Originally posted on Facebook HERE
Today I’m thinking about people. What we are, who we are, and how we interact. First off it seems to me we’re all our own separate entities. No two bodies or minds are alike. Some of us were born with physical challenges. Some with mental challenges. But we all have a body – the vehicle we get to use to explore life on this planet – and a mind. The mind is the computer we get at birth to process information. Why some of us get Luxury cars and supercomputers while others get Yugo’s and chrome books I don’t know. Whatever we get is what we have to work with, though. From there we begin to create our own reality. Totally, uniquely our reality. Not quite that easy, though – because there are many factors at work here. What is our environment like? From the moment we’re born we will have interactions with other people, too. Will they love us? Hate us? Take care of us, or abuse us? Build us up, or tear us down? I am by no means an expert on how our early childhood development affects who and what we believe we are, but my guess is it’s huge. Whatever computer we’ve been given at birth starts processing the information and begins to formulate a belief system about who we are and what we’re capable of. Our bodies begin to reflect whatever nutritional beliefs our parents have. But so do our minds. How much of who we think we are has no basis in what we really think we are, but is actually based on a belief system instilled in us years ago that we never really questioned or contemplated? And, who are these people that appear in our life? Do you ever think about that? Why am I related to this person? Why do I have to work with that person? Who are these people in my life? Are these the people I want in my life? Why is there always someone involved in my life I’d rather not see at all? Our connection as a species lies behind our bodies and minds. To me, it has more to do with our source. But while we’re here, we are all separate entities. We get to control how we see things internally. We can’t control what someone else will say or do to us, but we can control how it will affect us. We get to choose what we do, who we do it with, and what out attitudes and beliefs are. Personally, I think every interaction we have with other humans is a learning experience, and a chance. Every one of them. The guy pumping gas next to you – why is it that guy? Maybe you never say anything to him, but if you had it could have led to the experience of a lifetime. Sometimes I think we don’t spend enough time with each other, sharing our life stories. It’s how I came up with the “52 lunches in 52 weeks” idea years ago, which I still love. Schedule a lunch every week with someone (preferably someone you know, but not especially well, or maybe someone you don’t feel a strong connection with) just to learn more about them. If you do that for a year you’d know 52 people better than you did last year. Do that every year for ten years? Wow. If everyone did it? Maybe we’d start to have more tolerance for each other. Maybe love would flow as freely as anger seems to these days. Maybe we could start to see our connections instead of our differences, and focus on that. The choice, of course, is ours.
