Ammunition

Artist: Tamantha Williams
Title: Ammunition
Medium: Oil on Canvas
Size: 70cm x 160cm
Framed/unframed: Unframed

Do we ever go into battle without it? Ammunition? And if we have ammunition we remain on the battleground. It forms the foundation of any attack and defense, and there will be a winner, right? Is there possibly a war that rages within us, underlying the veneer of innocence we plaster on, this war finds its way out at various stages of our lives. For some it may be built up grievances we hold in place, for others in truth it is just who they are, their journey, the want to defend and attack at the slightest provocation. We have enough ammunition within us built up of let downs and unfairness and we feel rightful in loading the gun and pulling the trigger. What of those who seem to have no ammunition? They wait, they send out their ‘dogs of war’ – their senses, to find ammunition, to build up a stockpile of grievances sufficient to ALLOW them to pull the trigger. We may start off in relationships thinking that this ‘is the one’, this is the one that will complete me, that will love me with all my flaws, the one that will see me and smoulder in want, who will treat me as his rightful queen forever and ever. And once he makes me his, he will not forget the sacrifice I went through to make myself everything he wanted and more. As time progresses the grievances build, why is he not treating me as his special one, why do I not get to be wined and dined any more, somehow he is not as special to me as he seemed before and I don’t seem to fit his specialness either… Look at how he speaks to her and never cooks and cleans, he clearly does not love me and see me as special any more. Then I wait. I wait for the mistakes he will definitely make, one bullet in the chamber, the callous comment about my lack of interest in his work, another bullet in the chamber, his seemingly snide remark about my cooking, another bullet…and so it goes on. I am locked and loaded, ready to aim and fire. “You have carried the egos reasoning to its logical conclusion, which is total confusion about everything.” Now I truly have a REASON for leaving, for attacking for inducing guilt on him, for “see what you have done to me and not done for me?!” With this in mind the evidence is stacked in my favor, the innocent one can now truly leave guilt free even though the bullets where fired by her hand alone. And so she picks her way through society to find the next sacificial lamb for slaughter, maybe this time, this body will make me feel special enough… ‘repetition compulsion’ over and over again the ammunition is gathered in each new relationship, and need for specialness is refueled. The aching yearning to be loved beyond every other person on planet earth results in a vast emptiness within, a search and ‘do not find’ echoes consistently. This is only a choice, an awareness of being loved and being lovable allows us to drop the need for ammunition, for in it we realize there is no need for it. But no, we don’t stop there, we need our Generals and Corporals in this battle too. So we share the battle we have with our nearest and dearest so they too can defend our position, give us justification for our loaded gun, reason to pull the trigger, they come, happy to add fuel to fire, happy to follow the herd mentality and wage our war with us keeping us reasonably innocent and clearly the victim of the process. And so, like a wildebeest we mark our territory with our faeces, we rub our horns on a tree until we entirely destroy it. [PS. a herd of wildebeest is called a ‘confusion’ and are known as the clowns of the bush]. We gather our herd so that we do not go alone in for the slaughter of self and we surround ourselves with these generals to ensure we have enough protection between our selves and our attacker, let him pick/kill one of them first. We stamp our territory in place and wage our war all in the name of self protection. There are no winners, but we do not see that, there is no ammunition, but we will to find it, there are no victims but we need to be it and so the cycle of the destructive search for specialness rests on unequivocal need for love, value self worth and approval. Who are you and where does your identity truly lie? If it lies without, welcome to the herd trap. Load up your ammunition, this is the battleground. Triangle= challenge, understand, transform, the Holy trinity, mind, body and spirit, strength, purification healing and peace. Add red to the mix and you have danger, be careful, slow down, become alert. And finally it is a love triangle… Between us, our partner and our required specialness.