Imagine for a moment that you’re an artist, a painter. However, when you open your paintbox, as opposed to seeing an entire spectrum of various colors, you find that there is only one color in it. Not multiple shades of one color, but one solitary color. While you might still be able to paint a picture, you will be extremely limited on what you can do.
Some people will focus on one facet of their life as if it were the entire thing, the totality, to the detriment of all the other facets. They’re like the artist who has only a single color and their paintbox. Oftentimes they can only see that one color, and as a result, they lose the beauty and value, and the application of other colors to a well-rounded, fully developed human life. It’s what we refer to as being ‘partialized.’
Each of us is a multi-faceted individual, and these facets aren’t separated from each other but interrelated components of our entire being. Any single facet, while it might be an important segment of an individual’s being, represents only part of the entire picture.
It does not constitute their ‘totality.’ While I am passionate about Jeet Kune Do and devote a great deal of my time and energy to it, I also make sure to spend time exploring and cultivating other aspects of my being such as writing, speaking, consulting, teaching, being a father, etc.
Whoever you are, there’s a lot more to you than you think. You have within you potential for all sorts of things. It’s lying there in wait, anticipating the day it can be brought forth into the world.
An artist may have favorite colors, colors that they choose to use more than others, and that’s perfectly fine. And some artists choose to limit the color palette they use to a crucial few to express what they want to express, and there’s nothing wrong with that either. In the same way, you may have certain facets of your being that you choose to put more energy into than others, or you may limit yourself with regard to how many different things to choose to do at any given time.
Being passionate about something is wonderful, but don’t allow what you’re passionate about to consume you. Spending all your time on one thing to the exclusion of everything else will restrict and confine you. Again, it’s like having only one color in your paintbox versus a wide variety of colors. Don’t allow any facet of your life (martial arts, business, music, etc.) to become the entire paintbox, where that’s the only color you see and there’s no room for other colors.
Avoid a life of singularity, and instead become a well-rounded and total person. If you want to develop yourself as an ‘artist of life,’ to flourish, fill your paintbox filled with an array of colors.
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