Wrong number

A coworker I have yet to meet at my new job accidentally called my line at the office.

Me: I can tell you you are incredibly well-liked here - I've heard so much about you, and only good things.

Her: (surprized) Really?! You're going to make me cry!

Me: Well I promise it will probably be only be once, and thankfully it won’t be too socially awkward, since we're on the phone!

Dementia

On the highway out of Mobile, Alabama, we found ourselves talking about dementia: it’s terrifying affect on those we love, our powerlessness as it robs us, and the patience and courage it takes to confront.

He remembered visiting his father at the hospital, where he found his dad sitting at the edge of his bed, holding an invisible pole – fishing.

“Well, you know I sat right down beside him and joined him. And I can say, at the end of his life, I got to spend the day fishing with my dad.”

I asked him if he caught anything.

“No, but I think my dad did, the way he was reeling it in and pulling.”

“That’s beautiful,” I said, “that’s beautiful.”

Plate tectonics

Then it happened.

I was walking down the street and it hit me – realization of what I want and the steps I must take to get it.

The certainty was intense and undeniable. Then a feeling of intense joy came rushing in like a tidal wave, leaving my eyes wet and sparkling. I stopped and glanced around. No one else saw that everything had changed – all my internal tectonic plates finally clunking down into a new, steady configuration that fit just right.

Suddenly, finally, I know what I need to do, where I’m going with my life and why. It’s been almost a year and half since I could last say that with any certainty. What that realization is… well I’m not saying until it’s manifest, but I guarantee it will be unexpected.  Remember when I called myself anchorless in my first post? Well now I’m setting sail for unexplored vistas.

After my moment of revalation, serendipity came into play, as it often does: a couple days later I was hired to coordinate a volunteer mentorship program. The long term, permanent job I’d been waiting for, handed to me on a silver platter. I start in May, but I resigned from my current job early for some R&R. Next my dear friend invited me to spend a week at her condo on the Gulf of Mexico, I checked my miles, and sure enough I have more than enough to fly out.

Back in a week.
-M

Unexpected Gift: 26/ Two-sicks/Too-six

“Every day, once a day, give yourself a present. Don't plan it, don't wait for it, just... let it happen.”  Agent Cooper, Twin Peaks

Thanks to David Lynch, I also play this game with myself.  Each day, no matter how grim the task I might be tackling, I am looking for a unexpected “gift.”  This isn’t typically a gift in the commercial sense of the word – it’s almost never something I can hold in my hand.  I’m looking for the good.  I’m looking for the redemption. 

 

Today’s gift came to me from 26/Two-sicks/Too-six, a collective of brilliant street artists in my humble city.

Thank you 26.  Graffiti that gives instead of destroys.  Art that demands nothing in return.  Art that is not a commodity.  True subversion at its best.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

 

I am inspired.

The path

I was walking down a barely trodden foot path along the river yesterday. It was a narrow path with a wooded, muddy, steep drop down to the river to my right, and a high, unscalable fence to my left. As I rounded a corner I saw three men standing in the path – one a young man, another middle aged, another older, in a wheel chair. They all looked disheveled and a little out of sorts. There would be no way to pass them without acknowledgement of some sort. With a path so narrow, I would be able to just barely squeeze past. As a woman, my sense of potential danger was set off. “Do I turn around?” I wondered. Then I thought “no. Don’t be so judgmental.” I continued along the path and smiled, made eye contact with the middle aged man who turned to face me as I approached, then the older man in the wheel chair, who said “Hello miss.” I couldn’t help but wonder allowed “how the did you get down here?” The younger man, with bleary, unfocused eyes replied “it’s an ancient Chinese secret.” I chuckled and responded “Ah – levitation!” as I passed. “It’s not so hard with two strong men” said the middle aged man as I walked away. “Have a nice day” one man called out as I carried on. “You too” I said, this time smiling to myself.

The Smile Game

It’s easy to slip into a rut and go through life hurried, busy and focused on whatever goal’s in front of you. That’s sort of the way Western society works. Individualism. Disconnection. Privacy.

This scene from Waking Life gets right to the heart of it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDWEkzaBULQ
Certainly, there’s pleasure in solitude. I love to connect with myself through inward meditation, calm and the opportunity to find my quiet centre – it’s something I do daily on my morning runs. On the other hand, lack of contact can also bring with it the possibility of loneliness, isolation and despair. I remember many times, walking through a crowd and feeling deeply frustrated by the level of disconnection I felt. Ant mode.

After seeing Waking Life, and this scene in particular, I wanted things to be different. I didn’t want to be an ant anymore. It made me look at how I functioned in the world and want to change the sense of disconnection I was feeling. But how to break through that wall?

It all started with a decision to create change via experiment. I began to play a game with myself where I would smile at strangers and note their reaction. I’ve been playing what I call The Smile Game for many years now. When I’m in a social situation where disconnection is the norm – on the bus, shopping in a busy store or inching my way through traffic congestion – I smile intentionally, honestly and openly at strangers. After almost a decade of playing this game, I can tell you the most common reaction is a smile in return. Sometimes shy, sometimes confused, and best of all broad and open. A simple kind gesture, returned. The remarkable thing is that it changes the climate. What once felt like a grouchy, possibly tense environment becomes warmer, friendly and comfortable. Suddenly, you are not a single person in a group of people, but you have earned a comrade. Then another. And another.

This blog is inpired by...

This blog is inspired by Piero Ferrucci’s The Power of Kindness. In his brilliant book, with simplicity and warmth, Ferrucci examines the concept of compassion and its function within our lives. It’s an intensely contemporary book which doesn’t deny the times in which we live. It is by no means a self help book, but rather a study of the many facets that comprise kindness and its function within society.

I’ll be using Ferrucci’s book as a road map into my own exploration of what it is to be kind. There will also be lots of divergence and side trips that are all my own, but I must nod to Ferrucci’s work, as it is most definitely a key inspiration for my own.