Wednesday, March 17, 2010

Life, explained (4)

Part 1 is here.

Part 2 is here.

Part 3 is here.

When we left off, we had just begun to gain some ground in bossing around all these really big people. Now comes some serious miscommunication: they actually think they are in charge.

After a couple of years of this going on, we finally give up and let them keep their delusion of control. It's just not worth it to continue trying to straighten them out, as they clearly are too far from Home to remember.

As we begin to grow and learn more about this crazy game we have joined here on Earth, we become more and more like the giants. Over some years, we even begin to look more like them, growing larger and larger ourselves.

For many of us, there comes a time in our lives when we decide it would be fun to be the giants in the room which belongs to a little tiny new one. So, we get together with another person and create the Earth suit which another Spirit comes to live within.

This is a miraculous time, both because we are reminded of when we were so little and because we now have a great responsibility and a constant source of amazement living in our own homes.

We spend all of our energy and most of our resources caring for our offspring, teaching them all about how life works, and loving our time watching them grow.

Just about the time that they are moving out and starting their own independent lives, we begin a new part of the game. In fact, it is the time when, if we choose, we can recall the game. Not completely, at least not for most of us, but enough to wonder what we were thinking all of those years between giving up trying to direct the actions of the giants and watching our own children leave the nest.

In learning that we came here from Home, that we are here to love and laugh and enjoy the company of others, our focus shifts. Now, we don't seek to win the game. We seek, instead, to love the game.

What we come to see is that the game offers a rich environment within which we can discover an infinite number of ways Love expresses itself. Our instinctive response is to want to know more about Love. Where does it come from? Where does it go when it has passed through us?

Now, rather than competing in the game, we are becoming smiling observers. Because no one is not a participant, we are still in the game, even as we are outside it enjoying how others are playing.

We feel a great urge to share our new-found perspective with others. In some cases, our sharing is accepted and folks come to grasp a bit of what it is like for us now. In other cases, our sharing is thought of as the ramblings of old people.

Both conclusions are right.

Stay tuned...there's more.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Beautiful, Rick. I read all four parts. If I may, I would like to refer to your perspective and your explanation as a fable. I say this in the spirit of the game.

I have said that all of existence is built upon stories, as far as our experience of it is concerned - and that's really the only relevant existence I can talk about. My words exist in this world, and so I can only talk of this world.

However, you get clues sometimes about how this existence fits into a larger one. There are fissures in the border through which light pokes. Like a semi-porous membrane, or a colander. Just like the clue you mentioned in Part 1 - about seeing one's own emotions in the eyes of others. That's a clue indeed.

This fable you have spun here is unique as a whole and - I believe - the product of a man who is paying attention. I love it. Thank you for taking the time to share.

I look forward to Part 5.

Rick Hamrick said...

Thanks for stopping by and offering your thoughts, Will.

I'm thinking that all of our existence *is* stories, be they the ones we tell ourselves or the ones others tell about us.

Your point about this being a fable makes sense. It is through the boiling-down of things to their most cogent parts that we can offer them as digestable bits, and when we get them to that point, we call them fables. So, yeah.

I'd tell you when Part 5 is going to show up, but I have no clue. Unlike the US Census Bureau which sent me a card to let me know an envelope was going to arrive soon, Part 5 has not sent any pre-arrival hints.