So today in the car park (parking lot) I was in a little bit of a hurry. There was no need for me to be in a hurry but sometimes (always) this is just my default setting. I have often found myself, after getting home from a hectic journey, where I have overtaken slower drivers, after near tailgating them for miles, cutting in front of people, passing traffic lights on a very late amber, to be sitting at home, staring at the wall, for all of the ten minutes I have saved (if that), just unwinding from the stress of being so impatient. What I am trying to convey is that I often rush for no real reason, and that it what was happening in this car park.
There is a system in our town whereby you get 2 hours free parking but you must get a ticket to display, so they can monitor how long you've been there. On walking across the car park to the ticket machine I noticed there was a lady on her way to the same destination. I could paint for you a kind of spaghetti western type scenario where there is a close up of our eyes and a whiplash camera effect back to the machine and then back to our narrowing eyes (and mean expressions) before we break out into a run to be there first. The reality was a lot more sedate than that. But I knew she knew. I knew she was thinking what I was thinking and I quickened my pace. I am British after all, and a run would be so undignified. Besides, I didn't want it to be that obvious that I was trying to beat her. I just wanted to make sure that I actually did, in a non-confrontational manner. I was slightly ahead of her anyway and the natural advantage was mine. If she wanted to get there first she was going to have to be the one to break decorum.
Sure enough, I arrived first and pushed the button just before she drew level with me. To write about this incident is to blow it out of all proportion. It is something that I would usually give hardly any thought to. But, in the few seconds it took for the ticket to print, I had a moment of sanity. I thought, 'I am not in a rush, really, am I?' And, as I resolutely refused to make eye contact, for the embarrassment that any acknowledgement of my selfishness would bring, I decided to give her the ticket that was printing out.
I have no idea what this lady was thinking, but I imagined that, to her, I looked like the sort of heartless self serving queue jumper that would do whatever was necessary to ensure my own needs were met. I think that I might look quite sullen, a little aggressive and maybe a little rough around the edges. But when I plucked the ticket from the machine and simply handed it to her without a word, with just a little hint of a smile, her face lit up and she was disproportionately grateful for the few extra seconds I had just given her.
But the real kindness I had done, was to myself. Because, and this is the phenomena that I have found on other similar occasions, as I walked away, with my own ticket in hand, I began to well up a little. I felt genuinely warm inside, like the ice surface had just cracked and the warm caring emotional human being that had been trapped beneath it was able to breath again. And he was saying to me, 'where the hell have you been?? didn't you realise we were asphyxiating beneath all that self interest?!'
On so many occasions like this, a simple act of kindness has reconnected me to this sense of humanity that I had all but forgotten. For some reason, call it God, if you will, I am so touched by the good that I can do, if I choose to, that it makes me feel alive again.
As I walked through town I began seeing people properly again. I felt acutely aware of our shared vulnerability and our need to be understood and helped. That, beneath the prickly veneer, we are all in need of love, however it manifests itself. The warm feeling is still with me now, an hour or two afterwards.
And just when I sat down to write this, I remembered the bible gateway bible verse (that I get sent daily by email) from just yesterday;
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
Philippians 2:3-4
And I remember that when driving, how nice it is, when other people let me out of a junction, or give way and I remember how I feel when I do those things for others. I know I am not going to change the world by improving my habits but I can make it a better place, even if momentarily, for those I help. And in doing so I am doing my own soul some good too. And it is almost effortless to do so.
The problem I find is that in the same journey I may let some one out and then cut someone else up. The difference between these opposite actions comes down to one thing, and one thing only. It depends on what I chose to do. If there is going to be any consistency I need to rewire my neural pathways by repeatedly looking to the interests of others and that takes grace, yes, and Gods help, but it also requires my making a choice. I hope to remember this. No, I choose to remember it.
