When unpleasantly surprised, stay calm

The City of Richland has been landscaping in front of my office. They removed several trees and plan to plant some new ones in different spots on the breezeway I look out onto.

After they removed the old trees, they poured concrete into the 3 by 3 foot spaces the old trunks occupied. However, safety and watching out for the public’s best interest weren’t highest priority the day this all happened. They put no barriers, signs, or barricades around the newly poured concrete. No warning whatsoever.

As I ate my lunch, I looked out my window and watched a middle-aged woman tromp down the breezeway gripping a sewing machine case to her chest, doing all she could to hold herself together with such a heavy load.

Oblivious to the ground her feet traveled, she stomped through the wet concrete. Plomp, plomp, she went, in one side of a square and out the other, sinking 4 inches into the gritty mud.

I went out to help her and explain the situation. A bit confused and bemused by her surprise plodding through concrete, she asked who to call to have her footprints filled in. I answered her questions, and she was safely on her way.

After she left, I scrounged up some makeshift tools and fixed it myself, and gleaned the experience for a spiritual lesson.

I thought about how this lady assumed the walkway would be safe to tread without taking thought for what her feet may find along the way. She did not watch the path before her because she trusted it would be clear.

We learn to take certain conditions and relationships for granted through experience too. We trust friends to be there for us. We expect our spouse to understand. We expect our children will do the right thing. We expect health to be permanent. But then, a friend fails us, or our spouse doesn’t understand, our children make a mistake, or health wanes. We might start to wonder, “What happened?”

The lady who walked through the concrete certainly stopped and asked, “What happened?” while shaking cement off her shoes. But she handled the mini-crisis well, quickly shedding despair and looking for a way to fix the mess she had made. She didn’t blame anyone. She stayed calm and totally relaxed.

This woman set a high moral example for others to follow.

And she left the scene in fine shape. Even her shoes were okay.

We too, I thought, don’t need to get upset and angry when met by unpleasant surprises. There's always a remedy to whatever problem we face. The sooner we stay calm, listen for divine guidance and act with love, the quicker harmony is restored and events brought back to normal.

I believe we all have our moments when we learn that events, relationships and circumstances are not always reliable in this world. They are temporal, and take on a temporal nature.

So, to preserve our sanity, confidence and hope, we turn from earth to heaven—from the temporal to the eternal—and find Life in Spirit where there are no traps to catch us by surprise. God sees, knows and guides every footstep we take and keeps us on a safe path. This is a truth we can trust.