The Eye Altering…
“The eye altering alters all” wrote the great poet, William Blake.
Recently I was reminded of these words when a most unwelcome and unlooked for event occurred. Turning abruptly to retrieve my forgotten jacket from a departing airport shuttle bus, I broke my foot and sprained my ankle! In a split second of ill-timed urgency my day, my week – in fact the next couple of months of my life – were suddenly and significantly altered. Not to mention that my future mobility and ease of movement depend on full healing!
In the first moments, I wanted badly to deny that anything significant had happened. I hobbled unsteadily and painfully to the shuttle bus – now paused in mid-departure – and retrieved my lost jacket, then hobbled to the hotel lobby desk, determined to register and get on with my plans for the day. Though the pain in my foot and ankle was intense, I stubbornly refused to even look down. ”It will pass in a couple of minutes,” I told myself. Finally I peeked, and one glance at the lemon-size swelling on my left foot told another story. ”This isn’t good,” I said silently (and maybe a couple of other things as well).
Still I didn’t want to admit anything had happened that was going to throw off my plans to get to the conference I had flown to Minneapolis to attend. ”I’ll just wrap it in an ace bandage,” I still told myself. “I’ll be fine.” Luckily, more realistic heads prevailed – including, everybody who passed through the lobby where my foot was propped up on a chair under ice, as well as a dear friend arriving for lunch and who, after raising 10 avidly athletic children, knows a thing or two about injuries. I soon found myself in the local Emergency Room. Good thing too. I could have done a lot more damage if I’d soldiered on.
Lying on the gurney headed to x-ray, predictably gloomy, self-blaming and utterly unhelpful thoughts filled my head. These were along the lines of ”Why did this have to happen?!” and ”If only I could have back that moment when I turned too fast” and “So now my summer is ruined!”
And this is where my eye started altering. Something had happened. I couldn’t go back and change that reality. But what I could change was the way it was impacting me. I could change how I thought about my situation, how I held what had happened, what beliefs I held about what could happen next – and in that way I could change my interior experience. I might still be in pain, but I could diminish or even eliminate my suffering.
I made a clear decision – one I have made many times and expect I will need to make many more. I would not blame myself for what had happened. I had done the best I could see in the moment that I acted. At the same time, I would face squarely into the impact of my choices to see what there was to learn from the experience to carry into the future.
I’ve been telling everyone who asks what happened that my tip of the week is: Don’t run after a shuttle bus wearing flip-flops!
But there’s more. Another writer I love, Polly Berends, has written in Whole Child, Whole Parent (great book): “The next problem life hands you contains the next lesson you need.” And I not only believe it, I find that whenever I put that belief into practice my “eye alters.” I begin to see what looked only like a negative development also as an opening. I become curious about the possibilities – including what, to me, is the most intriguing possibility of all – and one that I happen to believe in – that there is a Source Consciousness in which I am embedded and with which I co-create my life experiences. That these experiences are all, without exception, a part of my spiritual path and in some way open my personal consciousness to the lessons I need.
At the very least I am certain that this perspective - whether true to the way the Universe operates or not – has never failed to improve my experience of otherwise difficult, even excruciating, circumstances. Nor has there even been a time when I have failed to find a gift buried somewhere – though there have been plenty of times when I’ve been too angry or stubborn or self-pitying to be willing to look.
It happened this time as well. Even with the real losses – a trip abroad I’d been greatly looking forward to had to be canceled, for example, and there won’t be more of my beloved beach walks this summer – I could see the opportunities as soon as my “eye altered” from doom and gloom to potentialities unfolding before me: more time to rest (and haven’t I been saying how much I’ve needed that?) More time to focus on art, reading, music – without a shred of guilt over the closets or file cabinets left uncleaned! More time with loved ones. And more than anything – more mindfulness and presence in the moment – the heart of all spiritual practice! What a walking meditation I am now engaged in! Every step on crutches must be mindfully undertaken in order to prevent further injury and promote healing.
Not that I don’t get frustrated or have moments of disappointment and irritation and fear. That happens – and I allow those feelings to surface with self-compassion. They’re a part of the experience too! But I also inquire into whatever stressful thoughts accompany those painful emotions and would keep them front and center. Always these are beliefs about how what I am missing is so much better than what I am (or could be) experiencing. Am I really sure that’s true? I don’t think so.
Dealing with the real while opening expectantly to the equally real possibilities in the present and future with an open mind and an open heart - that’s the “eye” I want to bring to this. And to every life experience.
May it be so…for every one of us.
Gratefully in the Spirit,
Rev. Cat
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