Month: October 2015

A woman starts to get on a bus

On By MaryIn vision and perspectiveLeave a comment

All too often we see something – or part of something – and are so very certain that we know what we saw and what it all means.  The other day I found this story at “Mirth and Motivation” and it kind of made me think . . .

So, the story goes that in a midsized town in the middle of a state a lady started to get on a bus. She looked at the bus driver, didn’t say a word and gestured to his by sticking her thumb on her nose and waving her fingers at the driver.  The driver acknowledged the lady, turned to her and used both hands in the same type of gesture and waved all his fingers at her.

The woman then held her right arm out at the driver and chopped at it a few times with her left hand. Then the driver put his left hand on his right bicep and jerked his right arm up in a fist at her.

The woman then cupped both of her hands under her breasts and lifted gently. In response the driver placed both of his hands at his crotch and gently lifted up.

Then the woman frowned, ran a finger up between her derriere, and got off the bus.

Another woman sitting in the front row of the bus watched the whole exchange in stunned silence.  Finally she said to the driver, “That was the most disgusting thing I have ever seen on a public bus! What the hell were you doing?”

The driver glowered at her and said, “Listen lady, that woman was a deaf-mute. She asked me if the bus went to 5th Street. I said no, we go to 10th Street. She asked if we make many stops. I told her that this was the express. She asked if we go by the dairy, and I told her we go by the ballpark. Then she said ‘Shit, I’m on the wrong bus!’ and she got off the bus. I don’t know what you thought was so disgusting, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder!”

On Giving Away All Your Marbles

On By MaryIn generosityLeave a comment

So, I’ve been thinking a bit about hope and love recently, and that got me to thinking about trust, which got me to thinking about full hearted generosity – and the all too human inclination to hold just a little back, you know just in case, just so we don’t look foolish, just so we have a little something in reserve, just in case. And I came across this story …

Esme and Biron were two young children whose families lived next door to each other. One day, Biron was shooting marbles in the park across the street from their homes, when Esme walked over to see what he was up to.  Esme was eating some candies from a paper sack, and watched him for a while.  After a few minutes, Biron offered to trade Esme his marbles for her candy. Esme thought about it and agreed.

But Biron pocketed his favorite marble before they made the exchange.  Esme on the other hand simple gave Biron her whole bag of candy in the exchange.

That night, Esme slept deeply and peacefully, while Biron tossed and turned and could not sleet at all.  He was haunted by doubts about whether or not Esme had hidden some candy from him the way he had kept back is favorite marble.

The moral of the story of course is that if you don’t give your very best one hundred percent in your relationships and in your interactions with others, you will be haunted by doubts about whether the other person has given their full measure as well. So, do your best, give it all you’ve got, and you will be able to sleep at night with a full and open heart and a clear conscience.

Dream well my friends!  Live full throttle with an open heart and a peaceful soul!

 

The Magic Eyes of Understanding

On By MaryIn forgiveness, generosityLeave a comment

So I was surfing around the internet the other day, thinking about forgiveness, and I came across the fable of the magic eyes … see what you think!

a fable about THE MAGIC EYES.

 

Once upon a time in a land that was far away and near to my heart there was a small village which had a baker, Zed, who was well steeped in righteousness. Zed was a tall thin man, even his face was long and thin. He was so upright and righteous that he seemed to spray righteousness even as he spewed vituperations on any who came within his sight. So, people mostly stayed out of his sight.

In contrast, Zed’s wife, Amia, was short, soft and plump. She just looked cuddly, and her soft cuddliness invited people to come closer to enjoy her warm, open cheerfulness. Now, Amia loved and respected Zed, but his upright righteousness kept her at arm’s length, and she yearned for something more. And in that yearning need was the seed of sadness within Amia’s soul and between Amia and Zed.

Life went on and wants and needs followed their course, and one morning, after Zed had been working since dawn preparing his doughs for the oven, he came home for a brief rest and found Amia with a stranger in their bedroom. Amia’s indiscretion became the talk of the town. Now scandal was in the house of Zed the righteous.  Everyone expected that Zed would send Amia away. Everyone thought that his righteousness would demand it of him.

But, Zed surprised everyone, and simply said that he forgave Amia as the holy scriptures said one should do. But as we all know the heart and the mind are not always in harmony, and in Zed’s heart of hearts he should could not let go of his anger and disappointment with Amia for bringing shame to his home and to his name. Whenever he thought about her, as much as he tried to forgive her, he only felt angry and began to despise her as a whore. Even he began to recognize that his forgiveness was a thin veneer for the punishing righteousness that he heaped upon her. What he really came to feel for Amia was hatred for betraying him as her faithful husband.

As life went on, over some time, Zed’s internal duplicity began to rankle his guardian angel. This angel was a wise old soul, and so each time Zed wallowed in his animosity and resentment of Amia, the angel would drop a tiny pebble into Zed’s heart. Each time a pebble dropped into his heart, Zed would feel a stab of pain. The more he hated her the more pain he felt, and the more pain he felt, the more he hated her. Soon enough, Zed’s heart grew heavy with the weight, and he now walked bent over from the waist from the weight in his heart. Zed became so weary from the pain and the weight in his heart, that he began to wish he were dead.

At that point Zed’s guardian angel, Tess, appeared to him in the image of Della Reese. Tess told him that to be healed of his heart ache, he would need magic eyes. Through those magic eyes he would be able to look back to the time before his hurt and to see Amia not as a betrayer, bur as a weak woman in need of his kindness. Through the magic of seeing through these new eyes, the pain of his old wounds might be healed.

Zed was not convinced. His righteous self said that nothing could change the past, and that Amia was guilty of betraying him. Tess agreed that the past cannot be changed, but she said, you can change how you see the past. Your vision of what happened is open to re-vision, and you can allow it to be healed through the magic eyes.

Zed was still not convinced and his hatred of Amia had become a refuge for him, but he was a desperate man, and so he asked Tess how he might look through these magic eyes. Tess said, “You only need to ask with a sincere desire to see through them, and their vision will be granted to you. Each time you see Amia through the magic eyes of understanding, one pebble will be lifted from your broken heart.”

Zed still had his doubts, but he asked for the vision of the magic eyes with all the sincerity he could muster. Tess smiled her blessing. Zed felt that he had been touched by an angel.

Over some days Amia began to change in Zed’s eyes. He began to see her as a sad woman with unmet needs rather than a heartless evil being. Zed’s vision changed and his heart began to soften as one by one each of the pebbles lifted from his heart. This took a long time, but over time Zed’s heart became softer and lighter. As these changes grew in Zed’s heart, his whole being began to change. He began to stand straighter and his countenance softened. He no longer spewed righteousness, but was less sharp than he had been. Eventually he welcomed Amia back into his heart, their hearth grew warm together and together they resumed their journey through the second season of their lives in hope and humility, together learning to temper righteousness with compassion with eyes of understanding.

On Being Certain, Certain People and Other People

On By MaryIn love1 Comment

Sometimes I just get a thought in my head and I can’t let go of it. This story is what I did with one of those thoughts . . .

 

Once upon a time in a place called Kenvilley the people were struggling to find their way to live in peace and justice with each other. In Kenvilley only Certain People were allowed to love each other and to make their homes together and build families. The Other People saw how these Certain People lived together, and they perceived that it was good. And so, they too wanted to be able to love whom they loved and to make their homes together and build families as well. These Other People had loved each other for a long time, and now they wanted to be able to live together and build families and to celebrate all that they had together.

These Other People went to the town leaders and made their case. But the town leaders said that it would be immoral for them to usurp the privilege of building families that by sacred tradition was granted only to the Certain People. The Other People were not deterred, they continued to work tirelessly side by side with all the peoples of the community, loving each other and becoming known as good citizens. One day, after many entreaties by the Other People, the Chief Leaders of the larger society proclaimed that that all of the peoples, the Certain People and the Other People,  who loved each other and who freely choose to do so could make their homes together and build families.

But the Record Maker of Families in Kenvilley refused to listen to the Chief Leaders. She said that she was certain that personal god forbid families among the others, and she would listen to no other.

Now, the founding citizens of Kenvilley and the larger society said that gods, goddesses and governance where all good things, and that they should be kept separate, so that all peoples would be free to choose and honor their own personal gods and goddesses, and there would be one impartial government for all of the peoples.

But the Record Maker of Families in Kenvilley said that her god told her she must be holy and moral, and to allow the Other People to make their homes together and build families would be immoral.

The Leaders and the Other People were angry and frustrated with Record Maker of Families. The Leaders put her in jail for a while, but she refused to change her mind because she was certain.  (And we all know that if you do not change your mind and your underwear pretty regularly, soon enough things begin to smell pretty badly!)

Some of the Other People tried to talk to the Record Maker of Families, but she would not listen to them, she said they were sinners, and she was certain.

The Other People got together to talk among themselves. They talked about what the registrar’s god had said about other things. They remembered pronouncements like, “you are forgiven for your sins. So is everyone else.” And they thought that even if the Record Maker of Families believed they were sinners, she should also recognize that she too was a sinner and they were all forgiven.  And the Other people wanted to remind the Record Maker of Families about the “Remember that love thy neighbor think?”  And they wanted to tell the Record Maker of Families that they were her neighbors too.

And they really thought they had her with this one, “Give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s. Honor the laws of the land in which you live.” But then one of the Others remember that this whole problem with the registrar was because they got the Chief Leaders to change one of the laws of the land. Someone said, ‘but that law was unfair.’ Quietly someone else said, ‘but now she thinks the change is unfair.’

And they were quiet for a while thinking about this, wondering among themselves about the best way, the fairest way to decide what is fair for everyone.

Someone said, ‘love is the answer.’ And that sounded good. But someone else asked, ‘who gets to decide what love is?’

And someone else asked, ‘who gets to decide who gets to decide?’

And of course somebody asked, ‘who gets to decide who gets to decide who gets to decide?’

And they all scratched their heads (and other body parts), thought about it for a while, and then one quiet woman stood up and said, ‘we do, right here, right now. With our words, with our lives. We decide with every breath we take. Who we are, how we are. It all matters. Love is the answer. Our lives and our love will transform her hatred, her misunderstanding, her ignorance, one heartbeat at a time.’

Another of the Others asked her, ‘you mean love conquers hate? Like the Buddha said?”

She smiled and said, ‘well, the Buddha had it part right, and maybe it’s just a bad translation, but not conquers. No more violence. Love transforms hate. That’s what I mean. Like water transforms rock. We just gotta keep on loving.’

And since Kenvilley is where they used to grow a lot of tobacco, they all thought that the Record Maker of Families should put some sweet lovin in her pipe and smoke that a while.