Neutrality / Ambivalence

I’ve hinted around neutrality before.  A friend in St. Louis first recommended that, when in conversation with the Universe, I might ask that my neutrality be expanded.  As a not naturally neutral kind of person, this was a brand new thought and a relief both.  Ah, blessed neutrality.  The precursor for things like understanding, clarity, observation, and acceptance.  A critical building block for things like compassion.  A requirement for choosing your reaction instead of just succumbing to your ego-centric emotional response.

Neutrality is about breathing.  The absence of expectations.  For someone who is generally anything but neutral, it’s like cold water on a blistering hot day.   It is the epitome of nirvana.

I have not been feeling much neutrality as of late.  Actually, ever since the move.  Prior to the horrible evening of watching box after box enter my roommate’s house, I was doing pretty good.  I’d been gifted with certainty and neutrality and I was riding out the attendant complications and ramifications of my choices with equanimity.

Then I moved.

Neutrality vanished.  My reasoned approach abandoned me and I said some things that I stand behind, but probably weren’t helpful at that particular juncture.   And all of that agitation and frustration and impatience stuck.

Until the past couple of weeks,  when neutrality’s cousin showed up instead.  I now have ambivalence.  While neutrality and clarity can co-exist quite happily, ambivalence and clarity want nothing to do with each other.  Ambivalence is a fan of napping.  Sleeping late, staying up late, watching stupid crap on TV, these are all the purview of ambivalence.

When compared to agitation and indigestion, ambivalence is a blessing.  Neutrality is better, at least when it comes to waking up in the morning…  But if ambivalence is all I get for the moment, I think I’ll not complain.