As a young child I remember envying adults (which included teenagers) for knowing everything, and being so capable and confident and self-assured. I couldn’t wait to reach such heights.

Now that I’m in the adult category, I see that very, very few of us are as knowledgeable or capable or confident as I used to assume. It almost seems like all of us have insecurities to wrestle with, and all of us are working in one way or another to establish, or at least give the impression to those whose opinions matter to us, that we’re (fill in the blank): smart enough, hip enough, hard-working enough, relaxed enough, witty enough, good-looking enough, talented enough, kind enough, strict enough, compassionate enough, conservative or liberal enough, involved in enough good causes…you get the point. Though often not consciously, life can be filled with an underlying tension connected with whatever we’re trying to prove.

Last night I laid on a lounge chair on my deck and looked up at the stars. Huge evergreens stood silently in yards within my view, solid, dark, unmoving. Planes too high to hear winked red and yellow lights. A family in the next complex clanked forks and knives against dinnerware.

I lay there soaking all of it in, noticing how loud the crickets had become, how gentle I felt toward the flying things brushing past my face, how glad I was for the ballad that spilled briefly from my neighbor’s door when she opened it to put out her trash. And I thought to myself: I am a part of the universe. I exist. Along with all the rest of this, I am. And for just a few moments, that tension I just talked about vanished, and the blood in my veins began singing what sounded like, Yes, that’s right. Like the bugs and the trees and the rooftops and the people and the galaxies way out there – right there, behind that shooting star – you ARE. Things that are don’t need to prove anything. And I smiled, and relaxed, and wanted to hug it all.

This entry was posted on Friday, August 27th, 2004 at 10:24 am and is filed under Mindfulness, Religion/Spirituality. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.