New Eyes
Rainy day and I’m sleepy already at 1pm. There’s a self-promised to-do list to tackle. I grab a notebook and umbrella for a brisk walk to the corner diner with intention of rebooting and making real progress on the big picture vision. As the cool rain sneaks in to lick my face, I notice how left-brain productivity wants to dominate and wonder if what I really need is to chill, not force more thinking. “Empty yourself and let the universe fill you.” How much more right-brain energy do we all need after decades of the opposite conditioning?
In the new Sounds True catalog, Tami Simon writes a beautiful letter from the publisher, encouraging us to cultivate a wisdom culture. “As our outer world undergoes widespread restructuring, what is needed are people with rich and grounded inner lives, people who can lead with vulnerability, learn from each other, and lift each other up.” Amen, sister! (btw, new audios look wonderful- check out SoundsTrue.com)
It’s part of my destiny to be a catalyst for this evolution of humanity; to equip the new kind of leaders to actually be the change our world needs now. I look forward to discussions about that with you. Today, however, I feel moved to share something more private and precious.
Something happened in the diner.
We need a little a back-story. It’s almost a year since I wrote “no accidents” after I smashed my skull in the street, almost died and lost the use of my right eye for months. [If you saw me today, you’d never guess. Both eyes open, look normal. I’m extremely grateful for what doctors called a remarkable recovery for a lucky woman.]
Jill Bolte Taylor (Stroke of Insight author) would ask, “What did you gain from this?” Falling off that silly scooter deepened a mystical journey into a voyage beyond logic or reason, filled with rebirth and emergence of a soul stronger in Love than ever before.
My beloved meditation teacher, Sri Eknath Easwaran would augment this with the delight of how God-Love comes in and uses us. Every morning I meditate with St. Francis – make me an instrument of thy peace and other passages from the great mystics. I recently unplugged for the month of March and sort of lived like a monk in a sacred place in California, meditating and mantram walking lots and lots. Back at home my daily practices are more consistent and deepening. That’s a minor miracle right there. LOL
My ego-saboteur harps, “Geez Baker, after all this meditating you’re not changed. And you haven’t done anything of substance with this be-the-change leadership stuff yet. Who the heck are you to equip new leaders anyway?” He’s just doing his thing, following the inner critic job description.
OK, back at the diner. A couple got up to leave and I felt drawn to them. They were so adorable, how loving they were with each other and I just felt gushy love for them. What a cute couple! My heart leapt.
So? Here’s the icky, private part. Their physical bodies were quite obese. It’s hard to describe how my eyes just didn’t see that in the gushy love moments that could have been seconds or an eternity. I’m ashamed to admit that I would have judged or noticed that 2-dimensional form for most of my life. I didn’t “see” with those eyes until they were much farther away, outside the window, down the sidewalk. This intense wave of humility overcame me. Oh, I am being rewired. My God.
My eye and the eye of God are
One eye
One vision
One knowledge and
One love.
- Meister Eckhart
And this, my friends, is how we are going to ‘Be the change,” and lead the evolution for a world that works for all.
There are other little examples happening. When I heard a child “annoyingly” crying in the store, my knee-jerk response was to meet her eyes and be love with her. (not typical, results may vary :-)) She immediately stopped crying and we had a spirit to spirit lovefest, until her mother abruptly strolled her away and she started wailing again. External forms are dissolving into that oneness more and more. The inner eye is first instinct before the outer eye gives it’s opinion.
I first fell in love with Easwaran in the book Your Life is Your Message. (title inspired by his hero, Mahatma Gandhi.) He addresses the grand agendas of a harmonious planet and global peace. The punch line keeps coming back to individuals’ own personal commitment to “quietly change the world by changing themselves.”
These tiny moments in diners, stores and living rooms are so subtle and easily dismissed as nothing to write home about. And they are everything.
I can’t begin to describe how humbled to my knees on the floor this gift feels. I know if I don’t keep meditating and doing my work, this could fly away. And I have a deeper appreciation for how one whiff of this is what keeps someone devoted to their practice. It makes me want to become a better person in a way I’ve only tasted or admired.
Closing Our Eyes
When you are a little child,
You are told to
Close your eyes and
Make a Wish
When you grow into an adult,
beyond the rails of a crib and begin climbing ladders,
You decide to close your eyes
(using the latest empowerment visualization) and
Set Goals.
As you evolve into a realized human being,
You practice closing your eyes and do your best to
Surrender to a higher Truth.
When you become one with All there is,
You close your eyes and
Truly See.
May we all be able to find new eyes to view our lives with greater compassion and confidence and be the change for the world we get to create together.
Be well, be inspired,
Marian
