Enemies – a Bloggers for Peace post

I have to say right at the start that I was uncomfortable with this month’s challenge, which was to address an enemy.

I don’t have any enemies.  Perhaps people perceive me as their enemy, I don’t know, but I don’t have that intense level of feeling for anyone personally. I might have felt anger at times, as I’m sure we all do, but I have neither the time nor the energy to invest in someone I do not like.  I’d far rather use that energy to enjoy the company of those who enrich my life.

There’s a difference in my mind between a personal enemy and an ideology that I oppose.  Ideologies are not human, they do not choose a path – they are an excuse for behaving in a particular way.

There are things that make me angry, and people who are powerful and cruel whose actions revolt me, and much of the world we know was created on the backs of the weak.

But this creates a feeling of injustice, and of sadness, and not a list of enemies.

With all these thoughts about the nature of an enemy floating around my mind, I doubted my ability to pull any sort of post together, and I worried that whatever I said would sound too trite, too simplistic to be meaningful.

And I decided this was where I should focus my attention: not on people, but on the worry and doubt that get in the way of just doing things. It might not be the purpose of the exercise, but it’s meaningful to my writing life.  

If you look at the meaning of enemy in the free dictionary, it includes this definition: ‘something destructive or injurious in its effects’

Doubt, fear and worry sometimes feel like playground bullies, taunting me over each submission, blocking me when I reach for an envelope, forcing me to read, and re-read, each e-mail, or blog post, or letter.  

They are the reason I have a pseudonym for this blog.

They are the underlying cause of embarrassment when I read my poetry.  They are the reason I defer and defer submissions until I literally have to publicise a date to do these things.  They seem cruel, and unfair, and unfeeling – and they are part of me.  Am I really my own worst enemy?  Are they truly destructive or injurious?

I reflected on that idea for a while, and in the end I decided not.  There’s no malice from emotions; they are warnings and signifiers but they are not sentient, they are not thoughtful.  Whatever impact my negative emotions have on me, they are part of why I am who I am. They are as much me as my skin, or my hair, or my teeth.  And they haven’t been done to me, either.

I’m not suggesting I am always accepting, and certainly the last few months have tested me in many different ways.  Nor am I suggesting that emotion are entirely nature, not nurture.  Many emotional responses may be the direct result of experience, both good and bad.

Nevertheless, hating my emotions is about as useful as hating my freckles, or hating my ear lobes.

I am learning to channel those fearful, doubting thoughts – and to value them. Without them, in a strange way, I’d never have written anything.  Emotions are what make writers write, or painters paint, or singers sing.

All in all, this month’s peace post is a bit of a strange one.  Enemy is such a strong word, I really believe it should be reserved for those occasions where someone’s behaviour warrants its use.  That way, it retains its meaning.

Happy writing,

EJ

🙂

B4Peace Central

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The Crayon Files

Through the Peacock’s Eyes

Electronicbaglady’s Bag of Bits