“Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited to all we know and understand, while imagination embraces the entire world, and all there will ever be to know and understand.”
―
I don’t really know for sure what my Father wanted me to be exactly, it was something in the line of Doctor or Engineer, it definitely wasn’t a poet or a dreamer. In some of his tipsy tirades, he would tell me he would love me more if I was successful, and to him, success meant having a degree or a doctorate or some kind of scholarly credentials. Being a rebel and a dreamy earthling, this didn’t resonate with me at all.
He would make me sit with him for hours while he fixed the washing machine and I had to memorize all the tiny parts. Maybe I was more of a *“handlanger” than anything else, but his plan was to inspire me to become an engineer like him. Having the ability to daydream while in a serious conversation with anyone has held me in very good stead over the years. It is actually one of my superpowers. Thanks to my Dad I became quite accomplished at not listening while pretending to.
I was born into a family of achievers, but secretly I never had much ambition. I preferred to watch plants grow, play with my pets, dress up, and pick flowers than get all serious and intellectual.
To my Dad, this was a weakness, and I often wondered if he loved me, because I actually failed his admission test. It bothered me for years and I grew up feeling highly inadequate, hiding in shadows so that no one would ask me what I do, too embarrassed to pronounce my occupation.
Perhaps my Dad knows now that I did become a Doctor and an Engineer, not the kind who stands up on podiums with a cape and hat being handed an award, but one who can diagnose humans and broken washing machines just by the noise they make. I’m not a specialist though, so I’m not afraid to refer them to experts in their field if need be.
So perhaps on earth, I disappointed my Father by being a dreamer, but in heaven, it could be quite a high achievement. Don’t get me wrong I’m in awe of people who build bridges, educate children, wangle numbers and fix bodies, but it seems they are defined by those things.
Recently a friend told me that her husband looks just like the accountant he is, and proudly so. It got me to thinking about what I look like, what defines me.
Do we all dress, walk, speak like our earthly careers, and what happens when our lifetime achievements get pulled from under us?
My Dad was an Electrical engineer, he should have looked like Albert Einstein with a shock of hair on top of his head. Instead, he looked like an old git in a safari suit.
Maybe he didn’t care back then like we do now. So much has changed. Who wants to look like a schoolmarm anyway?
People don’t ask me anymore what I do, perhaps it’s my age or perhaps I throw off a “don’t ask me” vibe. I’m disappointed though, I want to be asked….and this is what I’ll tell them. I’m a light-bearer on my 100th or so cycle through the earth. I’ve been all of the above and on this my hopefully last cycle I don’t need to be anyone. Actually, being a nobody is quite enough for me right now!
Is it just a pipe dream that I can discard these robes of ego?
Thanks to my Dad who came to make me feel very small and inadequate about myself while he was here, I learned to see other earthlings as vulnerable holders of light. To see through their façades right into their beautiful essence. Another superpower I hope to be proud of someday. He actually did me a favor…
We are spirits taking on a human experience, sometimes overwhelmed by the need to fit in or stick out, whichever fits. My recommendations always are watching more sunsets, smelling more flowers, sitting and doing nothing for as long as the mind will allow, and getting in touch with the incredibly beautiful beings that we are. If that ain’t a career, I don’t know what is!!
Ok well, I don’t get paid for it but every flower and dandelion appreciates the attention, and perhaps my reward will be in heaven after all….
If we really believed that we are all in this together and that we have been both peasant and king, and everything in between, wouldn’t we be singing along with the Beetles… “all we need is love”?
and thanks also to Albert Einstein for making me believe in the importance of imagination…
*“handlanger”- Gofer
