Corner of Your Eye

Sometimes we do not see what is so plainly against the laws of goodness and fairness and equality in life.  We can walk past it, run over it and push through it without a conscious thought towards its unfair state.  It is only when we stop and stare at it that we finally see the pain it causes.

This may not make sense to a lot of people.  Indeed, they have most likely fallen victim to this idea that all is fair in love and war, but it’s not.  When you see the homeless man on the side of the street begging for food, what thoughts pass through your head?  Probably things like, “He deserves this,” or, “That’s just too bad.”  Maybe, if you are filled with compassion, you will pledge yourself to try and help people like him; however, this will almost immediately become like a New Year’s Resolution; something you would like to do, but without enough gumption to ever start.

It doesn’t even have to be someone who is so obviously struggling.  How about the married man who has lost his income, but is still trying to keep his family together?  This man may have it worse than the homeless man; for he must persevere for his family and be strong for those he loves despite the little hope that exists.  The struggle can make one lose faith and dignity, a terrible blow with defeat so near.

Whoever it is, we rarely take out the time to see and to feel the pain that they are going through.  In the first episode, of the first season of “Doctor Who” with Matt Smith as the Doctor, there is an alien hiding in a house with a simple cloaking device around the room he stays in.  The way the cloaking device works is that the room directs your attention slightly to the right or left of the door, thereby making it invisible.  The Doctor locates the room by looking out of the “corner of his eye.”  The subliminal message behind this episode is that one can see something that he/she hasn’t before, by simply paying attention in a different way.

This is a necessary part of life if the whole story is to be attained.  It has always been said that one must weigh and think and let ideas simmer on both sides to get the whole story.  If this is not done, then one group will think it is better than another and conflicts begin to arise.  A great way of explaining this comes from the book, Mountains Beyond Mountains, by Tracy Kidder.  Kidder’s book documents some of the great things that the protagonist, Paul Farmer, did while helping people from Haiti.  In one paragraph, Kidder explains Farmer’s use of the word comma:

     This was for me one of the first of many encounters with Farmer’s use of the word comma, placed at the end of a sentence.  It stood for the word that would follow the comma, which was asshole.  I understood he wasn’t calling me one – he would never do that; he was almost invariably courteous.  Comma was always directed at third parties, at those who felt comfortable with the current distribution of money and medicine in the world.  And the implication, of course, was that you weren’t one of those.  Were you? (Kidder, 24)

This explains the issue of a one-sided approach.  It is important to research both or all (for many issues are not double- but rather multi-sided) sides of a problem before creating any judgment whatsoever.

In the end, we must make a difference, however small, in changing some aspect of the world.  Even if it is changing someone’s belief, this change is one more step in the right direction.  Why, one might ask, is this so important?  One little change in attitude cannot make enough of a difference.  My answer is because we care.  We ought to care because it is right to care.  Comma.