Saying Nothing

I haven't placed anything on these pages since my Thought For The Week last Sunday, I see - and now it's Saturday evening.  It hasn't been because there's been nothing to record, so much as because I haven't found myself able to find the words or the impetus to record it.  Actually, it's been quite a busy week, but maybe too busy to be well documented - since the time's not been there for me to have reflected properly on all the week has contained, and on the issues it's raised.

One thing I would say:  perspective is all.  How many of the problems of our world would be eased, if not solved, if we were able to find and make the time - and the space - just to step back a little, reflect, try to see what it looks like from the other person's point of view.  And maybe also make a proper assessment of how green the grass really is on the other side of the fence from where we're standing.

Next week will, if anything, be even busier and certainly more jumbled than this one has been.  There are some big issues to face, some meetings I'm approaching quite warily.  I'll not rush into reporting the week;  in fact I hope I won't be rushing (or rushed) into anything.  Too many mistakes have been made over the years, by my wanting to hurry things along, force the issue, take more than I'm due, stop my ears to the stuff I don't want to hear.  The call before me (and all of us, frankly) is to live in the real world . . . not the version I (or you) have created or desired, but the real one we'll only see and understand when we take the time to step back and take stock.

Nonetheless, we must do that purposefully, and with a real intention to act on what we discover and come to understand when we have taken the time to get things into focus.  Rushing into things and acting on prejudice or on half-formed ideas can do a huge amount of damage - but so can procrastination, the woffling discussions and futile argument that scaredycats and fence-sitters substitute for true involvement.  As is so often the case in life, there is a middle way that is the right way.  So I hope I'll find that middle way in the events and encounters of next week . . . it occurs to me that sometimes, when what you hear or see isn't to your taste, the vital thing is just that you take or make enough time for the initial emotional upheaval to die down - so that when you do come to act or decide you're dealing with, and informed by, the facts and feasibilities, and not just the feelings and fears.