Perspective - it's everything

I was 20 when I visited the eye doctor the first time. I remember the moment the optometrist took me outside the shop in Stillwater Minnesota – and asked me to look across the street at the trees in the park. As he placed the glasses between my eyes and what I was looking at – the leaves on the tree came into view. I didn’t realize one could ever see the trees. I didn’t know that most people could see leaves on trees. I thought all trees from 30 feet away – were just globs of green swaying in the breeze.

Many things changed that day.

The most important thing that changed that day – was realizing I wanted to find out how many other ways I was seeing the world – that could be improved – by perspective – or new lenses.

These times have a bonus. We seem to be receiving an invitation to grow.
Mary Oliver’s poem “The Journey” describes the moment of decision that we all make when we realize the quality and outcome of our lives ( by the grace of God) is one decision for destiny.

 

Mary Oliver’s Poem: THE JOURNEY

One day you finally new what you had to do,

and you began.

Though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice,

Though the whole house began to tremble,

And you felt the old tug at your ankles … (saying)… “MEND MY LIFE!”

Each voice cried,

But you didn’t stop.

You knew what you had to do …

Though the wind pried

With its stiff fingers

The very foundations,

Though their melancholy

Was terrible,

It was already late enough,

And the road full of fallen branches and stones;

But little by little

As you left their voices behind

The stars began to burn through the sheets of cloud,

And there was a new voice

Which you slowly recognized as your own,

That kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world,

Determined to do the only thing you could do;

Determined to save the only life you could save.

Your own.

 

Mary Oliver

Adapted by Tobi Lytle

Tobi@TobiLytle.com

Amen.

My sister and I are having a conversation about what the new economic reality will create in the masses. I say – it’s the loss of the illusion of entitlements. I think the way we define middle class – is going to change.

Those of us who are self-employed have learned how to live close to the edge – in peace – if prayer. We know it’s a waste energy to be churned up about what we cannot control.  I think entitlement thinking is going to die – finally.

I think what we’re seeing now is the final melt-down of the illusion that any employer, (be that government, corporate or non-profit) is able to offer employment for life.

The first melt-down in the employer-employee contract happened throughout the 80’s (after Telecom deregulation) and more expansively in the Silicon Valley in the 90’s’.  These were the times companies were flattening” organizations, outourcing to a global workforce, and doing more with less. Everyone of the boomers effected by the churn of the 80’s and 90’s understands the lunacy of entitlement thinking.

Rant here – but – I think we’re paying for the entitlement illusion that the auto unions propagated over the past 30 years. Selling entitlement-thinking has filled the Union coffer since the need for Unions died 20-30 years ago.

We may need a revolution – but we don’t need Unions. EVERY tax paying American today and for years to come will be paying for the entitlement illusion the Unions cultivated on their unsuspecting victims these past 30 years.  

May the time of illusion come to an end now. May we all be stronger for these lessons.

I’m preparing to move back to the Monterey Peninsula, again. Pebble Beach this time. November 1st.

What magic, mystery, karma, true nature – is guiding me back to this place, where my soul, can bloom and thrive. Nurtured by the place, the people, the possibilities, the naked truth of me.

Interesting how we feel that thriving is like the environment we had that felt most pure, as a child. I spent alot of time in the woods – of my parents 40 acre home – in South Central Michigan.
I don’t go there anymore.
Not since 2001.

I drew a line in the soil. We need to draw boundaries sometimes. From these boundaries – we build our home. The wall of the basement – is the boundaries we drew yester-month.

Who’d know that many years later -I’d open my eyes on a Sunday morning – in the foothills overlooking Pebble Beach – hearing the roar of the ocean meeting shore – below – and thinking – how lucky I am – to be here now!

I am living in the forest – out of the traffic of the city – off the beaten trail of the auto – and clamoring crowd. Living in the rich silence of the woods. I strain to hear the wind whisper through the trees. Cliche yes. Cliches are Cliches because they are real.

It’s so simple. And so hard to get. That peaceful, rich, full, and simply beautiful place where we realize, finally, that we are like flowers, inhaling nurturance, our friends and family and even a stranger’s love, curiosity, longing to know us; it all counts to fill us with wonder, and transcendant awe.
We are all like flowers – subtly dependent on the weather to cause us to bloom. We look to situate ourselves in a hothouse environment – where we are sure to bloom. But we’re left to find our own hothouses. Where is my hothouse?

Once Benjamin said about purpose, “We might be on earth -for the one moment – to say hello to a woman in the gutter – who needed to know – she was seen by someone – in that time – in that place.” My sons are rich – having made their own lives meaningful to them – for now. I know they’ll awaken – and it’ll all change – or at least look different – down the road. Sometime soon.

Blooming is all we really want in life.
How hard it is to find – how good it is to find – how simple it is to find – when we finally find it. . .
Our blooming self!

Bloom

Look at this video of Sarah Palin at her “Alaska home town” Church earlier this summer. It makes me wonder if in fact, she knew then, that she was being vetted for the V.P. role. Notice her comments about ‘the world will become aware of Alaska’ (paraphrasing loosely here); and, that things are “coming together.

Blooming

I imagine Barack’s visions of America’s future – have quelled the fear of a million hungry hearts – for now.

I have a question. Why did Barack choose to rest his passion-stirring Presidential Nomination Acceptance speech with an incomplete excerpt from Hebrews 10:23? Perhaps it was a good place to rest our innocent hopeful hearts.

Weary of denying the abyss of our Prosac-protected-hopelessness, aren’t we all just a little relieved to embrace Barack’s bold and audacious, if hollow, vision for our future?

His promises did it for me. The big easy surrender – like slinking down into the bathtub – I give in – for now – until the real deal comes along.

Big, bold, reasonable, and simple. But, can he deliver? But, do I, do we, does anyone know enough to evaluate whether or not he can deliver? Ah heck, let’s just enjoy the possibility, gamble on hope. Yeah, that’s what Barack inspires us to do. Just gamble on hollow hope.

I’m weary of buffered-hopelessness. I want to believe. Even for a day, or a few hours, or maybe all the way to November 4th. Let’s take a vacation into our hormone-reinforced youth, and believe in hope again. Relive the boomer dreams! But they are just dreams. Barack is like cotton-candy dreams that will make you sick if you take too much. But just for tonight. I’ll bask in his speech full of cotton-candy dreams wrapped around hollow promises.

Then there’s the grip of reality to overcome. Could things be better? How long will it take? Will it be like some cosmic consciousness? Will the whole world start believing in Barack’s vision? So many questions to explore. It’s unpopular to wake people when they’re dreaming. So for now, I’ll just float along – until the real hope becomes clear.

Which takes me back to my original question. Looking at the scripture he chose at the close of his speech, why did he not include the last six words of the verse he quoted?

Was he being politically astute or politically correct?

Politically correct is so not bold. Politically astute is so crafty-politician. What’s real about Barack’s relationship with or to God?  Is he a salesman who’s read the product spec sheet? Or does he know God – intimately. I suspect the former.

What do you think? Did Barack Obama end his speech by drawing out of context from Hebrews 10:23?

19Therefore, brothers, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus, 20by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain, that is, his body, 21and since we have a great priest over the house of God, 22let us draw near to God with a sincere heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty conscience and having our bodies washed with pure water. 23Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful. 24And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds. 25Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

He showed us all – how to face death – as we face life.

Sunday – with so many things to do – and the big desire to play instead of do.

Here’s an idea. I just heard that Starbuck’s is about to close stores and therefore ’surplus’ thousands of those perky, customer-oriented, Starbuck-trained-barista-employees. All that good training in customer service – could be put to use in your local post office. Yeah!

Instead of letting the government provide unemployment funds to these “surplussed” people – let’s invite all the people who are “surplussed” from Starbuck’s – to work – and – in fact – let’s have them CHANGE the culture of the local post office.

Imagine that!

We all play a role – in the great stage – that looks like everyday life.

Think about it.

we are all family.

BE aware when people capitalize, politicize, romanticize and mysticize us – in order to be connected to us, and our vote.