to be nobody-but-yourself
in a world which is doing its best,
night and day
to make you everybody else
means to fight the hardest battle
which any human being can fight;
and never stop fighting
e. e. cummings
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🙂 Love this!
So true. I try to teach my girls this very thing. Keep fight to be who YOU are not what your peer group says you should be. Thank you for this very true message!
I wish I could say it’s about my kids, but frankly, I needed to read this today. Thank you.
BEAUTIFUL PICS & VERSE!
Thank you for sharing this – it really made me stop and think.
Beautiful poem and lovely pictures! Thank you for this post, Lanier; being nobody-but-myself is something I have struggled with for a long time, and the poem by Cummings is a good reminder to me.
The passage of time, simple laziness and borrowed ideas of what an ideal Christian woman “should be” can make me slip into a lesser version of myself. Then I have to stop and say, wait a minute, God made roses and irises and birds of paradise and snapdragons and daisies. They share the same sun but they’re all different, he doesn’t want us all to be the same.
This blog shows someone fighting the “fight” with grace and style. It’s not trying to be like blog X or blog Y, it’s a thing unto itself.
Maryann, what a lovely thing to say. So glad we’re both fighting the fight. 🙂 God bless…
On the arts:
“Do not attempt to adopt the style of any author. Unless you can feel that you can be yourself, do not try to be anybody. A poor original is better than a good imitation in literature, if not in other things.”
–Ella Wheeler Wilcox
However, I tend to follow the more realistic philosophy of J.D. Harding (on drawing).
“Art is the graphic interpretation of Nature; and every painter either expresses his ideas of her in his own idiomatic pictorial language; or, guided by his knowledge, and his own peculiar views, embodies, in his own style, the excellencies of another….Every original painter relies chiefly on himself for the characters, or graphic language, which he employs in his interpretation of Nautre. He diligently studies her beauties, and investigates the various modes adopted by his predecessors and contemporaries in their imitations of the originals, deriving from each such aid as may be most subservient to his own views; and thus making their thoughts and practice conducive to the eventual attainment of a method both true and original.”
And these, of course, are true of all of life, as well.
But isn’t it amazing the difference between being inspired by a predecessor and pressured by a peer? The former is soundly based on demonstrated excellence and develops you gently; the latter is simply zeitgeist–substance-less, illusionary, yet powerful–and has to be beat away using all that’s timeless and true.
Yes, precisely, Maria. Your thoughts really give me something to chew on. Thank you for the blessing of your words. 🙂