There are times when I feel transparent – almost invisible. It is a fragile state in which I am diminishing. I have this feeling of being stretched so thin, of being insipid, diluted – a lite version of me. It is like speaking in a crowd and the conversation continues right through me – no one hearing. It is like being one of the weathered, nameless ones, appearing at my car window begging & when sated, blending right back into the shadowlands. Where did she go ?
The transparency of God. Abraham Heschel says that life passes on in close proximity to the sacred, “You are not alone, you live constantly in holy neighbourhood: remember: ‘Love thy neighbour – God – as thyself.’” The accessibility of God, God drawing near – holiness moving in next door.
The discipline of transparency is positional. It implies sensitivity to place & openness to otherness in close proximity. It has that sense of vibrating in tune, of being immersed, enveloped and eventually becoming at ease and purposeful there. It is relationally significant yet non-threatening – reflective yet non-judgmental.
Transparency has that sense of being poress & permeable – of light passing through the thing uninterrupted. Relationally it risks greater vulnerability and exposure of self.
Transparency pragmatically embraces truth; not so much truth - universal & immutable but truth - local and dynamic. It is at ease with a reality that is pitted, asymmetrical & irregular. I think transparency is a choice – I choose to be present, I choose to immerse myself & to allow myself to be penetrated & shaped by this place !
As for those others dwelling out on the margins – disempowered and vulnerable - the anonymity of transparency is a discipline of necessity & survival. Outwards & downwards !
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