Today was a beautiful Monday. Every other week on Monday’s I end up treating Monday like most people treat Sunday. It becomes the second day of my weekend.
It makes for a much more pleasant entry into the week come Tuesday, the new Monday as its the start of the week for me, but everyone else is past being stuck in Monday. Plus, since I have given myself such an amazing actual Monday the day before, the start of the work week goes so much easier, so much more smoothly. It has so much more positive energy.
This Monday I spent the afternoon hiking the Boone Fork Trail at a park just off the Blue Ridge Parkway with Sharon. She has hiked the trail many times before, but it was my first visit.
It’s a beautiful 4.9 mile hike that feels like 7, but in a positive way. š
There is so much to take in along the trail as it goes through multiple elevations and areas of the park. Through the first mile, I felt like I was trekking along from one beautiful little scene to the next snapping pictures of rocks and flowers and streams and creeks and boulders and roots and trees and all of the above over and over. The trails are very comfortable to hike, a little on the wet side, but not sloppy or muddy or at least not today.
Before we started the hike, Sharon and I had had a thought provoking discussion about when and how to share insights with people. We had talked about a couple different scenarios we had each experienced. One of those situations where a friend or family member had shared some perspective in a way that highlights where they are. In sharing, this jogged a memory of a similar experience for us and lessons learned from that experience.
There are a couple schools of thought or philosophy on what these feelings mean and how we should deal with them.
Open up and Share
One school of thought has it that when we have this feeling, it is our intuitions way of saying, open up and share this lesson you learned and consider what lesson the other person you are having a conversation with might have to share with you.
Practice Non-Interference
Another school of thought that comes from a taoist perspective is that we should practice non-interference, don’t interject our thoughts or ideas on other people. Let them work it out for themselves.
I feel that both schools of thought have something useful to share here and I suspect that in finding a way to navigate between both, therein lies something of a practical and ideal way of interacting with people.
On the one hand, we should be self aware enough to understand ourselves and recognize opportunities to share what could be valuable information with people. On the other, we do not want to walk around as Mr/Mrs No-It-All providing advice where it is not desired.
We hiked for a couple two or three hours. I didn’t really pay attention to the time. Me and clocks don’t work like that. I like to be present in the things I am doing and not be constricted by time. I remark on it only to share that a good chunk of time passed by.
At the end of the hike, we stopped at a picnic table and ate some homemade cookies. I took off my toe shoes and socks and walked barefoot over to the stream. I let my feet dangle in the chilly spring mountain water. They were not really tired nor over heated, but it did feel good.
As I sat on the bank, actually on a rock shaped like a step, but definitely a rock, I watched this stretch of the stream flow by. There were a handful of large rocks in the water breaking the surface in the middle of the stream. The water would stream right towards the rock and then as water does, it moved like water and flowed right around the rock.
It reminded me of a weird (to me) phenomena in Physics, a subject that I did poorly in during high school but better in college studying astro physics. When wind blows through a wooded area, the velocity of the wind changes as trees get in the way. Similar to the effect that an airplane’s wing has on wind, the wind tends to speed up around the curve of the tree. Each successive tree makes the wind curve and change its velocity more and more. It increases and the speed of the air movement gets faster.
A similar dynamic happens in water. The water in the stream flows down hill and changes velocity and speeds up around the rocks in the middle of the stream.
During our conversation before the hike, we discussed how one person that some wisdom had been shared with, never responded at all. They never acknowledge the insight, never engaged in further conversation, they just kept on going. It created a sense of ‘why did I even bother sharing this’ feeling.
Sometimes we open up and share things with people, we share some truth we have found and they just don’t respond at all.
Maybe they do not want us interfering. Maybe they are playing out some control drama and do not want to hear truth, they just want someone to play along with their drama. Maybe they are just not prepared to learn that truth on that given day. Maybe they will have to run into the opportunity to learn that truth from others, maybe once, twice, five times or fifty! Eventually, they might be ready to learn it, but for reasons out of our control, when we share it, its not their time.
That does not mean that we should close up and give up on humanity. It just means that we were only helping to give them an opportunity earlier rather than later. We might even assist in helping them reach a tipping point where they finally recognize ‘Oh, this is great and you know it seems like I keep getting reminders like this a lot lately.’ We may be the first reminder or the one that is the last reminder and the point where they dig in and learn.
That stream with the water flowing around the rock, it was something of a metaphor for this experience. Sometimes people are floating down stream and we see something that might help and like the rock in the stream, we share a little nugget of information, ‘Falls ahead!’ Or ‘Beautiful flowers, look right’ or something. But as they are going by, they can’t always stop to take in that message.
Maybe they are moving too fast. Maybe they are focused on not running into the rock in front of them. Maybe they are working to change their velocity and the message in the air between us takes a few seconds or minutes to Doppler through their ears and into their conscious thoughts. By the time, the concept arrives, they have already floated down stream and we rocks are way behind them. Conversation isn’t the option anymore.
It doesn’t mean they didn’t take it in, but maybe they just couldn’t make the time to internalize it, let alone dig deeper.
I’m writing this now from a porch in the mountains. The sun is behind the clouds and there is distant thunder almost as far away rolling this way and that. Birds are singing in multiple dialects and wood peckers are providing percussion. There is a family having a conversation that sounds almost like bird chatter too as it is too far away to hear.
Its almost chilly after a recent rain.
I’ve had an amazing Monday. I’ve dived deep into a lot of great concepts today. I’m probably going to eat a little bit and get some work done this evening as I kick start my Tuesday.
I hope your Monday has been amazing. I hope your week goes well too!
I invited you to share your truths with the people you care about. Its not easy and sometimes we have to be mindful not to interfere, mindful to ask if someone is seeking help or answers before sharing that truth, mindful as well that they may not be in a place where the sign or the idea or the vital information that we think we have… Mindful that maybe they won’t be able to do much with it… This time! But eventually, that information will build up like rocks at the bend in a creek, accumulating into a bank over time until eventually it provides a person the purchase they need to climb out of the stream and dry off for a bit.
Share your truth, and look for others that are trying to share theirs too! We all have lots to learn from each other and when we share and take the time to learn, it can make all the difference in the world!
I’m packing up now as the lightning is getting closer. The birds are sounding a bit more frantic and my left butt cheek is falling asleep from sitting on a flat metal chair…. Time to half step inside, into the warmth!
Happy Monday!
Seeking an Office for the end of the World 