Gabriel Roth, cont. . .
Dec. 30th, 2003 12:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dancerjodiThoughts from today's lunchtime reading:
This chapter is on the stages of life, and its relationship to emotions. Yesterday I read about the birth cycle, I continued with childhood, puberty, maturity and death.
She notes in the section on puberty how sexual energy is related to all things (pg 118): "At our most primal level we are sexual beings. Sexual energy fuels our life drive and forges our deepest connections to ourselves and others. We were born to be turned on, set aglow with the flow of primal life energy, enlivened and made whole by the cellular dance of orgasm. We were born in bodies to experience the fullness of sexual energy - alone and in relationship, in our youth and old age, in its masculine and feminine modes, on its surface and to its depths"
From here she discusses how our society has become puritanical, that older cultures provided outlets and community events that celebrated one's coming of age in sexuality, providing a gradual way for people to develop as adults. Sex here isn't just the physical act, its the creative energy that Roth notes has everything to do with anything.
In further discussing the puberty stage, she talks about people fine-tuning their minds, making their own decisions and figuring out who they really are. She makes mention more than once that people are incorporating masculine and feminine qualities into themselves at this time (based on experiences with mothers and fathers during the birth and childhood stages, respectively). It is a time to (pg. 120) "Find your own voice; take control of your own story. Otherwise, you sing secondhand songs, become part of someone else's plot".
The maturity stage involves actually going out and being what you are, doing what you do - acting out what you discovered in the puberty stage (she notes that our society considers people to hit this stage at around age 30, but that of course everyone gets there at their own pace, and some people never get there). Roth notes that many have ideas of enlightenment and where to find it, but that 'everyday activities' can bring enlightenment in addition to traditionally "cool" ones (pg. 123):
"In my work I've run into lots of people searching for enlightenment. Many imagine that it involves following some hot new guru or getting into some group or esoteric practice. maybe. But having a family is another way. The challenge of being in a loving, committed relationship for life and of raising children poses all the essential challenges needed to bring out the best in you. Committing yourself to work that is meaningful to you is another path to enlightenment. These paths to wisdom, which include marriage and family, work, a spiritual group, are maps for enlightenment that may be followed either separately or collectively"
Continuing on this train of thought, I really liked this quote on the next page: "But there's a lot more to maturity than a three-car garage, a fistful of credit card,s the right kind of spouse, and the appropriate number of kids. As puberty is the time to find out what you have to give, maturity is the time to give it. Its the time to make your distinctive contribution"
She ends the chapter with a touching story about the dying process that her father went through with she and her other family members (he had lung cancer). I just can't do it justice by quoting snippets here, suffice it to say it was very movie and got me a little teary eyed at the end (then again, I'm a big sap).
I can't believe that I'm almost done with this book - I have less than 100 pages to go. Some of it is very repetitive, some is more earthy-crunchy than even *I* can handle (and I'm pretty open minded about that kind of stuff), but I think its neat so see different ways to think about issues that are so pervasive in my life, my husband's life, *our* life, and my family and friend's lives.
This chapter is on the stages of life, and its relationship to emotions. Yesterday I read about the birth cycle, I continued with childhood, puberty, maturity and death.
She notes in the section on puberty how sexual energy is related to all things (pg 118): "At our most primal level we are sexual beings. Sexual energy fuels our life drive and forges our deepest connections to ourselves and others. We were born to be turned on, set aglow with the flow of primal life energy, enlivened and made whole by the cellular dance of orgasm. We were born in bodies to experience the fullness of sexual energy - alone and in relationship, in our youth and old age, in its masculine and feminine modes, on its surface and to its depths"
From here she discusses how our society has become puritanical, that older cultures provided outlets and community events that celebrated one's coming of age in sexuality, providing a gradual way for people to develop as adults. Sex here isn't just the physical act, its the creative energy that Roth notes has everything to do with anything.
In further discussing the puberty stage, she talks about people fine-tuning their minds, making their own decisions and figuring out who they really are. She makes mention more than once that people are incorporating masculine and feminine qualities into themselves at this time (based on experiences with mothers and fathers during the birth and childhood stages, respectively). It is a time to (pg. 120) "Find your own voice; take control of your own story. Otherwise, you sing secondhand songs, become part of someone else's plot".
The maturity stage involves actually going out and being what you are, doing what you do - acting out what you discovered in the puberty stage (she notes that our society considers people to hit this stage at around age 30, but that of course everyone gets there at their own pace, and some people never get there). Roth notes that many have ideas of enlightenment and where to find it, but that 'everyday activities' can bring enlightenment in addition to traditionally "cool" ones (pg. 123):
"In my work I've run into lots of people searching for enlightenment. Many imagine that it involves following some hot new guru or getting into some group or esoteric practice. maybe. But having a family is another way. The challenge of being in a loving, committed relationship for life and of raising children poses all the essential challenges needed to bring out the best in you. Committing yourself to work that is meaningful to you is another path to enlightenment. These paths to wisdom, which include marriage and family, work, a spiritual group, are maps for enlightenment that may be followed either separately or collectively"
Continuing on this train of thought, I really liked this quote on the next page: "But there's a lot more to maturity than a three-car garage, a fistful of credit card,s the right kind of spouse, and the appropriate number of kids. As puberty is the time to find out what you have to give, maturity is the time to give it. Its the time to make your distinctive contribution"
She ends the chapter with a touching story about the dying process that her father went through with she and her other family members (he had lung cancer). I just can't do it justice by quoting snippets here, suffice it to say it was very movie and got me a little teary eyed at the end (then again, I'm a big sap).
I can't believe that I'm almost done with this book - I have less than 100 pages to go. Some of it is very repetitive, some is more earthy-crunchy than even *I* can handle (and I'm pretty open minded about that kind of stuff), but I think its neat so see different ways to think about issues that are so pervasive in my life, my husband's life, *our* life, and my family and friend's lives.
