Enduring Doubts
An egg was hatching in my skull. I felt an animal’s sharp little movements rattle and break, leaving shards of shell strewn throughout my brain. And as it freed itself it seemed to grow. The pressure from this foreign growth caused my eyeballs to distend and rung my ears to a pitch that eclipsed my internal monologue. It must have been afraid because I could feel its confusion radiating throughout me, tinging my thoughts and diminishing the batteries powering the flashlight I shine onto the world.
Constantly I felt the animal trying to escape. It wriggled and thrashed with desperate instinct as I went about my day. Yet only just being born it lacked the strength and the knowledge to free it itself. I refused to make room for it, this unwanted addition—indeed my instinct was to crush it so that once again I may be permitted to sleep. Yet every method of extermination I attempted only made it stronger and more hateful.
As I lay awake one night, blaming my sleeplessness on the red light blazing from my alarm clock, I decided to shut my eyes and squeeze this unwanted animal with all my strength. But strength was insufficient—indeed, what force can destroy an idea?—and when my muscles wearied and I lost my grip, it raged within my nervous system, translating even the merest sense-perception into agony.
A river of pain flattened me, smoothing over my anger and rounding it out like a jagged boulder that had fallen into a raging river. Drowning in regret, I reached out to the animal and whispered to it soothingly. “Shh little one,” I told it, “There’s no need to be afraid. I won’t hurt you anymore; you’re safe now.”
Its thrashing subsided slowly as I went on: “I know that you want to be free,” I told it, “and in my ignorance I believed that to be impossible.” I felt it listening to me. “But there is a chance—if we work together—that we can find you a way out.” I felt a stillness steal over me, and with it came relief. Was this the answer? Was it possible that this intruder, this hated aspect could be something intrinsic? Something to contemplate and to guide rather than to neglect? “I’m sure it’s dark and cold in there,” I whispered to the animal, “and I’m sure that being nameless has left you feeling bitter and isolated. So, from now on I will call you Foe.”
The instant I named it a door swung open inside me, revealing an airy labyrinth at the end of which awaited the gate barring Foe’s freedom. And as Foe stepped through that door, the pressure caused by his birth was alleviated, and I began to feel comfortable with his presence.
Although Foe could not speak I understood him; and after months, years of interaction—during which I guided him through the intricacies of my mind—we grew close. So close, at times, that I regretted my promise to free him. I knew that we’d be better off apart—like twins born conjoined—but to lose a companion is to lose oneself, and I was afraid.
Eventually, when I knew everything there was to know about Foe and he knew everything there was to know about me, he reached the end of the labyrinth. So, together, we opened the gate, and as we did a little hole appeared at the base of my skull. From this hole hopped a timid pardalote, anxious to test its wings. This little bird flew around and around me, joyfully utilizing its form until it came to perch benignly upon my shoulder. And there Foe resides—my adviser—for although we are no longer one, we remain inseparable.
