We Thirst, so We Dug A Well

I’m sitting on a meditation Zoom call, in the garden. A brilliant blue Steller's Jay lands in the empty granite pond and cocks it’s head like they do, looking for water. Turning off my laptop camera, I get up to fetch the hose. I’m moved to tears. A few days ago, a dear loved one slid into homelessness, and my heart is blown open. What is this human tendency to only fully enter another’s suffering when it hits home? I’m very attuned, in this moment, to all those who may struggle to find food, water, safety and shelter. As a child I remember wondering, why does my father’s suffering affect me so deeply, but the suffering of a random man at the grocery store does not? 

Immediacy opens the heart and may it not close, may it never close. The same can be said about joy, I suppose. When someone we love dearly is given a tremendous fortune, say they buy a house or have a baby—we’re overjoyed for them, when it’s a complete stranger, not so much. Our joys, our sorrows, come back to the I: preferences, desires, me and mine. What if the whole world is ours? What if? 

Because it is. This is what I’m realizing. The only way I can be so wide, spacious and free is with the support of my spiritual practice and my community. Everyone deserves such support—the Steller's Jay, my dear beloved ones, the stranger in the grocery store. We all need friends on the path of life, looking out for one another. May we remember:

The whole world is ours, from the smallest grass to the wide blue sky. If we see a joy, may we rejoice. If we see someone thirsting, may we get up and dig a well.

The practice of mindfulness is the clear lens through which I see. Only when I stop and look with eyes that are awake and undisturbed, can I see what is beyond me. Perhaps, even see that life is never just about me and mine. The whole world belongs to me. As my loved one stumbles through his pain and sorrow, he is like a domino, touching here, touching there. May Bodhisattvas near and far help stop the momentum, see him as the whole world—the smallest grass to the wide blue sky. As a community, may we feel the thirst, and help dig a well.