EYES OPEN

Road trips are fun.  You never know what you are going to see.  We were driving on the interstate and saw this up ahead. Interstates are often sleepily dull. But, this was indeed a unique creature ahead of us. We couldn't figure out what it was but it got our attention.We got closer and it became clearer. We were looking at a fuselage of an airplane.  Now I had heard all my life that one of the reasons for the building of interstates was so that should there be a war, these wide highways could serve as landing strips for military aircraft. (Not sure if that is correct or not.) But I had never seen a plane do this.

The further we went we saw the rest of the story. There were the wings for this airplane.

And now we had seen it all.  This plane had been taken apart and was being shipped by truck to presumably be reassembled.

Sometimes we are confused when we hear people make a remark.  We think, "What is it that he said?"  We hear only distant echo of what the person is really talking about.  But, when we ask questions, and when we see more of the picture, things begin to make more sense.  And when we inquire further, the picture becomes clearer still.

When we keep our ears open and when we explore more deeply what we are hearing, the chances of understanding another person improve considerably.  Making judgements on the first impression may leave us responding without clearly knowing what the other person is trying to show us. And when that happens, we miss some amazing things.

THE LEAST OF THESE

I heard my mentor say it a long time ago. Fred Craddock shared one of his disciplines that helped shape the way he lived and communicated with others. 

He said that every evening he sat on his back porch to tie up the loose ends of his day.  And one of his disciplines was to try to remember the least significant thing that happened to him that day.

Think about that a minute.  When we wander through the memories of our day, there are often noisy moments that cry out and say, “I am really important.  Remember me.” But, if you keep asking yourself the question, “Is there something less significant that happened?” you will remember more deeply the fullness of your day. 

As I meditate each day, that is one of the results of cleaning my mind by paying attention to a single word or listening to my own breath.  The loud and demanding concerns, the anxieties that plague any human heart are often so loud and fill so much space that the “least of these” thoughts and feelings are drown out.  But, when they are quieted, emotions that lie deeply below the surface of each day niggle their way onto the surface of my mind. 

And sometimes those thoughts or emotions turn out to be more important in understanding myself than the loud voices.  Sometimes, when I quiet the self-judging voices, the voices that demand I be more than I am, I hear the quiet and tender voice of self-love that reminds me that I am enough.   

And when I listen to those within myself, I become more attuned to the quiet and shy parts of others who may need special attention.  I come to realize that sometimes others are not just what they let me see, but are rich and complex, highly textured and multi-faceted, beautiful creatures who enrich my life and the lives of others. 

So, try it sometime.  Listen to the least significant part of your day, the quiet and shy voices that sometimes get drown out by the noise of a loud and demanding world. Your soul will be richer for it.

WORK AND TIME

Three months ago I received a book and was asked to review it for a journal.  I started reading it.  It was on the roots of suffering and I found it engaging. But, then I put the book down and somehow it got overshadowed by other reading and doing.  Occasionally I would clear off my desk and it would emerge from under the rubble of daily life.  I would read some more. 

The book review is NOW due.  And I am busy reading the rest of it so I can send in my thoughts.  

I am reminded of what I learned in time management courses some years ago as I tried to manage the constant confusion and demands of ministry.  “Work expands to fill time.”  The purpose of that wisdom statement was to encourage me to set time limits on tasks and when I did that, I got more done.  When I thought I had lots of time, I took lots of time to do the task. 

This is a lesson I have to learn over and over. And it is especially hard to learn at this stage of life when I am not serving a church or a seminary and other people are not setting limits on my time or defining my tasks.  I have to set my own time limits or I won’t get much done at all. 

So, I have run out of time on writing this blog. I best end it here.  I have to meet my deadline on the book review.  Next time I will set more time to write the blog so it doesn’t end so abruptly. 

NOT ENOUGH

She was holding her 10 month old, trying to settle her down. She was feeding this little girl but the girl would not be soothed. The mother was sitting on the bleachers watching her 6 year old play baseball. 

Finally after trying a bottle, the mother got up and began to walk the child.  She went behind the bleachers, humming and trying to calm the child.  Then she walked back to cheer her son on. 

Back and forth she want, between addressing the demands of one child and cheering for her other.  There was simply not enough of her to go around—to be in 2 places at once.  She couldn’t give to each everything they wanted or even what she wanted to give to them. 

Being a parent is living in the constant tension between what she would to give and what she can actually give. 

This tension is then inherited by children.  Most children never get all the attention that they long for.  And at a very early age they begin to live with the anxiety that there might not be enough to go around.  There is not enough mother to fill the child with all her or his desires or needs. 

And is it possible that children then internalize that “not-enoghness” and think the reason they don’t get all they want is because they are not enough? 

How do we break that pattern?  Is it possible for parents to feel they are “good enough” when they know that their efforts are never perfect, never achieve what they want to achieve? 

I guess at some point, the breaking of this pattern will require our overcoming our fears of the empty space that comes when do don’t have all that we want or desire.  When our anxiety about not having or being enough drives us, we simply pass on our tension.  But, when we break that pattern, when we accept the limits of our own humanity we can pass on to others that they are indeed enough.  What a gift to give to another person.

LEFT BEHIND

He is now famous.  Known only as JR, this man has traveled the world taking pictures of people who are invisible to the dominate culture.  He began photographing immigrants and minority residences in a suburban town of Paris. He then enlarged the photos and put them on the sides of dilapidated buildings they inhabited. When riots broke out the following year, the world came to see and discovered his work. Now his work is in 140 countries and he has created a collage of selfies that have been sent to him and it covers the floor of the nave in Pantheon in Paris.

Aside from the pop-up art that he inspired around the world, what fascinated me in the article in the June 23, 2014 issue of Time Magazine was how JR got started. He had been a graffiti artist.  But, one day he found a camera on the Metro that someone had left behind. That discovery changed his life. Something lost by someone else became a door for a life of celebrity and art. 

I guess we never know what impact we have.  Things that we may have outgrown or left behind may become something that changes the life of another person. We often think that the way to make it in this world is to have a dream or vision and then work hard to fulfill that vision.  And certainly there is evidence that such action can result in achieving our goals.

But, don’t under estimate the power of surprise. We never know what our actions might produce.  What we leave behind in our life, the love or compassion, the kindness or tender touch, might just be the gift that opens the door for someone else to discover their future. I doubt that the person who left behind the camera on the Metro on Paris even realizes what an impact he has had on the world of art.