Life is Many Journeys

Life is a journey and, if we're lucky, it is also many journeys, each of which takes us out of whatever safe haven we have created for ourselves into something exciting and new and then brings us back again. When we return, we are the same and yet, we are more than we were. As if we had discovered some part of ourselves that had always been there but that we hadn't been aware of.

I went on a journey like that. I didn't intend to or even know it was possible. I was just cruising along, enjoying my life, enjoying my work, trying to stay out of trouble, which wasn't too hard because I was content. Kind of humming through my life. Not really paying attention or giving anything much thought because everything was pretty easy. And it seemed like everybody around me was mostly doing the same. Just cruising. And then one day, I was talking to a man and all of a sudden I realized that he was paying attention. He was really listening. He was thinking about what I said, what he said. He was talking and acting deliberately.
It was as if everyone else, including me, was sleepwalking and he was awake and standing there looking at me. It woke me up. I started paying attention. And I learned.