Greetings from the main line,
"What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Emerson
A typical freight train with a hundred cars, travelling 50 miles an hour, will take about a mile to come to a complete stop if the engineer determines it is necessary to apply the emergency brake. When where you want to be is 5280 feet behind you, that can be an eternity.
Some days it starts just as we become aware we are no longer dreaming. We sense the temperature of the room, the feel of the sheets around our legs, the bit of drool on the edge of the mouth. That first moment when we feel consciousness seep back, and we sense the baggage from last night, the spark from our last thought, the list from yesterday, the pain or the glow we went to bed with, that is our chance, our first choice.
There are points along our day where we choose. It is a fraction of a second, less time than we can feel pass, and then we go down this track or that. It is a conscious choice, but it happens so fast, with so much weight behind it, that it sometimes seems like someone else is throwing the lever.
It is a mental switchyard. We are clattering along our rails, building speed, the cars behind us filled with the freight we chose, and then we are faced with an experience and then a choice. How will I react here? And we throw the lever, the rails clank over to point us in that direction, and the tonnage behind us lines up with us, rolling faster.
From then on it’s far easier to be tempted by other switches that lead us down that way. The momentum becomes irresistible. The weight behind us, the cars with all the baggage, good or bad, cannot stop or change directions.
Down this way is; hope, patience, laughter, solutions, tolerance, forgiveness. It is doing what is satisfying, it is serving without expectation. It is where you are creative, where you are open, where you feel love. That day when all the lights were green, when you laughed at everything, when you gave a dollar to that guy with the sign you didn’t really believe.
Down this other way is anger, self pity, frustration, resentment, reworking failures, regret. It is a siding, a dead end. Or worse, it is a track that does not end, simply takes you further from the life you want. That other day when everyone was out to get you, the thing that didn’t work because it NEVER works, the day of the broken shoelace conspiracy. It was the day when you doubted yourself, and then you doubted everyone else.
When you are angry it seems all you see are the things that make you angry. When you are resentful it seems everyone is out to put you down. When you are envious everyone is doing better than you are. We fail to see the other choices, the other places to change direction. And to go backward, perhaps start over? Out of the question.
I’m not speaking from some abstract point of view. I have derailed and crashed on more days than I want to admit. Worse, I take other trains with me.
Thankfully there are ways to fix this. Sometimes it is complicated and difficult and you won’t think it’s worth doing. “Adjust my attitude?” you might think, “Leave me alone, I’m busy grinding my day into metal shavings.”
And at some point in your day, you might choose to take a turn out. Pull off to a quiet place where you can think about where you are headed; compare it to where you want to go. This requires patience and thoughtfulness and maturity. Since I lack all of these I have to rely on other people, and small miracles like the sunrise.
This morning the boys piled into the car, only a few minutes late. I was already mentally at work, spitting at the imaginary fires I built when I first woke up. I started the car and clicked my seatbelt. Harrison, in his subtle Dick Grayson way said: “Atomic batteries to power, turbines to speed.” I laughed, especially since he was not saying it to entertain me, he was just being Harrison. Gave me just the switch I needed.
People are not trains. We can stop when we choose to, shake off the momentum. We can move laterally, we can turn around. We can link up with others who want the same things we want and let them guide us.
And we can be the switchman for others. You are already doing it for someone; your children, your friend, the bank teller. You find reason to encourage, to praise, to pay a compliment. You give a gift of humor, you thank someone, you save them from themselves and throw the switch and watch the locomotive head in the better direction. By the way, when you do these things it pulls a lever for you too.
We have these choices. It’s difficult to throw the switch sometimes, even to choose the right lever to pull is hard. It’s even more challenging when it seems we are already committed to a direction we can’t change. You have it in you, and it’s the most important thing you can reach for today.
Hope this finds you on the right track,
David
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Copyright © 2011 David Smith