It can happen that your life can change in an instant. What we think will happen, who we will love, how we will live, can all disappear from view in a single moment. We like to make plans because they give us comfort – an assurance of the future. Sometimes plans fail or change and we are disappointed with how the future materialized. It is as if we are surprised again and again that our lives can change in a moment.
When we think of these rapid changes of expectations, often the catalyst is considered “bad”. We think of traffic accidents, random shootings, a cancer diagnosis, an unexpected heart attack as the things that unexpectedly change us in a moment. The opposite pole, we also think about, but that is the thing of which fairy tales are made: winning the lottery, meeting a new love, unexpectedly getting a new job offer. These, too, can change our lives in a heartbeat.
What about all that might exist between disaster and euphoria? These things also have the power to change our plans. Little things that happen during our day can adjust our course, perhaps very slightly at first glance – and have a tremendous effect on our lives.
“The tongue tastes the soup.
If you are awake in the presence of a master
One moment will show you the way.”
-Dhammapada
We need to be awake in this world. If we are awake we can see the subtleties that surround us, inviting us to live better lives. With our eyes open, we can see the force of potential, the force of change, inviting us at every turn. But if we are asleep, we don’t see or hear or feel these things. We wait in a blackened slumber waiting for the booming sounds of cataclysm to awaken us and explode the unexpected into our dreams.
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