I had such a remarkable experience last week, at the start of the third day of attempting to perform a quick half hour computer/internet task. (You know, the kind which would only take a few minutes, except that this time it's not quite working and just needs this other little tweak done first, and then you discover that there is a yet anther thing that needs to be done to make the tweak work, but it refuses to work so you need to look up the solution which arbitrarily all of a sudden requires a reinstall, and two and a half days later you find yourself still trying to get things in place so you can do the quick half hour thing!)
We often say—and believe what we say—that we have no choice in certain matters. However, I believe that it's more accurate to say that at times one particular choice is, well, so much more choicier than others, so as to seem that there is no question. Although in reality we do have rather more choices than we've thought of, and things seem somehow easier to do when we have chosen to do them rather than feeling forced to. I was aware that I certainly did have the choice to tell my client that I'm not going to sell them this particular photograph, but my desire for them to be able to enjoy the one they loved, utterly outweighed the techno-frustration that unexpectedly resulted through their order.
Life has a wonderful balance in all things—if we're open to notice and receive it—and so it's natural that an unexpected choice gift was also to be had through this experience.
Waking up on the third day and realising that I had at least another few hours of frustratingly should-be-unnecessary problem-solving computer work ahead of me, I felt really, really irritated! I thought to myself "I could be doing anything I wish with my day: walk through the forest for a swim in the stream, read a book, make grape jam... and instead, now I'm going to sit all day, and even worse, sit at a computer!" Following from that thought, I suddenly felt that future-memory of how it would feel to have solved the challenge, and the next thought that flashed through my mind took me quite by surprise: "This is what I wish to do with my day." And in that moment, the tension in my body relaxed into that wonderful mix of comfortable, confident excitement as I looked forward to proceeding with what a moment ago had been an unwelcome element of my day.
Everything was the same. Except for how I chose to view it. And how that made me feel. Which changed my entire experience of exactly the same thing to a rather more enjoyable one. As it turned out, a few more external obstacles cropped up, but instead of feeling frustration I found myself laughing at the irony, content to patiently find ways to work around them, which I did eventually, and with a far more satisfying sense of glee than is reasonable to expect from a mere order!
This photograph of a waterblommetjie under the surface of a pond with the under-reflection of itself seemed a fitting metaphoric illustration for the experience of being open to choosing a different point of view which may be more pleasant than our usual, obvious, one.