Dazzle Me With Truth
At the beginning of the summer I started a summer job and worried that it was all there was to me.
Instead, I decided to take a summer course too. Introduction to World Literature. Literature gave me meaning. It gave me something powerful to do and think about.
I’ve been stuck for a while.
In the course, we read about ancient Greece, the French revolution and the romantic poetry movement, historical events I was never taught about in high school. And I loved it.
Reading Russian poetry and African short stories was exactly what I needed. It made me see that the world is enormous; I have so much to learn and think about. So, maybe I’m not stuck. I can’t be. Not when the world is so large.
If you’re asking me how I fill my time, as I try to stay off social media (see the article here), the truth is that I do things that make me feel powerful.
The first one is reading. Whether that’s through a summer course or not, I love reading. It fills me with so many answers to life, to questions I didn’t know I had.
The second is yoga. In general, exercise has been shown to be so good for mental health. Personally, and perhaps ironically, I work out more for my mental health than for my physical health.
My friends complain that it’s hard to work out. I agree. It’s hard when you don’t find what you like. Intense workouts may be great, but they feel forced, and I feel unmotivated to do them. I shouldn’t feel pressured to either. When it comes to yoga, it’s calm and fun, what a workout should be.
Now my question to you is:
What makes you feel powerful?
It may not be reading and yoga. But I’m sure there is something you can chase. Something that makes you feel like you.
Speaking about our true selves, one of my favourite poets that I discovered through the course is Emily Dickinson. She’s awesome. She writes in a way that’s so unique, using repeated dashes to add a rhythm to her poetry. About truth, she says:
Tell all the truth but tell it slant —
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth's superb surprise
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind —
Emily Dickinson, Poem 1129
Perhaps the truth about who we are and what we like to do is too powerful for us. We feel intimidated. But we must pursue it regardless.
And speaking of dazzling someone with the truth, the band Oh Wonder reveals:
Dazzle me, dazzle me, throw away your gold
You’ll never be what you wanna be with all that money
Oh Wonder, Dazzle Me
That’s something to think about. Especially for us as business students. Is it really money and “gold” we’re after? Or something else?
And if you haven’t wondered about this by now, let me ask you:
Who do you want to be?
By: Gabriela Gueorguiev