Being and Doing

Maybe some people 'are' and some people 'do'. There's a message as we grow up that we need to be 'doing'. If we are not 'doing' we are being lazy and idle. But when we look at those who 'do', most are either interfering into everyone else's life or trying to rule the world.

"If everyone thought as you do," I was often told as a child and young person, "nothing would ever be done." My thought in reply was, "But what has been done by those who do thoughtlessly instead of thinking first?"

People rush thither and yon, always having to be busy, always having to take command of someone else, always having to meet deadlines or be at work on time, or get home on time, or fill the quiet hours with doing. And people have damaged the land, the animals, the trees and nature and caused havoc all over the place with our doing. Walk past a field of sheep and see that they are doing what they do without the need to do it. They just run when they feel like running, chew when they feel like chewing, stare when they feel like staring. Walk through a forest of trees and see how ancient they are, how they withstand the storms and the summer sun, how they don't give a damn for who is making silly rules about what we can and cannot do. Look at Nature and see how even when we try to crush all growth, the weeds still just work their way to the sun through the cracks in the pavement.

I'm not advocating inertia or suggesting that humanity needs only to stand as still as trees or spend our lives chewing grass, but it seems that the rest of creation knows what it is about and only humanity stands apart because we have forgotten that we are here to be before we are here to do. What needs to be done is being done by a far greater hand than ours. When we wake up to being, like the flowers wake up to the morning sunlight, rather than waking up to a day 'at the office' or another day of drudgery, we will truly be co-creators with the Divine.

Like the wonderful Davies poem:

What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.

No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.

No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.

No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.

No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.

A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.