Which way is up?

There is a fairly basic school of thought here. Look where your feet are, look directly ahead of them, let your eyes follow a line across the floor and up any perpendicular object in your path, then keep following your eyes skyward until you establish the position of up.

It all works fine unless you are a) under water, struggling to find the surface amid a choking whitewash of bubbles, or b) in the middle of a philosophic maelstrom, struggling to make sense of your ‘direction’.

I guess the reason Eckhart Tolle was so successful with The Power of Now, was his concept empowered people to not actually think about their direction. “Sshh, just be” he said. “The direction will naturally follow.” Guess that’s also why the Dalai Lama is so popular; what with all that Buddism jazz. And while Eckhart gets first billing here, it in no way reflects my personal preference. The latter is Great for spreading his much deeper philosophy about being; the former is probably his number one plagiarist who lucked onto a marketing machine.

But how does this all help in the current conundrum? Don’t think about it, just be – while immaculate in theory because you have to do diddly squat – is not entirely realistic. I mean, I work in marketing. If I trained myself to not think ahead, I’d be out of a job. “Heidi, where’s that media plan?” “Oh, I figured it’s best not to think about it, if we just be the client will approve this ridiculously inflated budget and the media will book itself.” Yes I have days like that, but it’s never going to become standard operating procedure. Is it? So what about the alternative? The ‘putting it out to the universe’ theory?

Has anyone in the room tried to live by Norman Vincent Peale’s Power of Positive Thinking? Hands up all of you who have chanted positive affirmations every waking day of a particularly needy period? What about chanting those good old affirmations internally, for 700 days straight, driven by the god-awful fear of failing at what seems life’s simplest and most successful wishing game? Failure here is just preposterous. I mean, all those testimonials shouted success. And so easy! Just spend five minutes every day visualising winning the lottery, and get five bucks on the tenth scratchie. Half an hour mixed with a round of chemotherapy and you can beat cancer. Look in the mirror and tell it you deserve more, and, fuck me, the award wage goes up in your state. Who wouldn’t believe it? But let me tell you, this pathway to health, wealth and happiness is not without its horror stories. What happens when you miss a day? Not through any fault of your own, but your designated ‘positive’ time has been usurped. Like you get dragged to court unexpectedly. Or you can hear the girls in the next room being flogged senseless. You can’t very well continue can you? What about when there is simply not enough space to think because 12 Russian prostitutes, one prostitute’s son, and all their dramas and dilemmas have been dumped in your cell – a cell that once housed only you and your co-accused? Maybe if Norman had taught you about contingencies you would have made it. But throw any of these interruptions into the mix when you haven’t yet mastered the art of pause and resume on your supercharged, bound to succeed, reiki-slash-power-of­-positive-thinking combo routine, and I tell you, there is going to be some internal horror. Like ‘Shit, will this hiccup run interference with the broader plan? Will my departure from Positive Thinking impact the Grand Scheme of Things?’

Ok, I digress. But you’re seeing the psychological bridge right?

So if not thinking is out. And thinking is out. How else are you supposed to work out which way is up? Just do it, I suppose...Is that what you were going to say? Awesome.

Suffice to say, I’m still thinking. I’ll let you know when I get my bearings.