A Lesson from Life

by Gregory Allen Butler

In an earlier article I wrote on poise I mentioned how to make a game of it. When you lose your poise, you lose. When you get through a situation that in the past would have rattled you, you win.

Today I lost. I was trying to fine-tune my blog software in conjunction with my external style sheet. Before I knew it, nothing was working. And I was getting frustrated and impatient. On a day when my wife left me alone for five hours so I could write, I spent the whole time trying to fix what I thought I had ruined.

But then, out of the blue, a flash of insight came. What would happen if I inputted an article without any html formatting at all? Viola! Everything worked perfectly. I discovered that I had broken just the right thing. It turned out that what I thought was right was wrong and what I thought was wrong was right. I was trying to fix what was already perfect and turn it into dysfunction. I just didn't know how to utilize it in its perfect state.

Isn't that a metaphor for life? Sometimes it takes a physical illness to show us that we weren't living properly in the first place. I went through that experience when I was 21-years-old. I almost died, but at the height of my suffering I found inner peace and joy. Then I was ready to live life more fully than I ever imagined, even though I could barely walk.

Sometimes we have to be fired from our jobs to find our true purpose in life. Sometimes we go through a divorce to find true love. And sometimes we suffer to find inner peace.

Sometimes we just need to let go of how we think things are supposed to be. As Inayat Khan said, "Nothing is good or bad; it's the mind that makes it so."

It reminds me of the enigmas of Heraclitus: "That which opposes produces a benefit." New ways of thinking are required. The crisis becomes the opportunity. Flexibility, creativity, resilience, perseverance, poise are all exercised when faced with opposing force. Sometimes it's just a matter of perspective.

I will leave you with this passage from Emerson who had a great knack of seeing things in the clearest light:

Our strength grows out of our weakness. The indignation which arms itself with secret forces does not awaken until we are pricked and stung and sorely assailed. A great man is always willing to be little. Whilst he sits on the cushion of advantages, he goes to sleep. When he is pushed, tormented, defeated, he has a chance to learn something; he has been put on his wits, on his manhood; he has gained facts; learns his ignorance; is cured of the insanity of conceit; has got moderation and real skill. The wise man throws himself on the side of his assailants. It is more his interest than it is theirs to find his weak point.