Contentment

Start with the canvas, a nice milky white and a smooth texture. And silence. Silence is important. Picture it, the quiet, the blank sheet in front of you, and hold it, hold it still. Before you ask, it’s not nothing. It’s everything. But before I get too ahead of myself, I should clarify. I think we can find so much more with no expectations, preexisting biases, values. It’s so much easier to find the off-color spot on the empty frame, or the slightest tick in a silent room. Clarity and fair judgment are hard to come by with a full box. Yes, we do need some stuff in the box, I know. I understand. But right now there is a little too much, perhaps.

It is, I admit, hard to unlearn things. To reverse a picture, a sound, and return to silence. Silence is where everything starts. And it is a one-way street. Maybe that’s why when we think of contentment, we picture the innocent newborn child, viewing the world through fresh eyes, seeing things for what they are, and not what they’re made to be. I’m sure I was content sometime back then, before my mind was made of words, when thoughts came in vibrant colors and a cacophony of sounds. Ignorance is bliss. Perhaps that is what the gist of this may seem like right now, but not really. I think John Stuart Mills said it best: “It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.” Turns out, I’m not looking for contentment. I’m not looking for long afternoons on the front porch, sitting back on a rocking chair, staring out into the distance. I’m not looking for closed eyes and deep breaths, sitting in a meditative position. I’m restless, I’m out to do things, I’m eager to reach out and create.

Why? Because I’m not content. Bring me the canvas, bring anyone a blank page or an empty recorder and there’ll be the desire to fill it with beauty, with themselves, and the world around. I long for the stillness and the untouched, not so it can last, but so I can fill it with my possibilities, so that, even if it’s only in my mind, the world isn’t so constrained by what is, but rather drenched in the what could be. Contentment is the start: to allow the lines of potential realities intersect, and let the infinite worlds play out before you. But then comes the painful part, when you have to collapse the realities and focus onto one truth. What comes out, it could be The Starry Night, or Beethoven’s 9th, but in a way it doesn’t feel complete. As beautiful as it is, there were other equally beautiful possibilities that were turned down. I think that’s why artists always tend to be dissatisfied and unhappy. But it’s not just about artists, in the sense of painters and musicians. If I may be a little metaphoric here, life is a little bit like art. We start out empty, with all the colors in front of us. But it cannot stay that way, and eventually you have to choose the painting that will become your life. And wonderful as it may be, somehow, in some ways that masterpiece will never beat that time in the beginning when you had all those magnificent images in your head.

Yet, that being said, it’s not so bad, having walked this far. It’s not so much about regret, or later realizing that you missed a stroke here or there. It’s just the thought that, “I am this one person, and I could have been many others.” Makes me feel sort of lucky, and unsettled too. So I’m here against all odds, for better or worse, making things happen, longing for contentment, hungry to move forward.