| Following the Signs |
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| Ceri Balston | |
| Wednesday, 22 February 2006 | |
"For all the advantages that our science has brought us, we have lost the language through which the world can speak to us, the language of omens, symbols, and signs." Steven Karcher My laptop had been behaving very badly for a while so I decided it was time to reformat and reinstall, not a nice job but at necessary at times. Everything went smoothly until I realised that the backup of my Outlook data file was corrupt - yep I lost all my emails, contacts, tasks, calendar... I wasn't a happy bunny. I had just about got over that disappointment when a few days later, during a particularly fierce Joburg storm my laptop made a scary crackling sound and promptly died. There was no fading red light or haunting nursery rhyme singing like HAL in 2001, it was just crackle... and silence. Luckily it's quite a new laptop and so was covered by the warrantee, after getting over my not quite so happy bunny mood, again, I packed it up and took it in for repairs. I dusted down my old PC that I keep lying around for moments like these so at least I wouldn't have to resort to the old quill and ink business. However, only five minutes after booting up, and without any dramatic crackle this time, it too died... It's very easy to get frustrated at times like this and I have to admit that my mood wasn't particularly great. What I did finally realise though, after my backup PC died, that I was being given a pretty big sign, I saw it like this - One of my problems, and I've known this for a while, is that I'm addicted to checking my emails. I work from home and so it's all too easy to wander past my desk and have a quick sneak at my inbox. Looking back I realise that I was not giving myself a chance to relax, even sleeping was a problem, I never seemed to wake up refreshed or felt full of energy after a relaxing weekend, and my stomach was showing all the signs of stress. Having finally twigged that all my computer issues were pointing towards something beyond simple bad luck I decided that from now on I would turn off my computer at the end of the working day and over the during weekends. My last weekend was just wonderful and I actually got back to work on Monday feeling refreshed. The time I had with no computer to work on at all gave me the opportunity to think about the language of signs and as far as I can see there are three huge problems with them. The first - you've got to notice them, second - you've got to work out what they mean, third - you've got to work out what you're going to do about them. Let's take a quick look at one of the most well known examples of spotting a sign and then doing something about it, the birth of Jesus and the three wise men. The three wise men, being the learned fellows that they were quickly realised that the new star in the sky meant that something pretty auspicious was going on and thought they'd better check it out. How simple was that, they managed to tackle all three problems, spot the sign "Wow, look at that new star", work out what it meant "The King of Man has just been born", and then do something about it, "Let's pack up our camels, get some suitable offerings and pay our respects". If only it was always that simple. I guess that understanding the language of signs is one of the challenges that life holds for all of us and is part of the process of becoming wise. In 'The Alchemist' Paulo Coelho explains that to read the signs and omens we must live in the moment and listen to our hearts, only then will we be able to penetrate the Soul of the World and understand the Universal Language through which it speaks. It takes enormous courage to truly listen to what our heart is telling us and then even more to acknowledge it and take the required action. It's not an easy road to follow. I was chatting about this topic with a friend of mine the other day, retelling in all the gory detail what I had been experiencing. I liked his response; "If you don't notice the sign the first time the hammer will get bigger and it will keeping knocking harder and get bigger until you take notice. The key is to spot the hammer before it's so big that things start to break". |
This is the powerful story of the author's struggle with Multiple Sclerosis and how a healer's unusual prescription of mindful altruism - to 'give away 29 gifts in 29 days' - ignited her energy, her happiness, and invited more abundance into her life.
