Tower and Town, June 2017 (view the full edition)Clergy Letter: Is It All About Perspective?Is it all about perspective?
Love means to learn to look at yourself
The way one looks at distant things For you are only one thing among many. Czeslaw Milosz It is well-known that different people have different memories of one and the same event. Also, most of us will know the experience of going back to a place: it is often not the same as we remember it to be. One of the first times this occurred to me was when I went back to my old primary school. The classrooms, which I remembered to be gigantic, were suddenly very small. Probably because I had grown, and got used to larger spaces. Another interesting experience has been that I remember certain car journeys as sitting in the passenger seat on the right-hand side of a car, which must be incorrect as it was a UK car driving on UK roads. Yet, it is the only way I can remember them. Physically moving to a different place, or transitioning to a difference phase of our lives, puts things in a different perspective. Whether we like it, or not, we start to see things differently. Because we have made a change ourselves, suddenly familiar places may look less familiar and things we took for granted are now not so sure any longer. It can be a very discomforting and disorientating experience, but I think we all need to go through it from time to time to avoid getting stuck. Changing place means changing perspective, and it helps us to see ourselves in a different and better way. I am sure that I am not the only one who at times can get somewhat self-absorbed. Usually it happens when I have been stuck in the same routine for too long. When trivial details have become unsurpassable obstacles, and I have lost the ability to see and understand others around me. The paradox alluded to in Milosz' poem 'Love' (cited above) is at the heart of our human existence, and at the heart of the Christian faith. We only can start to realise who we truly are ourselves, our own significance, when we begin to understand our insignificance, or maybe better, the significance of others. Where the distant gaze and the intimate encounter meet, there we will start to see glimpses of God. In ourselves and in each other. We are only one thing among many, but the many would not be the same if I, or you, were missing. Janneke Blokland |