap into the dark.

Having lept, of course, things will not necessarily fall into place right away. You have left behind one synthesis for another – but the other may still be barely born. Financially you may take a hit – after all isn’t it that which so often keeps us in dissatisfying situations to begin with. But remember your resolution: if you only had a short time to live, you wouldn’t have spent it doing what you were doing. So do now what you want to do, see, explore, be, achieve before you die. Today is the day for that.

You have stepped up to the plate. You have risked failure. Whether you succeed or not doesn’t matter in the end. What matters is that you are alive. You have leapt. You have trusted yourself and the universe.

Creation can be a messy thing. Form takes a while to take shape. The world wasn’t built in a day. But create. Create something true and beautiful and worthwhile and fun. Dance. Express. Sing. Write. Focus on what you want. We’ll be pushing up daisies sooner than we think. Laugh. Detach. Be thankful.

The greatest omission in life is to risk nothing

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“The greatest omission in life is to risk nothing. The person who risks nothing gets nothing, has nothing, is nothing. He may avoid suffering, pain and sorrow, but he does not learn, grow, live, or love. He is only a slave – chained by safety – locked away by fear. Only a person who is willing to risk, not knowing the results, is alive.”
— Anonymous

I came across that quote for the first time this morning on the web. Does anyone know who first said it?

celibacy is not a higher path

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Celibacy is not a higher path, even though that is often the line people pick up from the Church. You might ask: if it isn’t a higher path, a holier way, why would anyone in their right mind choose it? But it isn’t a ‘higher path’. Why did the Church teach in the past that sex was always sinful? It did in the past. Even within marriage. And why did women who gave birth have to be ‘churched’ before they could go back to Mass? And did I miss it but has the Church ever apologised for the negativity it taught about sex?

be thankful

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Pause awhile today – now – to be thankful for all you have and all you are. You are magnificent. Your existence is a work of art, a triumph of evolution, a significant moment of creation. Breathe and realize your breath is transitory. A day will come far sooner than you expect when breath will not be possible. This day, you live. Rejoice in that. Think of the film ‘A Wonderful Life’. Know it. For it is a wonderful life. And no matter what tribulations may come our way, life beats the alternative. You’ll be six foot under for long enough. So enjoy this second, this moment of consciousness, this fleeting thing called life. Revel in it. Breathe it in. Delight in it.

the open door

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The Killers’ marvellous song Human has a line: ‘sometimes I get nervous when I see an open door.’ It’s a magnificent truth about the human condition. We do not know what lies behind the door. Is it opportunity or disaster? Freedom or enslavement? Leaving behind the familiar is always scary, like the baby in the womb. Yet, had we not gone through that open door our home in the womb would have killed us. Beyond the door lies a world unknown. No wonder we can get nervous. It’s a powerful image! A great truth about the human condition.