my one and only final essay for Capstone~ What I know now that I did not know before

Lisa Meyer
Literature 495
Term paper
Dr. Michael Sexson
21 April, 2010


What I know now, that I didn’t know before and the difference that it makes, in regards to T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets


“We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started from
And know the place for the first time.”
T.S. Eliot


Beginning this paper, I thought to myself that it seems the only place to start is by asking myself the exact question my title addresses. What do I know now that I did not know before? While this is a brilliant question, I have a hard time answering it. I continuously obscure the lines between what I think I know and what I really do know. I am attempting to at least clarify for myself what I know and what I am in the present, though inevitably I will also address the future. To answer this question, I have looked to T.S. Eliot whom I believe has taught me much of what I know now. If he has not taught me through his own words, I feel in my heart that they have a strong connection at the very least.


When I first began my paper, I tried to write it as if every stage of my life represented a vale similar to those in Keats’ “The Vale of Soul- Making”. I soon came to realize that this was much easier done as a mental process, not on paper. It also seems to be one of those unique thoughts I had that only I am supposed to think about, a thought kept to myself, for me to ponder because no one else would understand. It is easy for me to move from vale to vale in my head, but writing it down interrupts the flow of this process. I must also mention briefly that this paper to some may seem informal but I am writing for myself in my own voice. While my paper is focused mainly on T.S. Eliot, Keats will be mentioned because he must be. Similar to Eliot, Keats has outlined the process of moving from light to dark and dark to light.


I have come to believe that every day is filled with dark and light, though not in an entirely negative sense. I have days when the dark is overpowering and I cannot seem to push past into the light. These times occur with tragic events such as loss. Then I have days that the dark is overcome more easily, as it is with everyday stresses. Once reading Eliot, I felt that I was able to reach that vale behind which there was light. The duo of Keats and Eliot has given me a completely new sense of Dark and light. I have learned not only from Eliot, but from capstone that the light is not possible without the dark.


I believe that when my life ends and a new life begins, my soul will still be left. I cannot explain how relieved I am to see that Eliot has contemplated the soul in this way. Keats focuses on the Vale of Soul-Making as des Eliot in a way. Eliot mimics Keats in his lines “I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you” (Eliot 27). My soul will never be redeemed from darkness; I shall be in constant motion through all the vales of my life.


Is it Life. Life! Or Life? Perhaps it should be followed by “…”, who’s to say? That’s the thought that I began with when I was pondering life. What is this so called thing and how does it work? Life is a gift, given and taken away. Although it is taken from us it is not lost forever. I have learned through reading T.S. Eliot that life is a pattern. The cyclical pattern of life flows with the idea that we never truly die. We have the ability to experience the same things over and over; for example, waking up, going to school or work, involving ourselves in the same activities daily with the same people, but it’s never the exact same. I hate to use the cliché “circle of life” because it is so much more than that, though similar I suppose.


More importantly, at this moment I must consider not the general meaning of life, but what life is to me. Life is taking a moment to consider all others around us and realizing how they have become a part of our life and the difference they have made. Family, friends, lovers. Perhaps some have parted from my life, but still have left their mark. Life is acknowledging the past and the future but allowing myself to live in the present. But then, what is living? Living I suppose is understanding, loving, hoping, failing and succeeding. I know these things but I will not live until I practice them. I know these things, but at the same time I don’t know them. I have an obscured, complex definition of life, we all do but I honestly do not think that we will know what life is until we have died.
As much as I hate to this say, life is addition and subtraction. We receive some and we lose some. What is the “some”? It is people, moments, time, love and meaning. But I believe that I never lose my knowledge of life, it simply transforms into a new way of knowing.


So, I continue to learn until I die, in which the cycle will begin again. This cyclical pattern to some seems mundane and repetitive but had they opened their eyes to T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets, they would see that no matter how repetitive, no day is ever exactly the same. No day is mundane either, rather the person living in that moment with that thought is mundane to me. Really though, I don’t know the meaning of life. Some may think they do but they don’t. The meaning to life is one of those things that goes undiscovered until death if not longer; perhaps we never understand the meaning. Isn’t attempting to figure that out a waste of time in itself? I am intrigued by this but try not to let it consume my thoughts.


Life becomes more complex and “as we grow older the world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated” (Eliot 31). When I was a child, life was so simple though I had not realized it. I knew nothing about life and love compared to what I think I know now. I knew that I loved my family and that death was inevitable but really I knew nothing. The circle of life was just something from “The Lion King”.
Children know everything about life and they know nothing. Children know how to live life in the sense that they only know how to have fun and throw a major fit when they aren’t. Time has no existence to children. Innocence protects them from some things, some of the time.


I worry sometimes that I allow time to rule my life, other times I ignore time by turning off my phone and avoiding clocks. I feel very strongly that time has become a powerfully negative nuisance in our everyday lives. It interrupts the moments that we should be fully engaged, the moments that we will never again capture. This unhealthy obsession with time in my life forces me to miss so many moments and is reflected wonderfully for me through Eliot’s thought that “we had the experience but missed the meaning”. How have I allowed myself to participate in so many things without really participating? Of course I come to class, I share my ideas (though not often enough), and I leave. But what did I leave with? How much did I engage myself and why did I not engage fully? I can answer this question right now without hesitation. The reason is because I am thinking about my next class, what homework to do during my breaks, and so much more. Why do I allow these thoughts to consume me within that one moment? That I cannot answer.


Eliot complicates the notion of time for me, teaching me that time is all we have and all we don’t have. Once I read Eliot I had a whole new conception of time. With that conception, the meaning of time changes and becomes deeper. Since I have read Eliot’s Four Quartets I realize I attempt to ignore time as much as possible. This, as I have recently noticed, can get me into trouble. But when I do, I am so much happier. I know that time rules the lives of humans today and as destructive as that may be; it is inevitable in this world. Now I am working on how to change that. How ironic to think that with time comes change.


What else surrounding us in this life is destructive? Love. I have learned that above all else, including time and wisdom, love rules my life. I want to say that this year I have experienced what love truly is but am almost scared to admit to having that knowledge. Do I really know love? Of course, we all do, love of something or someone.


As wonderful as love is, I am scared of it because of the power it has to overtake me and my thoughts. I succumb to love in a way I never thought possible. As I write this I can feel my heart racing, my mind wandering and wanting at this moment to succumb to the one that makes me feel this way…but I don’t. I can’t.
I think that recently more than ever, I have seen how healing love can be while at the same time destructive. Eliot allows me to see both the light and dark side of love. I have heard advice to not allow attachment to overcome and to distance myself at times. Eliot has said this in a direct, yet an enlightening way.


The Four Quartets is so romantic that I can’t help but think of love in every way and in a new way each time I read it. When I read of “two and two…holding eche other by the hand or the arm” I smile and fade into a state of consciousness in which I am only conscious of love. I never knew this was possible until I read Eliot and suppose what I have felt is love. “Love is most nearly itself when here and now cease to exist”, when in that moment all you have and need is love, when time is of no essence, that is love (Eliot 31). I also learned, on a deeper level, love is not just of things or people, but of the self, our unique individual thoughts, the world and all that surrounds us in every moment. What do you love and what do you wait for? My answer is everything and nothing.


My love of Eliot has evolved much through the remarkable connections I am able to make to my own life experiences. As I was reading East Coker, I came across a passage: “until the sun and moon go down comets weep and Leonids fly” (Eliot 25). I paused and realized that the first time Jon and I went on a real date was to watch the Leonids meteor shower. I simply smiled and read on. When I went back to re-read the Four Quartets, there in my book was a note (not from me) scrawled near that passage “our first date” and not only did I smile, but I realized that my love of Eliot grew from something more than the language and meaning, but from my life and the power of those connections to my real life experiences.


Examining the idea of attachment and detachment was difficult for me because it is so complex. It relates so greatly to my life past and present, as I am sure it will in the future. Detachment is liberation from everything except the present, though in this world that does not always seem possible. Listening to Lisa Hiller’s presentation the idea of living in the moment was so enlightening, yet difficult for me to practice sometimes. I have found that I have become attached to so many things, people and ideas and I have trouble being able to detach myself.


My attachment especially to those I love is so great that detachment seems to be such a painful process, a process that seems unattainable. A very personal example would be the relationship I am in right now. While I love being with Jon, I know that I need to detach myself. I cannot help but hope for a lifetime of great moments, but Eliot has helped me to realize that I should not wait and I should not hope to the point of making detachment difficult. Each moment I detach myself from this relationship is almost saddening, yet liberating. I have also found that detachment is necessary in order for attachment to have a positive outcome.


Attachment and detachment hand in hand. In regards to love I feel it is necessary to understand both. I am able to admit that I don’t fully understand either all of the time. What I have learned from Eliot is that detachment is not to cease loving, but to love in a different way, a less selfish way, “expanding of love beyond desire” (Eliot 55). As I reflect on experience, I think that more than experience it is the meaning that comes with it that matters. Eliot tells us directly that we miss the latter though. Sometimes we have moments that we only take in the meaning and others that we bask in the experience but forget what it means. For me, the meaning is something that is deeper than anything else. Meaning involves feeling, thought and action all at once somehow. What makes something meaningful though? It’s the heart of the experience.


Thinking about meaning brought me to the idea of distractions. I wonder to myself still whether distractions have meaning or not. I think at times they do because some distractions prevent us from experiencing other things. What can be considered a distraction though? Distractions in my life consist of anything that keeps me from doing the things I need to complete, such as homework. Yet a distraction for me is also something that simply distracts me, keeping me from other thoughts and actions.


Love as I said before is a great distraction, but not just love of people. Distraction is love of words, dreams and illusions. I always use the word distraction with a negative connotation though I shouldn’t. Just as Eliot shows, distractions can be empty of meaning but I do not believe that they all are empty of meaning. For example, Jon is a gigantic distraction much of the time. He is a distraction I don’t want to get rid of though, a distraction I absolutely adore with more meaning than I could ever explain. Cleaning my apartment on the other hand is quite meaningless and again a large distraction. I notice too the word “action” hidden at the end of “distraction”, another interesting discovery because Eliot uses both of these words often in the Four Quartets. One of the actions I practice most often is actually mentioned in the Four Quartets. I lie awake constantly, contemplating the future just as in Eliot’s “Dry Salvages” as he describes “anxious worried women lying awake, calculating the future, trying to unweave, unwind, and unravel and piece together the past and the future…when the past is all deception, the future futureless…when time stops and time is never ending” (Eliot 37). I find it absolutely amazing that when I wake up that time I was contemplating will be the future I was worried about.


So in the end I am still left with another question, what difference has all of this made? I feel that I am perhaps not more knowledgeable on time, love, meaning, and life but knowledgeable in a different way. I know things and think about things much differently now than I did before reading T.S. Eliot. In fact, I have always hated time for the most part but I had ever actually thought about time. T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets has definitely brought me further from the “real world” which I view as a positive consequence. All of this has made a difference in the way I live my daily life to some extent and the conversations I engage myself in. Mostly though, the difference is who I am now since realizing all of this. Am I a completely different person? No. In reality, I am very much the same but I feel different.


One of the greatest differences though is the way I see others as well as myself. I feel like everyone has secrets in their past which we may never come to know. We all carry with us a past that will never be forgotten, live in a present that often goes unnoticed because we are worrying about a future that may never even come. I am remembering to appreciate the moments I have now for fear they may never come again though I cannot deny I still contemplate the future, near or far.
As I come to the end, I “see, now they vanish, the faces and places, with the self which, as it could, loved them, to become renewed, transfigured, in another pattern” (Eliot 55). Every day I am someone new. Every day I see new faces and never see them again. The idea that every experience and moment is new and exciting is reflected in this. But then again it is up to me to observe the meaning in those moments that are gone as quickly as they came.


I am having trouble concluding this paper because I don’t feel like it is time for me to. I have attempted many times to find an ending, and have come to a final realization that nothing ever ends or is finished. Right now Eliot’s lines, “we shall not cease from exploration” speak to me more deeply than they did before. In fact, I remember I liked those words, but did not love them. Now I love them and I feel them. As exciting as my upcoming graduation is, I do not know if I am ready for it. I used to wonder why people were here for six or seven years, but now I think “why not?!” We are always learning, we just have to figure out where and when we move on.


One thing I wanted to create within this remembrance was my vales. My vales are made of tears, relief, pain, happiness, regret and understanding. They are the vales of unforgettable encounters with others, goodbyes and experiences. Every vale is obscured in some way. The vales of my past because I did not take the time to absorb them and the vales of the future obscured because I will never know what lies ahead. If I live by what I have learned in regards to T.S. Eliot’s Four Quartets, I believe that the moment I am in and the vale I am behind may be come a little more clearer though never completely.


Concluding my paper I also consider my sacred duty. My sacred duty is to get through today, to live my life with a passion unlike any other. I must love myself and others and live within every moment as fully as possible. My sacred duty is to succeed but to do so with happiness. I want to live as Eliot says and expand my love beyond simply desire. Lastly at the moment, I want my life to end knowing that I have fulfilled my secret duty by living in the here and now with a different appreciation and understanding for life.


I have cried tears of pain before when having to write papers but as I wrote this paper I had tears in my eyes for a whole new reason that I cannot describe. Never before in my life have I written a paper so personal that has brought me to tears. Perhaps I could say that it’s a true accomplishment. Also meaning that one vale has been pushed aside while I move towards another. I am on a whole new stage, with all new actors. C’est la vie. My life continues behind a whole new vale from this moment on.

But “all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well” (Eliot 57). I look forward to the moment of graduation when “the dove descending breaks the air with flame of incandescent terror.” (Eliot 57) This is the image I will leave with, the image of the moment that will be the present.

~My "last" blog~

My first thought is...CeLeBrAtE but that can wait until after graduation I suppose :)

I cannot begin to explain the feelings that I have experienced while being in this class. I have learned so much that I didn't know before but what difference has it made? It has made a world of difference! I have a new view of knolwedge, life, love and most importantly time. And yes, of course I have Eliot to thank for that!

I have been memorizing my Eliot lines and am taken aback at how wonderful it truly is to have something so influential in my memory! While i still have trouble memorizing my whole section there are lines that have stuck in my head throughout the semester because they spoke to me in a way that I cannot explain but a way that was different- they connected. One line is "'go, go, go said the bird, Human kind cannot bear much reality" and another... "Love is most nearly itself when here and now cease to matter".

I have been a lover of Keat's Vale of Soul making but in capstone it took on a whole new level! I placed myslef behind those vales...something ambitious I had never thought to do. How does that change me? I feel more exposed yet also hidden by those vales. I feel like now there is so much more to be revealed to me in the future, though with the balance of knowledge from Eliot, I have realized I cannot wait for that future (of course because a brick may fall on my head) but now I am weary and am saying "knock on wood" because superstitions do that to me.

As I type, I find I am rambling because like my college education, I do not want to quit. Where will I go, what will I do when my last blog is finished?!?!?! It seems as if I am directionless and lost! But we have to eventually move on because this is the end and soon there will be a new beginning. Where? We do not know? When? Every moment is a new beginning in a way. Take it in, live it up, and calm down because we are all in this together!

The rain is falling from time to time lately and it fits the solemn mood. Sometimes I feel like crying and sometimes I feel like celebrating- whatever I am doing, I am in the moment. My thoughts are taking me to other places now though and I succumb to them and the emotions they leave me with. This is my end. I must now find my beginning. My sunrise and sunset.

Thank you to Dr. Sexson, such a wonderful semester in capstone! Thank you for the past memories and the present moments in which I immerse myself. Past, present and future. Thank you!

To everyone, you are all amazing! Truly...you have so much to accomplish and I am absolutely honored to have shared these experiences with you. I must say, Eliot...we did not miss the meaning or the experience here!

Good luck and I'll be seeing you.

Where to begin...

The last week of capstone was celebrated with such wonderful group presentations...all very creative and ritualistic. It really truly felt like such a wonderful send off and it was fascinating how every group incorporated the whole class in their presentations!!

Epiphany has a whole new meaning finishing capstone. So really what is an epiphany, other than a divine manifestation? What is it to each unique individual? That is what is truly divine about epiphanies, it is never the same- they last and leave each person a changed person.

I have been overcome with epiphanic experiences this semester and realize how truly important they are to our life now and in the end...and at the beginning, again

I could continue blogging on Eliot, Keats and this class in general but instead I will end this blog and move onto my "last" blog for this class...

But I want to leave by saying CoNgRaTuLaTiOnS to everyone! Terrific class- good luck in the future! All my good wishes to each and every one of you!!!

I am listening to Pandora and typed in Ingrid Michaelson to find music similar to hers. Can I just say that I am experiencing an epiphany...a musical epiphany! It has made this moment of blogging a much different experience than I would be having had I been listening to all the other keys clicking as those around me work on boring projects, probably not epiphanic!

I still have to post my paper! Soon, I know! I will be doing that by Friday because I don't have my flashdrive with me.

I realized I did not blog for the rest of the Individual presentations which seems unfair! Nick- wonderful, wonderful job! You've made the last few semesters manageable and fun! Your presentation in silence was great and fit so well with capstone, not to mention the END of capstone. I think that all endings have a sort of silence to them. Victoria, I am proud of you! I wish you'd have read your paper. Not everyone is eloquent with words and you shouldn't feel pressure, those are your words written in your voice, presented by YOU! Nice job :) Erin's presentation on boxes and frames was intriguing. She picked a topic that has interested her all semseter and did a wonderful job turning it into the best work she has written (perhaps) :) Mick- well, I am glad that you had SO MUCH FUN!!!!!! haha- your presentation was so YOU! Don't eat animals but love food? Yes, something of that sort :) No, I am joking- I thoroughly enjoyed it! Amy- you did so well! loved your presentation! To everyone- awesome! I feel like I am forgetting people, and I am sorry! Just know you all did a wonderful job because it was YOUR presentation and that is what I loved about them!

Taking advice from my own paper

I decided to read over my paper today...just because I felt like there were some things i needed to practice and have already seemed to overlook. I am currently going to practice detachment. What better thing could one practice the last week of classes. I am having mixed feelings though. I feel like in regards to school and myself detachment would be a wonderful thing for me to examine. I could gain more knowledge of myself and reactions to certain things and also experience my very last week of classes (unless perhaps I decide to never leave school adn continue learning) in a whole new way! Excitement and anxiety! I know though that detachment will force me to miss other experiences as well which is a bit saddening. Now I must ask myself what I am detaching from that has been causeing me such great distraction. My practice begins...

To Sam

I was in a really, extremely, overwhelmingly crabby mood moments ago but I began reading some of the term papers instead of wasting my time thinking about what made me so crabby. I am no longer crabby. I beagan with Sam's paper- in journal form! It is such a wonderful piece of work and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Not only get I get some amusement and knowledge out of it but it lifted my spirits a bit and prompted me to move on from this waste of time attitude and do something more constructive! Thanks you Sam for writing this most wonderful paper (journal). You did an amazing job!

Individual Presentations Day 3

Rian started off our presentations on Monday talking about melancholy in regards to epiphanies. I think that if everyone wrote an essay on Melancholy it would be so fun to hear them because each of us would have a different experience or story to tell, as with everything!
I followed with real life in connection to T.S. Eliot. Soon my paper will be posted and you can read it if you missed the presentation. Again, sorry my voice was practically gone :(
Taylor took the cake! I am actually struggling with even saying anything because I feel like no matter what I say, it will not do justice! If you missed it, you really missed it! She read her whole paper and connected epiphanies to children. To write her paper she looked to her journal that she kept when she was about 7! If only we all had them with us, we could sit around and read those- there would probably be much laughter! She talked about how children transcend time and live in the moment. She described her life as if she was living in a garden (the secret garden). Taylor also questioned, "what is a child and who was I?" Her paper was brilliant as was her presentation! Loved it! She didn't raise the bar, she threw it into the air!
Sam's presentation was also wonderful. she described stories within stories and narrated a trip of getting lost she had through Seattle. In her presentation she talked about a lost and found box...there is a box for the lost but not the found- well, they are the same...but how?
Tai ended our class period and it was a great closure for the morning! He talked about funerals, tila tequila, ritz crackers & velveeta...I must read his paper! He also discussed ritual and rememberance, as well as mentioning that many times even though we are doing something we ignore it. And you'd think how can you ignore something you are doing- that is what I thought when he said this but then I realized there are so many things I do that go unnoticed even though we are doing them...very interesting to think about!
Good luck to the rest!!! Can't wait to hear them! :)

Individual presentations Day 2!!

I was running late and missed some of Derek's presentation but plan to read his paper on the blog, then I will post comments! Lisa little legs followed with a presentation focusing on predicting the future. You can't. As she ended her presentation I realized all of what she was saying was that we have to take in what we can of the moment because you never relive it the exact same way and may never be able to experience it at all for a second or third etc. time.
Helena is trying to find Rome. But as Huxley says its a state of mind and you get to rome through remembrance of the divine. She mentioned the levels of understanding and the Wallace Stevens poem "To an old philosopher in Rome" seeing a place literally. Robert closed with dreams and freudian thinking. He talked about how everyone is a warrior facing distraction, being tormented by desires. His metaphor of the woman on the other side of the door was captivating. I think that this is something everyone can relate to whether it's a woman or a man, or simply something that is or seems to be unattainable. We age too fast and are lost in our thoughts. "We're all cowards because we are under the spell of distraction".

I feel bad that I was late to class and missed some of Derek's presentation but I must say....some good comes from everything...it has to! While I was walking to class from my car....which seemed a lifetime away....I had so many thoughts on how to write my paper, what to write, etc. and I was thrilled to have these thoughts racing through my head with so many others.

Unfortunately I missed Day 3 presentations...also my presentation for various reasons...I missed out, that's all there is to it.

Individual presentations Day 1

The first day of individual presentations was wonderful! It is so interesting to listen because it is unlike the presentation of any other term paper. These are so much more personal and unique to that individual. Kevin Luby talked about inscape of course and achieving "mental clarity"...I don't quite know if he even knows what that is. I loved that he addressed the idea that silly experiences allow you to upgrade to all new experiences on a completely different level and without those you wouldn't reach that level. He raised the bar for the following presentations. Abby also did a wonderful job talking about memory and experience. We are living in a world of fragmented moments as she described it...which seems accurate to me! I almost laughed when she was talking about eternal truth because I didn't really stop to think about what it really is! Well...there is not really a right answer is there? We all have our own eternal truth. Though it could be said that the divine is the soul. I like that. Live, Die, Choose- well said Joan. I greatly appreciated Joan's way of breaking down life into stages: the first 20 years a hormonal mess, the 50 after that we live and the last 10 years we are losing our minds. That's 80 years of rich, unique experiences. The sacred and the sacrifice are the same- the more you give up the more sacred you become. Katie's presentation was also wonderful of course, raising the bar once again...her presentation was very personal and i know she put a lot of time and effort into it. "if you didn't have bad luck, you'd have no luck at all"...good advice but isn't there such a thing as good luck? Perhaps luck is luck. Ronald ended the class with a presentation on the four quartets which of course I was excited by. He talked about the five chinese elements (wood, earth, fire, water, and metal) and how they all connect. I thought it was brilliant that he changed the order of the elements though and I wondered to myself...had he kept the elements in the same order, would his paper have the same conclusion? Just a thought...He also talked about the phases being circular just as Eliot describes life as circular in a way. Learn to love and you will love to learn.

Tres bien tout le monde!

What I know now...

With the help of Dr. Sexson, I have finally come up with a working title and ideas for my term paper! I am so excited to get started on it, and though it will be "complete" when I present it...I don't think it will ever conclude. I started with the two people I have become absolutely enthralled with: T.S. Eliot and John Keats. I have so much to learn, but looking back...I have already learned so much the last four years. Experiences in and out of the classroom have all seemed to connect.

My working title:
"What I know now that I didn't before and the difference it makes in regards to T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets"

Ideas:
Right Action- what is the right action?
What do I see now as my sacred duty?

"'On whatever sphere of being the mind of a man may be intent at the time of death': That is the one action (and the time of death is every moment) which shall fructify in the lives of others and do not think of the fruit of action. Fare Forward."

"Other echoes in habit the garden. Shall we follow?"

"go, go , go said the bird: human kind cannot bear much reality."

I have many more ideas as well...so I intend to update this blog entry often!

Back to Eliot...

Of course we are back to Eliot, we are always with Eliot. Including the recitation tonight, which I am very excited for! Actually, I am surprised that so few people are participating. But...I was reading Eliot and using the excuse that I HAD to memorize my short 7 lines so that I didn't have to do my french homework! It has worked out well...

I was reading Eliot the other morning before class and found so many more passages that interest me even more as I read them over and over. I don't remember which notes were from the first or second or third time I read, so I apologize if I am repeating a few things from a previous blog!

In the Burnt Norton, Eliot asks us if one should follow the echoes? And in response I asked myself...how would one choose? While it would be interesting to follow the echoes down that road of curiosity would we be conforming to what we think we should be doing or what everyone else would do? If we didn't follow the echoes are we creating our very own unique path?

I pause now because I am all of a sudden at a stop after that thought. Where do I go from here? I honestly have no idea...everyday my book has a new mark on the page...I noticed just now, the binding is slowly coming apart from the book. I am tempted to go home and scan in the pages that have the most notes on them because I really don't think I have the ability (at least at the moment- and every moment is death). The soul. another subject eliot touches on. What is the purification of the soul? Is it darkness and deprivation that serves as the purifier? Must there be light and association before purification is able to be done? I am thinking the light and experience lead to times of darkness and deprivation. It reminds me of the popular saying "You never know what you've got until it's gone". Is this the purification of the soul, coming to that realization?

I am going to pause on this blog to see where i should jump to next and perhaps scan in some pages just for kicks. It would be fun to have others see my notes and let them make their assumptions from that.