Glances

...I haven't shared anything on here for a long time, which has several reasons.. And somehow the longer the silence, the harder it is to continue writing.. But today I really felt the urge to write again, sometimes inspiration does knock on my door unexpectedly... :)

When I went to my former church some weeks ago, I think it was only for one reason. At least in backsight.. I had to be there that Sunday to hear one specific sentence that was bound to confront me with something big. At the end of the service the pastor spoke a blessing, which happens in many churches, and I've heard a LOT of these sending-you-out-for-the-week-blessings. But this one struck me. Or, to be more exact, one of the sentences totally collided with my inside.

"May God bless you ...... so that others feel comfortable under your view."

For some reason that was the ultimate WAKING UP moment of the entire morning - I have no idea what the rest of the Sunday was about... It struck me. I know a lot about how I'm supposed to act, what I'm supposed to think, or what I'm allowed to think...I know many of the lines that I'm not supposed to cross - for my own good - that I do cross on a regular basis and then feel miserable about it. But somehow I had NEVER - in all my 18 years of reflecting things down to the microscopic level of the case - spent a thought on what my face looks like what I look at people...and, going down to the root of this, I never really thought about the fact that a glance, my eyes - your eyes, OUR eyes - put our judgement right there on the table, black on white.

Judgement.

Another one of those bad bad words - no, of course I don't judge others... x)) I do. But somehow I always thought that people wouldn't exactly see this. I don't know why I never spent a thought on it. The larger thought, however, was leading me into a different direction. The opposite direction, namely the reason the pastor said these words at all. The fact that we can do GOOD by the way we look at others. The truth that I don't even have to speak to encourage, to trigger a smile in someone's life. To love. Our eyes do the job for us...But how often do I walk through town, through school, through church, using my eyes only to observe, to suck in, to throw angry glances at injustice or totally lost gazes at people who might just be in need of a smile...?

The sentence encourages me. I feel like hardly anything in the past months has stayed with me as much as this. ...Basically, there are two options to every encounter: you either leave the person you met - with your eyes, or with your words - encouraged, or discouraged. Built up inside, or broken down a tiny bit more. I'm aware that not all our encounters SEEM that meaningful, that often things are totally superficial, or rushed, or merely without a lot of feelings - but it leaves some mark, no matter how small, you'll have an aftertaste of some sort after every encounter. And what I find amazingly ENCOURAGING, and it has actually made me happy, is that we have the ability, I could almost say the power, to do good in this drowning chaos every day. You don't need to go to your bank and send millions to Africa to be a benefactor. The glances you shower your world with are the beauty you are adding to it, or taking away...

I felt shocked at first, because I realized that perhaps people didn't feel comfortable under my usually rather critical, examining, *inwardly shaking my head because things are so lame* view.. :) Nowadays, somehow the sentence I heard that morning comes back to me like switching on a light every time I notice that someone seems to cringe and hide away after exchanging glances with me. I've started noticing reactions, they are like a mirror to what my face must be saying.. But more than that, I've been reminded that it's up to me to shine out into the world with loving glances, with eyes of acceptance, of understanding, maybe merely of interest and kindness....I've realized that a gigantic part of what we feel the atmosphere between us humans is, lies in the way we look at each other. And what our eyes are saying, without speaking a single word....

I want to start sowing self-consciousness into people's hearts, instead of showing them that I perhaps disagree with their personal taste - which is actually so irrelevant.. I want to encourage you to start spreading happiness with the way that your eyes rest on the individuals around you.... :) My experience is that I become happier myself, the reactions I get to a perhaps totally random yet honest "I am not your enemy but perhaps a potential friend"-glance at a stranger, gives me back so, so much....

:)