My Unlived Life

Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment and especially on their children than the unlived life of the parent....Carl Jung

The above quote lept out at me the other day and has been at the front of my mind since. Strong isn't it, especially as it came under the heading of his (Carl Jungs) thoughts on failure. I'm not suggesting that I am, or feel I am, a failure, but a large part of my life, indeed my inner makeup, has been resisitance to following my path, even a lack of really understanding what my path is. This has involved trying lots of things and giving them up. Coupled with the old trying to please thing. And staying with things that just aren't working for far too long.
Trying to find my own way in life has been extremely difficult for me at times, and caused no end of illness and anxiety to me personally, and caused me to be a burden on, and suffering to, those close to me. And my biggest fear has been that this will in some way effect my children, hold them back in life and cause them to be overly concerned about me. To in some way feel unable to follow their own paths and live their own lives.
And along comes Carl Jung, before I was born, and gives his validity to my fears.

Then I open a book I was browsing in the library and this caught my eye....

Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires...William Blake

I read somewhere once that, when we are at the end of our lives, its the things we haven't done, those things we really wanted to do and didn't, that cause the most pain, the biggest sense of loss and regret. And what I think William Blake was trying to get at here almost a century before Carl Jung, was that when we don't follow our path, our desires, we might as well never have lived, might as well have been murdered in our cradles.

And in some ways I do sort of feel that about my life, when it comes to what is my true purpose in being here, or even at the day to day level. That constant, nagging feeling of something is missing, that longing for, well, for my truth, my own truth, in my own words, and my own life lived through my own actions.

And life is now presenting me with another opportunity, another chance to take stock and forge my own way. I have siezed the offer of voluntary redundancy at work, and been accepted.
I read once that, when a friend of Carl Jungs came to him and said 'Great news. I have been promoted at work' he replied along the lines of  'I'm sorry to hear that, but if all of your friends gather round we may just be able to help you through this'! And then, when another friend came to him and said 'I have been made redundant at work, I have no job, what am I going to do' Carl replied 'that's great news, now you have the opportunity to try something new'....

So here's to something new. Here's to the truth in each and everyone of us. Here's to us finding, and living, our own unlived lives....