At 11pm on Saturday night, BGC and I lay on the carpet listening to Creedence Clearwater Revival. As I sang along out of tune, he pointed out the hidden music in the background.
Who knew there was an organ in there?
From carpet level, I could also see a whole lot of details about my house that I rarely pay attention to. I could see how much my carpet needed vacuuming, and how much of my hair no longer lives on my head. Being on the ground shifts your perspective and focus, as does listening to music with BGC.
The hidden beauty behind the chorus struck a chord with me (pun); it hit me as an analogy for what mindfulness brings to a bloody good life.
My three favourite things: mindfulness, life, and mindfulness-life analogies.
If we really listen, there are all sorts of things we can notice under the surface of Have You Ever Seen the Rain.
There’s a whole lot more going on under the hood of our lives that we often skim over with our super efficient zippy multitasky to do listing habituation.
But when you just Stop. Look. Listen to your heart hear what it’s saying, (sorry, delved into some Bridget Jones’ Diary Lyrics there), you see what mindfulness sees.
It reveals a hidden depth to the seemingly mundane and routine experiences that make up our day to day lives. It allows me to experience a newfound curiosity and interest in the things I’d taken for granted.
It’s exciting to go travelling, to seek new experiences, but what if we just stopped and really looked, listened, smelt, tasted and touched the world around us right now?
And the people in it?
We’d be amazed at what we’d find.
When I learnt mindfulness I learnt that there is nothing and no one boring in the world. If we are present enough with someone or something that we can observe our judgements, fears, need to self-validate without getting caught up in them, we can see things in the world that most others don’t see.
Only through presence and non-judgemental curiosity can we allow people to open up and be themselves.
You are only boring when you are not yourself. – Kim Anami.
With presence and self awareness, you see people through a new lense; a lense of curiosity, compassion, understanding and tolerance.
And the same goes for objects that we’ve labelled or judged as boring, ugly, pointless.
I used to pretty much hate pretty much everyone, and most things bored me.
Now I pretty much love pretty much everyone, and most things excite me. The only people I don’t love are the ones that trigger old wounds in me, and even then, I know I don’t love them only because of my own triggers and nothing to do with them.
Because every person is unique, every song is different, every moment, every smell, every taste, every touch, every glance is new. Every time.
And there’s so much more than meets the eye. Or the ear/nose/mouth/skin, as it were.
If we see the world through our senses and use that childlike interest that we all have buried somewhere inside us, we find that the world is just as fascinating and vibrant and exciting as it was when we were a small drunk person. That’s what BGC and I call children.
