Kind Eyes

September 7, 2024 3:08 PM

For as long as I can remember, I have always loved taking walks. I'm not sure if it's the calmness of natures silence or my desperate need to wholly embrace the company of self, whatever the case, I have always loved taking walks.

On my many walks, I would always see trees and flowers of various kinds in varying conditions. I always appreciated their subtle beauty and marvelled at some of the trees and their monolithic and sometimes humble sizes.

“I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery—air, mountains, trees, people. I thought, "This is what it is to be happy."

― Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar

A few days ago I was reading on the practice of observing without judgment and the more I read, the more I began to see the disparity of human observance, how we look upon nature so differently to the way we look upon ourselves.

In its imperfection, all nature is imperfectly perfect. How easy it is to look at the crooked tree and see only the artistic beauty behind how it twists and turns, how it curves as it stretches out to follow the sunlight in a dance that can only be attributed to nature’s artistry.

"And so I practice turning people into trees. Which means appreciating them just the way they are.”

― Ram Dass

So much like trees, not everyone got the same measure of sunlight, or to sprout in-kind soils, or to grow where the waters are bountiful, or to know the kindness of a gaze filled with awe at their beauty.

So when you look at all men as you do tree's, you won't say "Why are you like this?" or "You’re too this," you will merely accept them for who they are and in doing so, will embrace the true beauty of humanity, that in our vast diversity, we are imperfectly perfect.

That our beauty is expressed by our diversity, that with each distinct difference we are set apart from the next and defined as beautiful, as perfect and not merely a semblance of perfection.