Free Speech
[Today’s post is part of a new series of short parables about the creative life, chosen from my almost forty years as a creativity coach. Please enjoy! To be in touch, you can reach me at [email protected]. To subscribe to my Craft of Coaching weekly newsletter, please visit here.]
They were sitting in a dark bar in a sketchy neighborhood. Adam had been drinking alone at the counter, until this stranger came up to him and took the seat next to him.
“I believe I recognize you,” the stranger said. “I believe you used to write about politics?”
Adam glanced at the nondescript man and returned to his beer.
“I no longer write about that,” Adam said.
“And if I remember correctly, there was a time when you wrote about Big Pharma? And their abuses?”
“I no longer write about that,” Adam said.
“No? And you were very passionate about human trafficking. That stopped interesting you?”
“I no longer write about that,” Adam said.
“Well, what do you write about nowadays?”
“I write about vegetables,” Adam said. “And sometimes fruit. And flowers. The things that happen in my garden.”
“You mean as metaphors for other things?”
“No,” Adam replied, still talking into his beer. “Exactly as they are. A cherry tomato as a cherry tomato. No allusions, allegories, commentary, fables, parables, metaphors … just a Persian cucumber being a Persian cucumber.”
“How very Taoist of you.”
“Exactly.”
“But … you were an important voice,” the stranger continued. “Did you get scared off?”
Adam looked at the man. He was plumper than you would expect from a government agent. But maybe government agents were getting plumper? Adam pondered that possibility. The man certainly wasn’t just some stranger who had happened to wander in and who just happened to know all about Adam.
“You know, you’re very nosy,” Adam said.
The man threw up his hands. “Didn’t mean to,” he said. “Just being friendly!”
“Not hardly,” Adam said, returning to his beer. After another minute or two, he rose and left, without saying goodbye or glancing at the stranger.
Once Adam was gone, the stranger moved to a corner table where his associate sat.
“So?” the associate said.
“He’s been pacified. He’s frightened to death.”
“Good. Still, we’ll keep an eye on him.”
“Yes. You never can tell. These characters who used to point fingers, you never can tell about them. He might have a little ‘truth’ left in him.”
They laughed merrily, ordered a drink for the road, and, later that afternoon, found themselves again in their cubicles.
Walking home, Adam considered. Either they knew about his ties to the Resistance or they didn’t. It didn’t matter, one way or the other. He had no wife, he had no children, he had nothing but his freedom, as corroded, curtailed, and contained as that might be. He was Sisyphus … except that he wasn’t smiling, ironically or otherwise.
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Eric Maisel is an internationally-respected diplomat coach who specializes in creativity coaching, existential wellness coaching, and relationship coaching. He trains coaches and provides workshops and webinars nationally and internationally.
Dr. Maisel is the author of 50+ books, writes the “Rethinking Mental Health” blog for Psychology Today (with 3.5 million views), blogs for The Good Men Project and Fine Art America, serves as lead editor for the Ethics International Press Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry series, and is co-founder of Purposely, the life navigation app.
Dr. Maisel’s books include Fearless Creating, Rethinking Depression, Coaching the Artist Within, The Van Gogh Blues, The Power of Daily Practice, Redesign Your Mind, and scores of other titles. He has been published by Penguin Random House, McGraw Hill, Rodale, Harper San Francisco, Shambhala, New World Library, and Conari/Mango, among many others.
Dr. Maisel has created three certificate programs with Noble-Manhattan Coaching, a Creativity Coach Certificate and Diploma Program, an Existential Wellness Coach Certificate Program, and a Certified Relationship Coach program. With Lynda Monk of the International Association for Journal Writing, Dr. Maisel has created an Art of Journal Coaching Self-Study Plus program.
Dr. Maisel’s most recent books are Why Smart, Creative and Highly Sensitive People Hurt (2023), Affirmations for Self-Love (with Lynda Monk, 2024), Parents Who Bully (2024), and Choose Your Life Purposes (2024). Dr. Maisel lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and maintains a thriving international coaching practice.
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This Post is republished on Medium.
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Photo credit: iStock
