The temptation to be something other than our unique selves
is trained into us at a very early age and reinforced, at least
in this country, in the public school systems. No where else
in the animal kingdom does this seem to occur except in humans.
I am continuing to read U.S. Andersen’s Three Magic Words.
He writes a chapter on competitiveness versus creativeness.
Some of what he says I have not heard anyone say it quite like
that. In a couple of places I’ve added some emphasis to his words.
Enjoy, Bethie
“The essence of mankind is not competition; it is creativeness. In all
this world there is not another you nor has there ever been another
you. Is it not ridiculous to attempt to mold yourself into a likeness
of your fellows, to attempt to undo the work that God has done?…The
universe has sired no other person like you. Only you can be you.
Only you can draw upon the infinite for those divine powers that are
yours.
There is a fine line demarkation between competition and creativeness
in the minds of everyone today. Yet they are black and white,
complete opposites on the polar scale. Competition attempts to be like.
Creativeness attempts to be unlike. *Competition casts all humanity into the
same mold. Creativeness makes of each man an individual counterpart of God.*
Competition…it leads you into the suffocating trap of *not wanting
the different but wanting the same, only better. It imposes upon you
a scale of values that is not your own but belongs to a group.*
*Creativeness, on the other hand, is a world of your own*. If you were
to take brush and palette in hand right now and paint a picture in
oils, the result — good, bad, or indifferent by the world’s standards —
would be all your own. The finest artist living could not copy it exactly.
Does not this prove there is no other you? Conformity and competition
are death knells to the spirit. Creativeness and non-conformity are an
expansion into cosmic understanding.”
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