Trying to look at everyone with new eyes, with the eyes of God. I don’t mean that in a trite way, in the generalized “call if you need me” but then not really pull through kind of way. I mean this in a radical way: looking to someone I loathe or struggle with and seeing the arm of God wrapped around him or her and considering what it is that God can see I can’t. God nurtures all.
It’s not that God doesn't incite or instigate or inspire or create change in the hearts of the worst—that’s happening, too. I’m trying to figure out my place in helping that along, in bringing goodness to the world. Admonish the sinner. Instruct the ignorant. To not know is the Latin base of this word ignorant—so many do not know. I do not know—I cannot possibly know all that comes with the suffering in this world. I do know that I suffer, members of my family and my friends suffer, and when I am compassionate, and suffer with them, meet them where they are, I come to know that all over the world there is more of the same, and that different souls take on the suffering in different ways.
I spend time looking at people now and again—not stalking them, just gazing when the time is right, like on the bus or in line somewhere waiting for something. We’re all waiting for something, after all. If you look at someone’s eyes when they’re speaking, you can catch a glimpse of soul, of that unnameable thing that makes the person, the body, be. It’s easy to value that in those we love or get along with, though I’ll admit it’s equally easier to take that life-force for granted. My intention this year is to pay attention to that, to look into others’ eyes, to see them as souls caught in this living experience, just like me. To wonder what will come of seeing souls in this way and what will join us together now and evermore.