We need them both if we are to live any kind of full life. At times our curiosity is so intense that we simply must have that closer look, that peering into areas not easily seen - to bring the distant view up close. At other times, we need to save our sanity by looking the other way. Knowing we cannot change what is happening right before our eyes but also not having the intestinal fortitude to watch it, we purposely set our emotional virtual blinders to narrow and trudge ahead.
Either of these approaches can also be abused and cause us to suffer in the opposite directions of our intended use of the binoculars or blinders. An extreme of the need to see more, to bring the distant or hidden view close, could morph into the tendency to become a Peeping Tom. The abuse of the blinders can result in our stepping over and around the wounded of our society and not bending to help where we are needed.
The balancing act is hard to pull off and over a lifetime, we often fail to manage it .
A new acquaintance on the golf course yesterday seemed a pleasant enough fellow. Seemed like someone whose easy-going company I could enjoy, for that day's round and maybe future golf outings. But his need to talk out loud about politics, beginning with a veiled racial slur, ruined it all. And this man revealed a devotion to blinders to a degree I didn't realize was possible. He actually said that if I thought Bush had been bad for the country, that apparently I had been watching something he wasn't aware of. My friend stopped us before we came to blows!
This warped and weird conversation took place within a few hours of my having learned of the death of my older brother back in Kentucky. It was some of that same kind of blind and uneducable approach that this particular brother exhibited, the reason, I suppose, that we were not close. Many other factors were involved, but this one thought struck me of the way blinders can prevent cordial fellowship among folks - even siblings.
Happy Halloween!
Sorry to hear about the loss of your brother. Obviously, you weren't close, but it's still a loss and reminds us of our own mortality.
ReplyDeleteI am also astounded at the overwhelming blindness some people have to the obvious. It's almost unfathomable. I've been treating on it quite a bit lately.