In this world, our lives are everything. To us, to our friends, and our families. They're all we know; they encompass all that we are. We are confronted with strangers every day of our lives, in some form or another. What we sometimes forget is that they're human, too. The people sitting alongside you on the bus, those who walk past you on the footpath; all human. All the centre of their own little world's. All with favourite songs, cherished memories, secret loves, passions, dreams and hopes. All with scars, fears, insecurities and worries. All of these lives are jigsaw pieces in a puzzle that will never be complete; pieces change shape, disappear, and new ones emerge. Quite often, pieces that looked like they would fit together don't, and those you thought were too different to reconcile sit cosily side by side. Pieces that would fit aside each other seamlessly are currently sitting on opposite sides of the board, just waiting to be pieced together. Some pieces might seem to never fit... Until the perfect gap appears.
Yet although we are confronted with this tangible mass of individual life on a day to day basis, it can be easy to forget that to the world, we too are just one person. That's not an indication of our worth, so much as it is an indication of the cumulative worth of humanity. 29 worlds were lost in the Pike Mine last friday. 29 well-established pieces of the jigsaw disappeared into thin air without warning - creating a ripple that shook to the core those around them, and radiates through entire communities, and an entire nation. This is the kind of tragedy that reminds us that while we can't see it at first glance, each person we pass on the street is an important piece of the jigsaw to those pieced around them. It reminds us of the enormity of grief, and illustrates the exponential devastation loss of life causes in the world's of individuals everywhere on a day to day basis. We know that people are born, and that people die; in fact the only certainty in this life is that we will all, someday, die. Often when we talk of being scared of death, we mean we are scared of our own demise; but we forget that the demise of loved ones is even worse.
It's easy to see the differences between us and people on the street - hair colour, eye colour, height, weight, race, sex, fashion; and understandably easy to isolate ourselves from humanity in our heads. It is even often easy to isolate ourselves from our friends; those whose actions we don't understand or agree with, those whose priorities we question, those who's choices seem from odd to absurd. We are so quick to characterise these differences as a gap, an impass between us and others. We even choose our friends based on the qualities we perceive in others. What we forget, far too often, is that these differences, far from separating us, are what allow us to fit together as a whole. Without others, how we would know ourselves? If everyone had blonde hair, would we know it was blonde? If everyone was courteous, would we use the term polite? If we didn't know any different, we would never appreciate things when they WERE good.
Its so easy to focus on the differences between people and allow our perception of these differences to let us justify isolating ourselves. Those differences are worthy of focus, to be sure - they are what make us unique, special; they are what make us "us." But what we can often forget, when we get stuck inside our own heads, is that every one of us is human. Everyone suffers, everyone loves, and everyone deserves to be loved. So say what you feel - and be honest. If you love someone, tell them. If you appreciate that person, make it known. Because the tendency of humanity to get stuck inside our own heads often distorts the reality of our relationship to the world; that we're not alone. That all we need to do is reach out a hand, and ask for what we want; or even just take it. Because life isn't eternal, although it feels like it. And our lives aren't the be all and end all, our perception isn't the only one. We are who we are, they are who they are, and that's wonderful, but "if you judge someone, you have no time to love them." (Mother Teresa)
So...
1. Ask for what you need - be it help, love, or anything else.
2. Don't pretend. Your emotions may not seem pretty to you; they may seem embarrassing, weird, or even scorned. But remember, your head over-exagerates your importance. Say what you really feel, not what you think you should - pretending anything only complicates things.
3. Love and accept. This means yourself, too :-) Tell those you love that you love them; bridge any differences by focusing on the similarities that permeate humanity.
4. Live. Now is all we've got.
And never forget..... You're beautiful!
