The windows along my deck reflect images of my property’s many trees. Looking at my house is much like looking at a forest interrupted by cedar ship planking. The appearance is good for people, bad for birds. A number of birds do what birds do. They fly to apparent trees at full speed only to have their flights and their lives abruptly terminated against the glass.
In their short lives birds cannot pass on what they learn about crashing into barriers they failed to see. Like the birds, humans also crash into unexpected and unseen barriers. Unlike the birds, many of us attempt to pass on our learning to those we love and those less experienced. Our attempts to pass on warnings about barriers are, unfortunately, only irregularly successful. Both parents and teachers discover the difficulty of passing on lessons about anticipating barriers.
The geography of each life is bordered by barriers both self-imposed and imposed. Some of those barriers, like addictive habits, are visible, but we still bang into them. Some are invisible and are an inevitable consequence of limited experience, distraction, or ignorance.
Every place on our planet presents us with some limiting barrier: Ebola in tropical Africa, landslides in hilly areas, floods in valleys, heat events in summer and cold events in winter, droughts, torrential rains, tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tornadoes, hurricanes, tropical storms, lightning, sinkholes, forest and grass fires, rip currents, falling coconuts, mold in the hay, trips down the steps—name a place, and I’ll cite the limiting barrier.
It is our finiteness that is the ultimate barrier, and it is one we fly toward from birth, never really knowing when we will encounter the glass. Along the way those more experienced attempt to tell us about the folly of flying toward appearance and reflection without forethought. In our turn, we try to pass along the knowledge we have garnered from less than fatal collisions with idyllic reflections from hard surfaces. But the young birds, the unthinking birds, the unrealistic birds keep crashing headfirst into the glass.
This finite life is not a practice for another go-round. Imposing barriers on ourselves adds limitations that can, like the windows of my house that interrupt the flight of birds, halt the flow of our lives or even end them. The key to successful and effective living is to anticipate those barriers, to be smarter than the birds.
In their short lives birds cannot pass on what they learn about crashing into barriers they failed to see. Like the birds, humans also crash into unexpected and unseen barriers. Unlike the birds, many of us attempt to pass on our learning to those we love and those less experienced. Our attempts to pass on warnings about barriers are, unfortunately, only irregularly successful. Both parents and teachers discover the difficulty of passing on lessons about anticipating barriers.
The geography of each life is bordered by barriers both self-imposed and imposed. Some of those barriers, like addictive habits, are visible, but we still bang into them. Some are invisible and are an inevitable consequence of limited experience, distraction, or ignorance.
Every place on our planet presents us with some limiting barrier: Ebola in tropical Africa, landslides in hilly areas, floods in valleys, heat events in summer and cold events in winter, droughts, torrential rains, tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tornadoes, hurricanes, tropical storms, lightning, sinkholes, forest and grass fires, rip currents, falling coconuts, mold in the hay, trips down the steps—name a place, and I’ll cite the limiting barrier.
It is our finiteness that is the ultimate barrier, and it is one we fly toward from birth, never really knowing when we will encounter the glass. Along the way those more experienced attempt to tell us about the folly of flying toward appearance and reflection without forethought. In our turn, we try to pass along the knowledge we have garnered from less than fatal collisions with idyllic reflections from hard surfaces. But the young birds, the unthinking birds, the unrealistic birds keep crashing headfirst into the glass.
This finite life is not a practice for another go-round. Imposing barriers on ourselves adds limitations that can, like the windows of my house that interrupt the flight of birds, halt the flow of our lives or even end them. The key to successful and effective living is to anticipate those barriers, to be smarter than the birds.
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