Collages can be tangible:
papers, fabrics, leaves, twig, bark, and flowers handcrafted into a
visual art piece. Disparate items convey a whole new idea in their formation as
a single entity. We also make collages with our life; using the experiences
that Life hands us, we remake the pieces into a cohesive whole. We reconstruct
or we perish.
“Collaging life” does not always require an end product that
is wholly different from the original. But the shifts and textures of who we
are slowly move us to different responses to our lives. It is as much these
responses as it is changing the details or facts of a life that craft something
emergent, new, fresh, beautiful, and complete.
Some of us make collages of our lives simply by refusing to
let the incongruities we face become isolated pieces of ourselves. They are all
inherently part of who we are anyway, regardless of how we might deny them attention
or refuse to give them voice. So the hard work comes in learning how to place
these shards and scraps onto the foundation of one’s life so that something
beautiful emerges. And how to hold and live this in the face of seemingly
mismatched colors and textures is another challenge. I think if we can become
open and compassionate enough, we will naturally move to a place of inner
expansion, one in which we can hold all of our pieces. They become held in
unity, peace and – finally - beauty.
My passion is for story. But not just any story. I long for
Story, that deep confluence of insight and seamlessness that we can make out of
the incongruent facts and experiences of our lives. These deep inner Stories are
what I long to tell and to hear; it is a privilege to share them with others, to receive
them as priceless riches from another. We can know bits and pieces about ourselves or another, but the whole
weaving together – the placing of these bits into a context that gives our life
richer, fuller meaning – goes missing in our tendency toward random, brief chats. When we have been able to share
the books of our lives, only a paragraph at a time, we can’t know how the
sentences and paragraphs form a complete Story. That is what we strive for: an unfolding, a wholeness, unity with self and others.
Understanding how we can collage our lives into Story helps us
expand into a bigger world; we create a bigger version of ourselves for the world.
All blog images created and/or photographed by Jennifer J. Wilhoit unless otherwise noted.
