Charles Darwin once said:
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one most adaptable to change.”
Actually, it wasn’t Darwin at all it was supposedly Leon C. Megginson supposedly, well does it matter? It was quite the rabbit hole I fell into just then for a simple quote to sloppily introduce my writing. Interesting, nonetheless and a testament to the blurring of time and memory and perception.
Today I found myself at a crossroads where I can chose to adapt strategies to circumstances to detach myself from them, abandoning promises and obligations not only to others but to myself. I was seen as snappy in my approach at work with these things, blunt and to the point with a no nonsense attitude while in fact, I felt myself being clear and concise. In my personal life, I have developed a new role within my little corner of cyberspace for myself, working in away better suited until I am able to re-join the community at large. These scenarios are rather vague, of course but they also slot into, for me, my experience of the past week or so as a period of change and adaption with rather rapid effect.
Within 20 minutes on Saturday afternoon, I had moved house, for example.
These things may have had an effect on my body, of course. I am exhausted and live off coffee more than ever, awaiting a biological and neurochemical adaptation of body clock to compensate. Yet, my mind, the directing source and soul is clear and flexible. Of course I will not lie, in the moment of these instances I was far from a still lake but we follow the advices:
“Withdraw into yourself. It is in the nature of the rational and directing mind to be self-content with acting rightly and the calm it thereby enjoys.” – Meditations 7.28
… And then, you will see
“A deep scowl on the face is contrary to nature, and when it becomes habitual expressiveness begins to die or is finally extinguished beyond rekindling. Try to attend this very point, that this is something against reason. In the field of moral behaviour, if even the consciousness of doing wrong is lost, what reason is there left for living?” – Meditations 7.24
It’s a fluid thing, our emotions, our responses and ultimately adaptations. If we are rigid in our experience then we will become brittle in our minds and philosophies prone to shattering. But this fluidity is not to be some uncontrolled ever thundering waterfall or busted damn holding back an overfilled lake. Think of the coral reefs and their carefully maintained ecosystems within an endless expanse of simply vastness. Not one clown fish will ever remain.
The clown fish will one day grow legs and then maybe a tail, then maybe lose that tail and so on.
I’d say, rather shamelessly that my recent experiences – or perhaps it’s always been this way with me – can be summed up with one gif:
And, I’m not entirely unhappy to say that this gif, out of context with the rest of the film Hercules, is the sum total of my progress along the Path to date. My own emotions adapting to the philosophies and the circumstances to which they are applied. It’s tangible and real evolution and I love it.
Amor fati.
We all adapt, we all change and even in the fastest of situations and most changeable of days, we adapt all the same. After all, if we don’t adapt, what becomes of us?
Just ask the woolly mammoth.
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