The Direction of Intention

22.

Join me in inspiring truly powerful people. Each day I will add a new thought, story or idea to support your quest and mine.

Once you have a word for something you stop seeing it. A tree becomes a concept. You see the word. You see a category. But you rarely see what is right in front of you. You see what you think is there but you don’t see the tree.

To see the tree you have to slow down. Then, you have to challenge the assumption that you know what it is. Seeing has less to do with they eyes and the mind than it does with the capacity to be present.

To see the tree you probably have to stop the internal chatter, the interpretation, the to-do list, you have to challenge the idea that the tree is a resource, a consumable object. You have to challenge the idea that this “thing” is a category, one of many of the same thing. It is not. It is only fits into a category in the abstract.

Only then, after all of that “putting down” are you capable of engaging with what is there. Only then can you see.

Consider for a moment, if it is this hard to get beyond yourself to see a tree, how difficult must it be to see another human being – especially a human being that you’ve placed in the category “not like me.” How hard must it be for them to see you?

Imagine what might be possible if we took the time to see. What might change if we acted according to the unique and splendid instead of the generic and the abstract?

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