Without Frames

Without Frames

The inevitable frames that shape our lives are essential to a defined identity.  It would seem in fact that a meaningful existence is impossible without a frame of reference to identify with such realities and social constructs as gender, race, class, nationality, or religion.  So often in an attempt for equality (“politically correctness”) we deny the very boundaries that shape who we are.  How then would the experience of life be seen through such a frameless mind?

            The critically acclaimed African writer Bessie Head is a person who’s own experience characterized a life without frames.  In the opening sentence of her book A Question of Power the phrase ‘I am just anyone’ tells of her lack of identity.  The madness revealed henceforth is a testament to the conflict in a frameless existence…. (Though I digress, identifying Bessie’s experience as madness is a confine that, for the purpose of this article, must be accepted). 

            Bessie Head has the ability to experience everything from one polar extreme to the other; there is no ideological construct influencing her perspective.  It seems as if her alter egos and visions of “God” like entities are simply her mind’s way of creating separation in an endless stream of experience.  Without being raised with a truly framed identity, Bessie’s mind (via perceived madness) created a form of archaic frames.

            These frames that we so often wish to ignore or claim that we are not bound by should, in fact, be acknowledged.  True, some frames imbedded deep within us are not in the best interest of humanity (or our self-perception for that matter), but to deny these frames is to deny a meaningful life experience.