Some Self-actualizing Metaphors to Live by

Perspective

Father: Son, I have just finished reading your story. Your imagination runs wild and far to fetch images and ideas which make your text breathe in an exotic atmosphere. The landscape of your narrative is rich with fertile thinking budding and branching into a network of events.

Son: That’s exactly what my teacher said. She says my stories wallow in rich expressions. My friends call me a power house of creative energy. Actually my reading habit is a big cushion in this regard. My books are my mentors.

Analysis

Ok. Let’s stop here and break this conversation into bits. This small talk is laden with images:

Each bit is an image wrapped in words, and each of these images is a METAPHOR. Though these images bear an indirect reference to a conversation about a piece of writing and the writer, yet, the association is so very relevant that the mind feels entertained with this facilitation of imagery at play. In fact, metaphors help us build correlatives and make it easy to make sense of our abstract existence. In fact, these linguistic figures construct an aura of realism around us and we feel a kind of fitting relevance to the elements we coexist with. Metaphors are self-actualizing.

Time for a Definition

With this small chatter about metaphors, I think I have said enough to intrigue your mind for a definition of this thing. Well, that is simple. A metaphor is a way of talking about something by describing something else, for the sake of comparison; or, as Merriam Webster Dictionary puts it:

In simple terms it is a picture in words substituting one thing for another. In order for us to enjoy the interplay of these metaphors in our life, we need to eye the world around us with a figurative mindset. Once this particular vision mode is switched on, everything in our foreground becomes a picture gallery of thoughts set in motion. The associative property of these mingled thoughts is the basic substance for the creation of metaphors. One thing might as well be another thing at the same time, only if you know how to pick the relevance.

Expanding the Linguistic Horizon

With all this gear in place, what happens next is your language starts acquiring an expansive stretch. Vocabulary enrichment begins to actualize in your oral and written relay of thoughts. A cloud, for example, will become an image for a range of ideas you want to manifest. May be you want to talk about hope; ‘every cloud has a silver lining’ says it all. ‘I’m on cloud nine’ is your perfect statement of joy; and being ‘under the cloud’ can be your phrase for gloom. Besides, the term ‘cloud’ is now a part of common software buzz wherein it represents remote data storage.

Metaphor lives a secret life all around us. We utter about six metaphors a minute. Metaphorical thinking is essential to how we understand ourselves and others, how we communicate and learn, discover and invent. -

James Geary

Metaphors are ubiquitous, and are intricately networked in our daily use. They can be of great help in epitomizing a long tale into a nutshell. ‘Life is but a walking shadow’, is how Shakespeare sketches his metaphor on life through Macbeth’s speech; and goes on to call it ‘a tale told by an idiot’. This is how he aptly builds an environment of guilt and gloom that floods Macbeth’s life after he commits the horrendous murder. And that’s exactly what encases his predicament into a metaphor that grips the whole narrative till the end of the play.

Why metaphors?

Life is a metaphor. It opens up to a number of interpretations; you choose the ones that come along close to your state of being. Metaphors do not stand out obvious; we have to step back some distance to see the patterns. Once the vantage point is steadily formed, we can feel the liberty to cherry-pick the metaphors that fit our life.

Our main goal through this quest has to be all about discovering a sense of direction, inspiring ourselves to better gains, and finding comfort and contentment. This distant look at our own life is guaranteed to add enchantment to the view. We start feeling better aware of our own bearings and what follows naturally is the ability to determine the next leap in the course of life. Metaphors, then, are the major mind-making tools, and we must, therefore, own up the ones we have dug up for ourselves.

Some Self-actualizing Metaphors to Live by

Metamorphosis

Life has a unique gift of suppleness to it. It is sentient to its habitats, and can demonstrate adaptability to the fittest measures of survival. You can see your life through this lens for all the transformations you have made in life. May be you changed your career, felt depressed in the new environment, but anyhow grew new wings to fly better. This need to morph into newer self-awareness is the substance of self evolution and growth. So, it makes good sense to call your life a metamorphosis.

A Storyboard

One metaphor that will equip you with good control of your living experience is that of a storyboard. A storyboard, as you know, is the graphic organizer of events or images set in sequence for the sake of pre-visualizing the motion picture. Putting your desired vision of life in an optical sequence can surely help you with a better oversight and a good understanding of orientation. Saying your life is a storyboard brings you the freedom to predict and partner the outcomes of your current course of action.

A Lyric

A lyric can be the choicest metaphor for your life, if you are an emotional type. Lyrical poems are the warehouses of intense emotions of life, love, tragedy or other such experiences. You choose the rhymes (the scheme and agenda of your life) purposefully like a poet to achieve the desired impact upon your readers. You relay your emotions in words tactfully with all the propriety of diction. In choosing a lyric as your metaphor for life, you put yourself in a position of a reflective thinker who is well versed in transcribing the experiences of joy and sorrow into a note of learning, all rhymed and relatable.

A Classroom

What happens in a classroom has a direct bearing on life too. Life is all about learning. So, why not deem it a classroom, where you enter all excited to learn under the care of your mentors. There is a teacher for each different subject, beside peers and obviously the peer pressure. At times you experience self-enlightenment inspired by your teacher, and at others, a spark of learning when grouped with peers of varying capabilities. No matter your age, this metaphor will keep you engaged in learning, and that is, probably, the best takeaway from life.

A Clean Slate

Ok, you want a break and see your life clean of all clatter about philosophical witter? Done! There is this metaphor of a clean slate or a blank canvas for you. Give it a try and you will have the liberty to write or draw whatever you want. After all you have the key role to play in filling your life with an existential throb. Write the first draft; if that doesn’t seem to work, cross it out, wipe it clean, and write the new one. Enjoy the freedom of choice.

Be Discreet With Your Choice of Metaphors

A metaphor is a big picture of your life, so it largely rests with you to choose the image wisely. Living the metaphor will be your next job. Make sure it demonstrates the specificity of your choice. This will be your aid towards achieving a greater sense of being and achieving. Discipline and mental well-being will automatically come along as good collaterals.