Fire Starter

I interpret pursuing one’s passion (singular) to mean that one has to nail down the thing in life that gets them feeling all hot and tingly. Then they dedicate their life to that pursuit. Curiosity comes with far less pressure. It is following the white rabbit down the hole because you can’t pull yourself away, you can’t stop yourself from following the line of thought, or the tingly feeling in your toes when you reach the edge of knowing, the edge of knowing how something feels, learning the edge of what someone else knows or feels. I am curious about people and about the human experience. And reaching the edge of what someone is aware of, and being with them as they explore their own experience and perhaps either come to new conclusions, or share their experiences and conclusions with me… That’s the space that makes me feel tingly. Maybe they’ve known for a long time, but they’ve never given it voice. They’ve never blown a little air into the kindling of that fire to let it burn. To then allow it to burn just bright enough that a little of their story floats on the wind over into my story and joins my kindling, to let my fire and the fire of the world continue to combust. 

The four stages of fire are known as the incipient, growth, fully developed, and decay stages. 

The incipient stage is the set-up stage, it’s the coming together of the required elements. And if someone who is intent on stopping fires from happening notices the alignment of the conditions, it’s during this time that the fire can be suppressed most easily. As one is setting up their fire, they’ve got their combustibles and their oxygen and their ignition all aligned, a passerby could most easily stomp out the motivated energy during this time. The passerby may not have ill-will toward the fire, fear alone is an incredible motivator for stomping out what could be an awe-inspiring event. Awe is terrifying for many people, because it could literally burn down the history of what once was. The solid foundation of the house he’s lived in for years, his family has lived there for generations. Seeding that very ground. Why would he risk the possibility that this motivated energy could burn it all down? When those elements and conditions begin to align, which could take a long ass time, hence the incipient stage being one of the longest stages, he gets scared and vigilant.  

In the growth stage, the fire has begun and is looking for the opportunity to grow, for things to combust and oxygen for fuel. The growth stage is the shortest of the four stages, which i find interesting because, if i were to use fire as a metaphor for one’s life course, i would assume that growth would be the longest stage – or at least not the shortest. Growth comes in short bursts. Swallowing up the surrounding kindling with great vigor and assertiveness. Gaining momentum. Gaining courage. Gaining ground.

The fully developed stage occurs after the fire has grown by enveloping all combustibles within its reach. It has grown such that the fire is at its biggest and brightest. This is the most dangerous stage for all those who may wish to extinguish the fire, because the force of the blaze is so strong that humans, and really all living beings, have no hope of overpowering its sheer ferocity. It has grown, it has fueled itself for this stage. It has sucked in all the oxygen around it to burn higher, brighter, stronger. Get the fuck out of my way, says the fire. I have been waiting for this a long time. I chose my time. I chose my place. And this is it. Try and stop me. Blow your loads at my feet, your hoses are useless against my power. No one gets out of this stage alive if they’re trapped inside. Because it’s too powerful. The opportunities to put the fire out have passed, and now one can do nothing but stand back and allow it to burn. Be a witness to the power. Notice the moment and appreciate the alignment of elements that allowed it to be so. 

The decay stage is the longest. Once the fire has burned the brightest it will burn, there’s a slow and steady dropoff in intensity and heat. During this stage, there is a possibility for the fire to travel, it can find new combustibles, new spaces to inhabit with new oxygen to suck up into its being. It can grow again, it can find kindling again. But without new combustibles and fuel, it will decay slowly but surely into nothingness. I was struck by this beautifully poetic phrase about danger during the decay stage, written by a firefighter, “the danger of a backdraft, when oxygen is reintroduced to a volatile, confined space…” Backdraft. Movement of air in a different direction, backwards. An unexpected turn of events. A volatile, confined space. Confinement. They thought they were secure, they thought it was contained, confined, subject to the inevitability of decay. But what if they confined the fire into a volatile space. The possibility of a new alignment of elements, unexpected movement, containment gone wrong, reignition under new conditions.

How does fire get ready to blaze? How do we know when growth is happening, when something has ignited and the rise to power is imminent? How do we know when to seize the moment of  fully developed opportunity to show off and shine? How do we seem to forget that we have the power within us to blow a little oxygen into a developing blaze and/or to envelop the combustible energy into our fires? 

I am fire. I am air. I am water. I am earth. I am setting up my elements and going through bursts of growth. I have no clue whether or not i’m fully developed, because i have no concept of how long my story will be. The illusion of time hides the present moment from me, and stops me from focusing on the combustion that’s occurring right now. The fear of not knowing, of needing to be ultimately certain what the outcome will be, stops me from igniting. The opportunity for backdraft, for growth that I couldn’t have anticipated. Confinement as an element of ignition. The wonderful thing is that the alignment of elements, volatile confinement, and a little air blowing in the right direction, can lead to a blaze that burns down the previously agreed upon stable house that i lived in and blinds those who pass by. I thought I had stamped out the motivated energy and rerouted it into a more comfortable and predictable path. Surprise, bitch. Here I come. 

We can never know whether the sharing of story, of our own personal story, may be the very combustible material that someone needed in order to let their fire grow. The telling of story is literally bringing breath and fueling air into space with the power to ignite fire. You can’t always control the direction of the draft. You have no way of knowing whether the backdraft may be entering a space that was once volatile and confined, now subject to burn. Maybe it will be slow, maybe it will be only another element taking its place in the incipient stage. There’s only one ignition and not being there for that specific moment doesn’t make the collection of combustible material any less important. We have to tell stories. We have to share experiences. If we don’t collect new combustible material and breathe air into confined spaces, the process of decay will inevitably continue its slowly dematerializing burn. 

I vow to continue to witness story telling. To witness growth and fully developed blazes. I vow to not be arrogant enough to think that decay is inevitable. To breathe oxygen into spaces and stand in full view of unpredictable fire. Doing so consciously and humbly, in full awareness that i may become a victim to it. Because I cannot know the outcome. I cannot know the way the wind will blow, or what groundwork has been laid before that allows the fire to develop more fully, or what attempts have been made to stamp it out. Perhaps I may have unwittingly stamped it out, for the time being or forever, by standing on top of it. Maybe if i had backed away it would have burned brighter. Maybe I am the passerby, I cannot know.