The Road Less Traveled

Pondering

When I reached a major turning point in my life well into adulthood I remember being completely anticipatory about trudging on especially after many years of living under an oppressive thumb -- I felt like a teenager getting a taste of freedom from my parents for the first time. I was cautioned by a number of well meaning people that I need to remember I will also have to face the consequences of my choices, so choose wisely.

Those words began to haunt me over and over again in my mind. I pondered upon these words of caution for many months. I began to worry about making wrong decisions. I was moved to investigate further this “Pondering” process in order rid myself of this growing fear.


That’s when I painted “Pondering.” For me, painting is a form of meditation, yet not always a peaceful one. Often times painting is an intense, and exhausting process. I engage my thoughts – “what am I trying to convey with this image?”, and these thoughts stick with me the entire painting session.

When I finished painting ‘Pondering’ I felt like the process taught me something very valuable. I will never REALLY know what my choice is until I have lived it.

“There are two kinds of teachers: the kind that fill you with so much quail shot that you can’t move, and the kind that just gives you a little prod behind and you jump to the skies.” – Robert Frost

Life is difficult. This is a great truth, one of the greatest truths. It is a great truth because once we truly see this truth, we transcend it. Once we truly know that life is difficult - once we truly understand and accept it - then life is no longer difficult. Because once it is accepted, the fact that life is difficult no longer matters. - M. Scott Peck

The Road Not Taken (The Road Less Traveled)
By Robert Frost

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

The Road Less Traveled