So there’s this guy, and he says to another guy: Didn’t I meet you in St Louis?
And the second guy says: No, I’ve never been to St Louis
And the first guy says, Yeah, me neither. It must have two other guys
It’s important to know where you are, you know? where you’ve been, where you’re going. Presumably, That’s one of the reasons we’re here today. But it’s not so easy to actually figure that out. To find yourself, you really have to actively look for yourself. Track yourself. Become aware of your route, altitude, speed, and direction. Ask yourself: how did I get here? Is this the right road? For that, you’re going to need a really good map.
But teacher, I already have a map. True enough. I’m pretty sure that you’ve been following a navigational chart in which everything that has come before today, the trek through essays and equations and games and performances, has led you to this solid black line on the map: the border to THE FUTURE. And, the familiar lexicon of graduation ceremonies and Graded mythology says that “your suitcase is all packed with the knowledge and skills you’ll need to make a successful border crossing .” In fact, you have actually recited this travel itinerary to me and your other teachers many many times in the past few years: First I’m going to get on diploma track for 2.0 years, travelling at 95 gpa and add SAT or cursinho prep class fuel so I can cruise into college in the restricted lane where I will study for 4.0 years then take exit to graduate school and stay straight for 3.0 years before that road dumps me right into the road to a job in .01 minutes and then: Arriving at destination.
As if your life could be lived by google driving directions.
As a teacher, I like that map. Your parents love that map. You have internalized that map. But it’s more of an aerial view, you know? Not a map that’s meant to guide you meter by meter. moment by moment.. Not an antique treasure map that you rigidly follow to find a fixed red X. In 2015, I think you know, the map you need is more interactive, more like WAZE, which gives you constant updates, route options, and doesn’t keep saying: you missed a turn, you missed a turn, you missed a turn.
So I’d like to change the scale of this map from the very large: your whole life, to the very small: This moment. I don’t think of this moment as the boundary between your entire past and your entire future any more than I think of any other moment in those terms.
Isn’t every moment a moment between the past and future?
Let’s map this moment right now. right now. Well, it’s actually not right now anymore. It’s now. No, it’s now. As soon as we name it, it’s gone, into the past. Moments are slippery, hard to chart as you whizz by, hard to notice or remember that we were even there. Because much of the time, we weren’t really there, we were just passing through, tourists in our own lives.
One of the students in my mindfulness study said, after a 5 minute meditation: wow. I never knew I had any other state besides being really busy or being asleep. That’s a state I’m hoping you’ll visit more often. I’m hoping you move there. Most of the time the state of just Being, doesn’t even show up on our maps, which are only the maps of the country of DOING.
So look out the window for a minute. Get your bearings.. Feel yourself breathe. This moment is beautiful, expansive, has its own dimensions, its own value, its own scenic attractions. It’s not just a highway marker on the side of the road to somewhere else. What’s happening in this moment?: Is your foot asleep? Is your stomach churning? Are you feeling nostalgic? overwhelmed? bored? In the moment the way is fluid.: in the moment you can love fiercely, learn deeply, open your heart to getting it broken, laugh, sweat for something ; you can maneuver in the moment. I want you to be truly happy, which we know comes from living an engaged life, not just a pleasant one. It comes from tuning in and not tuning out. I don’t want you to wonder, when you’ve arrived at that destination that you plugged into your mental GPS years earlier, what happened to those millions of moments along the way.
So, there’s this problem: you have two different maps, one for the overall journey and one for the moment. In order to not just be a leaf on the wind, living randomly, in order to get somewhere, you need to plot a destination and move in that direction. But in moving in that direction you collapse the possibilities of other destinations, like electron positions in the quantum world. In plotting that destination, you create a map in which many beautiful places become just flyover country, a bathroom and a pao de queijo on the way to Maresias, not places in themselves.
So, how to balance doing and being, moving forward and appreciating stillness?
As I see it, there are 3 pretty good ways to map out your future while still living in the present.
1) Don’t fear the desvio,
the dreaded orange sign with the big black arrow that pushes you off the main road into winding alleyways or some isolated country track far from the sight of the freeway. There is knowledge off of the main roads too. In the middle ages, some sailors must not have heeded the warnings to stay within the boundaries of the known world. Although the corners of their maps were filled with menacing drawings of fantastical monsters, labelled “here be dragons” they went there anyway, found the dragons, classified them, named them manatees, and narwhals, orcas and volcanic islands.
2) Share the road
It’s easy to think that you’re the only one on a journey, the only one following a map, that somehow everything else is just background highlighting your moving blue dot on the screen. But that background is actually other people, on their own journeys, with their own itineraries.
So next time you’re stuck in traffic, think about it from another perspective. You are not stuck in traffic; you are traffic You might be the obstacle blocking someone else’s journey.
3) Don’t get stuck on a dead end route
Neuroscience tells us loud and clear that whatever thoughts and behaviors you practice will be the thoughts and behaviors your brain defaults to. There is a literal map in your brain of the tracks and roads of your mind. The superhighway of a bad habit gets harder and harder to exit off of. Use your compass--you have one, inside, built right into your human hardwiring-- Use it in the moment to make a different choice. Update your map. Enter new coordinates, and recalculate.
I guess what I’m trying to say to this crazy, anarchic, frustratingly lovable class, is I hope you can map the overall arc of your journey without losing the freedom of the moment. And without dragging along a trailer full of toxic cargo that you have clearly outgrown. To really know the landscape, to find the treasure that is your meaningful life, you need to be both the explorer and the cartographer. If you do this, you will not lose your way. Then, wherever you go, there you are.
Bon voyage!
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