Divine discontent

I was outraged a number of years ago to read a book by an eminent Freudian analyt whose theory was that all artists are neurotic, psychotic, sadomasochists, peeping Toms; that not one is normal.

At this moment I do not know why it bothered me so. He means one thing by his labels; I would call it something quite different; but there is no denying that the artist is someone who is full of questions, who cries them out in great angst, who discovers rainbow answers in the darkness and then rushes to canvas or paper. An artist is someone who cannot rest, who can never rest as long as there is one suffering creature in this world. Along with Plato's divine madness there is also divine discontent, a longing to find the melody in the discords of chaos, the rhyme in the cacophony, the surprised smile in time of stress or strain.

It is not that what is is not enough, for it is; it is that what is had been disarranged and is crying out to be put in place. Perhaps the artist longs to sleep well every night, to eat anything without indigestion, to feel no moral qualms, to turn off the television news and make a bologna sandwich after seeing the devastation and death caused by famine and drought and earthquake and flood. But the artist cannot manage this normalcy. Vision keeps breaking through and must find means of expression.

Madeleine L'Engle, Walking on Water

There is no denying that I am an artist :) (But my divine discontent comes via methods other than the news; I refuse to watch or read the news except by accident). This, Kentster, is a bit more of what we were talking about earlier on your blog, this unusual life where we can rest in God while being in turmoil at the same time. It is a paradox of the highest order, but also a common occurrence in my own life and the lives of all believers I know. Divine discontentment while in the arms of the Father, El Shaddai - the Many Breasted One. Sometimes, however, I get sorely tired of my divine discontentment, this yearning and searching. I am tired from the past years, Papa. I am tired of finding myself once again back in a place where I keep hopping out of your arms and going off striving in my own strength. I am tired of looking at the worst things about myself, the areas of myself which are most broken and wanting to control. Take it, please. I'm tired of striving. (I'll take it back again, after a while, but you know the score. Some day I'll give it to you and not take it back again :) I would, however, like a greater measure of your presence in the coming days, if at all possible. I understand totally the way you remove yourself a few paces for certain seasons. It makes us come harder after you. But I miss you, Papa. I miss being in a season where your presence is so close. Hurry back now, ya hear? (I know you're here, but I need to feel it also).

I'm going to read in bed, a comforting thing. A non-striving thing. I am so bloody tired of finding myself striving. May this particular tiresom wrestling match with myself be reaching some kind of end some time soon (even if it means KO'ing myself to end the fight :). Amen.