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Dalton
Roberts |
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Little experiences are really the big deal
in life. If we save all our appreciation for the “big experience,”
we will miss all the little ones. Literally, we will miss life. This truth started coming into my awareness
like an island arising from a lake as the water goes down. It was one of
the most beautiful experiences of my life when I saw it blooming there
before me in verdant splendor. We tend to wait all our lives for ”the
big break.” It blinds us. We wait so hard and so fervently for the big
bang that we miss all the little sparkles. No matter how big the bang,
all of them are made up of a lot of tiny sparkles. If we take time to be
mesmerized by the little sparkles, we will have so much ecstasy we will
not need a big bang. It helps to simply quit looking for big
experiences. In setting big experiences as your goal, your consciousness
camps out around that goal and is not available to see the little
experiences that can transform your enjoyment of life. Let your schedule book be your map to see
the little experiences. Before my island of delight rose out of the
waters of my life, I would look at my schedule in the morning to see
what the “biggest deal” was that day. Now I forget the big deals and
look at all the little experiences that await me. I decide then and
there to milk all the moments for all they’re worth. I find that each
one is just as good as any other and the little experiences often become
so delicious I wonder why I ever saw them as little. If I have appointments that day with a
millionaire and a carpenter, I bring to mind that Jesus was a carpenter.
Wouldn’t it have been a tragedy to look forward more to seeing King
Herod than to meeting with Jesus if you had lived in that day? If I have appointments with a genius and a
person who cannot read or write, I remember that my nephew will never be
able to read or write but he is one of the dearest and most enjoyable
persons I know. He and I tape a discussion every once in a while based
on the TV program “Face the Press.” We call it “Face This Big
Awful Stinking Mess.” We both laugh till we are giddy. Can you imagine
a finer “little experience”? Is it really little? Your soul tells
you instantly what is big and little and my soul tells me this one is
too special to even try to classify. Some things are beyond words. All these pleasures of living are in the
set of our mind like the movements of a boat are in the set of the sail.
Get your sail right and your boat will take you anywhere you want to go.
If you want to really enjoy a meal, don’t look to the food. Talk to
your taste buds. Say, “We are about to eat. Are you ready to savor
every morsel?” Deepak Chopra gave me a delicious insight
when he said to maximize the variety of tastes (sweet, sour, tart) in
every meal because the taste buds are connected to different parts of
the human brain. The way we eat can expand the capacity of our brains to
appreciate life. What a thought! In one of Robert Rabbin’s great books, The
Sacred Hub, he speaks of being “ravished by the beauty of life.”
You cannot do that if you are looking for the big bang, the big job
opportunity, the love of a lifetime, your knight in shining armor
or the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. There is no pot of gold at the end of the
rainbow but there is a pot of golden pleasure in simply savoring the
sparkles in every little experience of each day. |
