Being and becoming

There is a being of a person. 

That being is in becoming. It is in constant search of its being. 

At one moment, one is reflected in a friend’s smile; at another, in a sad face. Sometimes one appears in the landscape in which one sees oneself, or in the lazy stare of a cat. The circumstances of one’s existence change, and so do the mirrors. But how should one respond?

How should I respond to a smile, to a sad face? With what step should I tread this earth, and how should I approach my cat? These questions make me wonder about my being: What am I before a foe or a friend, before the wind and rain, or a night’s dream? What am I at each specific moment in time?

There are two fluxes: one internal and the other external. Apparently, the two are separated by a tiny yet extensive and complex being-on-its-own called skin. One is covered in skin, forming a delimited shape in order to live within the flux within and without. Still, the skin itself is soft, porous, changing — always dying and being born anew — also in flux. 

And yet, even if all is in constant flux, I search for my being — in the eyes, in my cat, and in the landscape — for I am, nevertheless, a becoming being, a shaping form.

I do believe in essences. Call it the nervous system, or the gene, if you wish — or destiny. Perhaps it is simply a poetic way of seeing the world, where every word (including "skin") has its own unique, revealing core.

[Photo above by Sergey Filimonov @videoprolab]