This is the first time I have ever created an actual blog post, so this is a little new to me. I am not the type that tends to share these deep rooted thoughts and feelings on the internet. Most of the time I tend to lean in the direction of sharing funny memes and gifs as my default.
Over the last few weeks since I have started my MFA in Creative Writing at Full Sail University my perspective, and my perception of things has started to shift. I’m not sure if I am forcing it to, or based on the readings, videos, discussion posts, or conversations my mind is starting to see things differently for the first time. In particular, the Mastery book by Robert Greene has hit me a few times really deeply. It was as if in a few brief moments, he was writing about me. The book has given me pause multiple times. There have been a few instances where what the book was saying forced me to take a break from the reading because it hit too close to home. (Greene, Mastery, 2012)
That brings me to the point about “perception.” The way I have perceived things for most of my life has been turned on its head in only a matter of days. It was really hard for me to think of an inspirational quote or image that came to mind. I really struggled with this for days on end. Then in a moment, as if it came out of nowhere, I was reminded of something.
When I finished my undergraduate degree in the early 2000s I was struggling to find my place in the world. In a lot of ways fifteen years later, I would say I still am, but I am getting closer. I was reminded of a poster I had in my bedroom in my childhood home. It was a poster I purchased not long after college mostly because I thought it looked really cool. I didn’t really think about what it was saying, what it meant, or most importantly, what it was saying to me.
When I scoured the internet for JPEG images of it, the options were limited, so the attached picture might not be the best resolution, and not to my normal standard of things I would share. The poster is generally referenced as “Sea Escalator.” But the poster is actually called Surrational Images by Scott Mutter. He was a photographer who created montages of mixed unnatural images to create something unique who died in 2008. The poster is of a man silhouetted in a suit with a briefcase, standing in water with waves crashing around him as he walks towards giant escalators, one going up and one going down. It is a really unique image that always really connected with me. There is a quote at the bottom of the poster that reads as follows: “I’m A Pilgrim On The Edge. On The Edge Of My Perception. We Are Travelers At The Edge. We Are Always At The Edge Of Our Perception.” (Mutter, Surrational Images, 1992)
It is a very unique image and poster. I had to dig it out of my closet to find it buried behind tons of other old posters and junk. I felt it was important to share this particular image because, as I mentioned earlier, I feel for a lot of the student enrolled in the Mastery class at Full Sail University, we too are travelers at the edge of our perception. We are on the brink of finding out who we are, and what we are made of.