The Eye of the Storm

Storm clouds just passed by our Florida coast and are now gathering above the late October northeastern skies.  In the midst of it all, gazing upward, it is easy to ask big questions.  Looking at the changing cloud patterns above, connections emerge to our human behavioral patterns below. 

'Clouds' are all the buzz this week as the pop culture film, Cloud Atlas, opened in theaters.  The film left me disappointed, but I was able to exit the theater with one philosophical nugget from the book by David Mitchell: "My life amounts to no more than one drop in a limitless ocean. Yet what is any ocean, but a multitude of drops?” ―  The truth of that statement as it applies to 'meaning of life' questions led me to ask, what the heck is a Cloud Atlas?   Since authors and filmmakers are known for giving away clues in a title,  it seemed like a good starting point to find out if there were any other philosophical nuggets worth mining. 

Interestingly enough, a cloud atlas was an early tool for studying the weather- a collection of visual images to identify different types of clouds and how those clouds predict weather patterns. We humans, like clouds, fall into some pretty predictable patterns ourselves.  We create emotional storms via the 'butterfly effect' from one tiny negative thought, leading to a not-so-tiny negative act, leading to a massive misunderstanding. It would be nice to have an atlas to navigate around particularly dangerous swells. (Maybe Twitter and Facebook are currently serving this purpose since I have now learned to steer clear of the angriest posts and people.)

Conversely, a single positive thought (as in right now -this second)  may generate a single kind act - which could build a wave of kindness surging beyond any one lifetime.  Clear heads and clear skies seem connected in ways that parallel dark thoughts and dark skies, yet our world is absolutely defined by the existence of both.  Our planet and our souls cannot flourish without the changing pressures.  Good things and bad things happen because the flower needs the rain.  It is silly to believe any one of us could thrive sitting under a perpetually cloudless sky.  The challenge is to avoid getting blown over by approaching storms.  In order to withstand the weather life brings, we need to mimic the eye of the storm.  Find that place of relative calm within.  With this mastered, we become empowered to understand what it takes to be the pressure system actually causing sunny skies to follow,  for ourselves and everyone else in our atmosphere.

Do You See What Eyes See?

Looking at the October sky last night,  it dawned on me that the obvious answer to the question, "Do you see what I see?" is most certainly, unequivocally, under any and all circumstances,  "no".   "Seeing" is a complicated endeavor, an action with variables unique to each and every receptacle. When we see, we use both our eyes and our brain.  Basic science tells us that our individual lenses and brains follow snowflake logic: no two are the same. Hence, no two 'viewings' are the same either.  

The greatest factor in this lens-brain equation is, of course, the brain. Our brains both reflect and affect what our eyes see in any given situation. Presidential debate watchers Wednesday evening saw the same debate, yet our preconceived beliefs affected what drew our focus.  We know this, but always seem surprised when others don't share our take-away. As a person who has spent my life trying to persuade others to see things the way I do, I am only recently coming to realize that no one ever will.  And therein lies the beauty.  Only the beholder gets to judge because we each construct our own path to the truth. 

Wisdom seekers have long recognized that the goal is to see beyond what is before our eyes.  The true gift of sight rests not with the eyes, and not even with the brain.  Transcendent understanding involves a third element;  insight. Unlike eyesight, which is dependent on the physical world around us, insight emerges from the intangible world within us.  Insight connects what the eyes and mind often cannot.  Atticus was able to teach this to Scout, and Obi-Wan to Luke, so perhaps there is hope for the likes of me yet.