Originally published on Elephant Journal: https://www.elephantjournal.com/now/finding-the-door/
Finding the Door.
Awaken gently, lovingly, embracing the warmth of the morning light as it glistens on your skin, and celebrate your day’s first conscious breath. Yeah, who can do that really? Maybe you can, and that’s great, just realize it’s also exceptional. Many folks may aspire to it; they very rarely, if ever can do it. I’m not even sure what that means.
The majority of us wake up congested, sometimes metaphorically, sometimes physically. We have various aches or pains that living life has blessed us with as we have used or abused our bodies over the years. Some of us are confused by the night’s dreams, or confused as to why we can’t remember the night’s dreams. Still others awaken full tilt, verging on panic or in a panic about what they expect will be the course of the day, plotting it out like generals at war.
As I write this, I am fretting about a beautiful red cardinal that has crashed through my pool cage. The point is not the pool or the cage, it’s the bird. I’ve opened the screen door, put water out for it, and strewn sunflower seeds in a trail to the open door.
Caddie-corner to what could be the bird’s egress, he sits, crying for his mate, jumping from the deck and flying into the screen. I have walked toward him gently, and with sheer terror in his heart, he flys into the poolside pygmy palms, but nowhere near the door. After I leave, I see him through the windows, back in the corner exactly opposite the door. My hope is that he calms down and finds the door before nightfall. Unfortunately his mate is on the other side of the screen where he sits, calling back to him from the hedge. He is so set on trying to get to the hedge through the screen that he doesn’t even look for another way out of the cage, the open door.
We all have the time we have, and that time in reality is only the time we have right now. Right now, the cardinal is thinking, “Oh sweet Jesus, that primate is chasing me around this cage, the love of my life is over in that hedge and I can’t get through this screen, no mater how hard I fly into it…how did I get here? Why me? Why does this primate torture me? For years I have come to this yard with my love, we raised children here and, he never once bothered us. Now I am trapped, and what was a happy Florida get-away has become a nightmare. I was not supposed to die this ignoble death with this primate.”
I could hear him, but he couldn’t hear me. I don’t speak cardinal but I could sense his fear and pain. Countless times, I have been that cardinal, whether at work, or with my family, or simply in a conversation where I wasn’t actually listening like I should have been and, because of this, I knew I needed simply to leave that pool deck; leave him alone so he could see, I’m not the problem; that the cage, because it is open, is not the problem.
He’s like all of us. How often has it been in retrospect that we realize a door was open all along and yet, for panic, fear of the unknown, or shear stubbornness, we were keeping ourselves from really looking at and knowing our surroundings, missing that open door.
A lot of people talk about being present, but I can’t say I am always clear about what they mean. Here’s what I mean. In martial arts, when I am not in the moment, not present, there are immediate, often painful consequences. To be present means to not let my fears take me away from the situation at hand. That is not to say I don’t understand what could happen, I do, but to focus on what is happening. In heated conversation, I have to hear what is being said rather than thinking about what I need to say while others are saying what they need to say. I constantly have to practice. My instinct is to fly headlong into the cage.
Like the cardinal, I am not always the best door finder, but by not letting my fear and anxiety about what could happen, I’ve gotten better about being stuck on one path or another. Maybe I am getting to know the path well enough to see both its perils and beauty. I’m not sure because it’s an every day thing, but I do know, that I need to start the day acknowledging that each day and every step, is a new day with new steps.
Glancing out the window, I can see that the cardinal is eating the sunflower seeds two screen panes from the open door. He may find his way out by evening.
Sharing Courtesies With Strangers
by Glenn Brown
Circumlocuitous obfuscations of opportunity can begin with the squeak of a shoe. In two pairs of shoes, with each step of my left foot, a small yet clearly discernible tremulous creak is emitted, broadcasting my movement to the world. I don’t know what the forces of left side of my body have imposed upon these shoes and have neglected to impose on others; so the expectation is that one day, this shall reoccur, seemingly randomly to me, but actually following a pattern in nature to which I am oblivious.
The squeak detracts and distracts with the emotion of annoyance so I persistently forget to pay attention to the pattern that could determine whether the issue is an odd gait, or something in the design of the shoe. I focus only on the left shoe being a bother and as any day that I wear the shoes continues, I imagine that others begin to listen to my squeaky shoe, some glad for the warning that I am soon to appear so that they may otherwise busy themselves, and others wondering why I won’t get new shoes, throw the annoying noisy shoes away, and perhaps worrying if I have money trouble or am simply too cheap to buy new shoes.
These thoughts then carry me away. Although by all appearances I seem to be listening in conversation, I am actually trying to determine whether or not this is a person who finds the squeak helpful, fond of knowing who is and isn’t approaching? Or is this a person who is judgmental, and if judgmental is it in a compassionate thought, concerned for my condition or in a spiteful thought, thinking of me as a base, petty, crude and stingy person, not spending to care for myself? I miss much of the conversation and curse my shoes, wondering what implored me to ever put them on?
Outside of my head, the world shines and buzzes. The earth turns and the sun seems to continue along a path across the sky, and billions, yes billions of human beings go about their day totally unconcerned about my shoe. They don’t know I even exist. Some are worried about their own shoes, if they have shoes at all. And outside of my head, unless the person I am conversing with has struck up a conversation about my squeak, the thought of my shoe for him or her has come and gone, if it was ever there at all. Unbeknownst to him or her is the tirade in my head. He or she carries on in good faith that I am listening, not knowing that my attempt at this will be to carry on like an automaton, using monosyllabic responses at opportune momentary pauses or at various tonal inflections near the end of sentences. It is a failure on so many levels.
Each conversation is an opportunity for connection, for discovery, no matter how seemingly mundane at the start. I wish I could say it was unusual for me to easily get outside myself, that I didn’t have to fight the nagging thought or worry that I will have to engage with a person in some facet of the moment or aspect of life that I don’t think I am going to care about. Worse, to have to face the possibility that whomever I am speaking with has no interest or compassion for my squeaky shoe, and that I am the mundane one.
These opportunities can move me beyond what is in my head. A gift of sorts, discovered with a simple “Hello,” as it is a simple flashing moment of compassion – for another as well as for myself. We share as I can interject into this moment, and can ask, “Do you hate my squeaky shoe as much as I do?” In verbalizing this, I realize that my sock is rubbing on the heal of this shoe, it’s not my gait. Now I can hear another. Liberation for us both.