There was a small hotel I stayed at on several visits to London. It was within walking distance of Victoria Station and in a nieghborhood filled with bed and breakfast places and all sorts of little shops.
After a day of sightseeing, I’d often stop at the corner convenience store to buy a magazine or some Cadbury’s. The same man stood in the same spot behind the same counter (probably wearing the same clothes), with the same stony expression on his face—year after year.
Frequently, I’d leave the store pondering such a life. I can barely imagine going to the same place at the same time and having the same experiences day after day after day. That’s a death sentence for the creative spirit and breeding ground for all sorts of negativity.
I also know that it’s an unquestioned way of life for many people. I was reminded of that the other day when a friend told me about a woman she’d met who said that the best thing about her job was that she didn’t have to learn anything. That’s not my idea of a job benefit.
There are, of course, many ways to keep from evolving forward. For instance, there’s a man I know who seems to have formed all his opinons about life at the age of eleven and has spent the last thirty years looking for evidence to support those beliefs.
Consequently, his philosophy of life includes such things as people can’t be trusted, if something can go wrong it will, and so on and so forth. He’s quite certain about the correctness of his beliefs and determined to keep proving them. Needless to say, he’s a grumpy old man in a middle-aged man’s body. He doesn’t laugh very often, either, I’ve noticed.
Although I don’t hear it so much anymore, when I lived in the Midwest, I often heard people defend their limiting notions by saying, “I wasn’t raised that way.” My (unspoken) reaction to that was, “You wouldn’t wear your mother’s clothes, would you? Why are you wearing her outdated beliefs?”
We don’t need to trap ourselves behind the counter of a convenience store in order to be trapped in a world without discovery and adventure. Yes, I understand that limiting beliefs are often fueled by fear and self-doubt, but if we don’t challenge our assumptions, look at other perspectives, we stay stuck in certainties that may not bear any resemblance to the truth.
Opening our hearts and minds to a bigger world, a world where ideas flourish, where people are spreading joy, is absolutely essential if we’re ever to discover who we are and what we can become.
It’s no coincidence that the motto of the wildly successful Cirque du Soleil is, “We must evolve.” If we don’t take that challenge, we stay stuck in the Twentieth Century while the adventurers are blazing new trails.
Quite simply, we can’t make it better by keeping everything the same.
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Every Friday morning, I wake up to a mailing from the folks at Prairie Home Companion. My favorite part is always The Old Scout’s essay and this week’s is worth passing along. Garrison Keillor is hanging out with the college crowd. You may want to eavesdrop. http://tinyurl.com/2c6hcdm
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