Today I turned on the
radio to hear an old song sung slowly and
sensitively by a wonderful though unnamed
artist. It moved me to ponder each line, each
word, each syllable as never before. That song
was Both Sides Now, by the artist Joni
Mitchell:
Bows and flows of angel
hair
And ice cream castles in the air,
And feather canyons everywhere,
I've looked at clouds that way.
But now they only block the sun,
They rain and snow on everyone.
So many things I would have done,
But clouds got in my way.
I've looked at clouds from both sides now,
From up and down and still somehow
It's clouds' illusions I recall;
I really don't know clouds at all.
Moons and Junes and ferris wheels,
The dizzy dancing way you feel,
When every fairy tale comes real,
I've looked at love that way.
But now it's just another show,
You leave 'em laughing when you go.
And if you care, don't let them know,
Don't give yourself away.
I've looked at love from both sides now,
From give and take and still somehow
It's love's illusions I recall;
I really don't know love at all.
Tears and fears and feeling proud,
To say "I love you" right out loud,
Dreams and schemes and circus crowds,
I've looked at life that way.
But now old friends are acting strange,
They shake their heads, they say I've changed.
Well something's lost but something's gained,
In living every day.
I've looked at life from both sides now,
From win and lose and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall;
I really don't know life at all.
It really is true that
when we reflect on life, we often recognize our
current perspective as quite different from the
actual experiences we lived through, enjoyed, or
even immortalized in song or on videotape. Just
when we think we know something for sure, we
realize we do not know it at all. After years of
disillusionment in love, for example, many
people give up and live without a significant
partner. They can't bear getting hurt again, but
they also eliminate any possibility of feeling
the rapture of an open heart that experiencing
love can offer. Warmth and tenderness are but
two faces to our many-faceted human nature.
Anger, rejection and spitefulness also dwell
within, even though we might not like or even
acknowledge them. They are known as our shadow
elements. What we like about ourselves and what
we do not both exist within us. Looking at life
from both sides allows us to mature and grow
from witnessing ourselves being stretched
between ecstatic and painful experiences and
emotions.
Looking at life from both
sides means we stand back and observe the
observable, hopefully in a nonjudgmental
fashion. We see the light, we acknowledge the
shadows. It is from both sides that we gain
perspective, balance and most importantly
integration. Life is not black and white, nor
are clouds, nor is love. Nothing in our world is
that static. We live life on the fulcrum,
constantly balancing give and take, win and
lose, up and down, joy and pain. If we plunge to
any extreme with the hope of remaining there, we
are bound to be disappointed. Life itself does
not have the power to disappoint us however,
only our illusions about life can do this. We
can choose to recall certain poignant moments,
but they may prove to be illusory when we
examine them more carefully. Two people involved
in a swept-away romance are both going to
experience rapture perhaps, but would describe
that experience quite differently. Two siblings
will remember a parent or a family event on
their own unique terms. Who is right? Who has
the final say on the nature of experience?
We all possess our own
version of reality, our own life experience.
None of us is right or wrong, though we ARE
responsible for personal choices which lead us
into complex relationships with others. We
always possess free will, though at our most
challenging times, it certainly might not feel
that way! If our job is in jeopardy or our lover
is about to leave us, we don't tend to see
ourselves as co-participants in that particular
relationship. We feel victimized and helpless.
It is perhaps at such junctures that it seems
like another person is exerting their will over
us. Yet we do have choices, no matter how
helpless we feel. One choice is to surrender.
With our back to the wall, surrendering to
Divine Will might be our best option. Wound up
in our own human drama and lacking a grander
perspective, perhaps the best we can do is to
pray for peace.
We can try to see both
sides, though in the heat of emotional upheaval
we might fail more often than we succeed. But
inevitably once the dust clears, we will find
ourselves reflecting. The act of reflection
allows us to perceive more angles, more sides to
an issue. Instead of trying to isolate and pin
down life like a physicist trying to pin down an
atom in a particle accelerator (and the more he
tries, the faster it travels), we can take time
to reflect and observe and learn from our
interactions and choices. We can look at
life from both sides and, in the process,
surrender to the wonder of it all.
