Transport Money
Which Way Shall We Go?
“The world reveals itself to those who travel on foot.”
The above stunner of a quote emerged from the lips of Werner Herzog, a German filmmaker, and I have, as a student of cinema, taken it to heart. It has been a real treat to stroll along long distances and take it all in, the beauty of the world and the story it tells, albeit subtle.
There is an appreciation for every small detail, every notch in a tree bark, every runner and creeper across trees, the whole lot. I definitely do not have to enjoy all this because I’m broke. I really like walking. I mean who wants to be in an air-conditioned car with an armrest, headrest, any kind of rest?
Not me. This is a “despite” situation, not a “because” situation.
Yeah.
It is in the throes of my compulsory exercise over the past few weeks, that I have discovered the beauty of a long road and all it can offer.
Open spaces. There’s a particular road that opens up into an empty parking lot and every time I get into that space, I do, shamelessly of course, my imitation of the “boy dancing in the club” meme. Emphasis on shameless. The reason I do this, besides the fact that it feels really good to dance unhindered, is for the burst of energy that fills me up. This implies there’s a need to, doesn’t it?
I believe this need expands to other facets of the human experience. We are, by the crudest of definitions, empty, starving, with a lack of knowledge, of love, of tools to really understand the world we’ve been dumped in to explore and, since we only experience the world through our eyes (empathy can only go so far), the lack of the previously stated creates unimaginable inner turmoil. After all, all our lives are experienced with us at the center of every recollection, even if the event doesn’t revolve around us.
It takes a lot of intention to create a self not immersed in the idea that the world is created for and centered around it. If successful, you ascend into a new plane of human experience, so rich that you start to channel a different level of love and life and, of course, dance in parking lots too.
Yeah, you evolve into me.
Lucky you.
Anyways, all of these boils down to one word, perspective. The way we see the world, that is, the only way we can, without evolving. Perspective, for me, also means intentional focus on details that make you, you. I’m reminded of something from my earlier days. Growing up, I used to have a y-shaped thing floating in my vision. I turned and rotated, blinked off, but it was always there, floating. I even looked into lights to get rid of it, nothing. So it stayed, and everyone I talked to, had this thing floating about on their faces, distracting me every single time. This was how I saw the world, my perspective. Y-shaped object on faces.
I hadn’t seen it in a while, but it came back for a reunion tour two weeks ago.
Yeah, just a thought.
There’s a note of surety in Werner’s quote, especially with the choice of the word “reveal”. To reveal would imply, in this context, that we need to search, and that it is a delightful experience to do so, because the reward isn’t only discovering the world but also, the chance to pick up other things on the unpredictable path we chart.
If only I could find some transport money on this path. *Ife weeps, internally screaming in despair. So delightful, isn’t it?
There’s a song that I feel describes, in peak efficiency, the power of perspective. It is titled Little Room, the sixth song off the album released in 2001 by The White Stripes, White Blood Cells. Jack White croons while his wife at the time, Meg White, drums awkwardly; “When you’re in a little room, and you’re working on something good, but if it’s really good, you’re gonna need a bigger room. And when you’re in a bigger room, you might not know what to do, you might have to think of, how you got started, in your little room.”
A lot of people feel a loss of that inner creative wildfire as they progress in that search for their personal truth and with nostalgia amplifying that loss by a thousand percent, they start to yearn for what they felt when they were supposedly doing this for only them.
So remember, as you evolve, to do the things that fill your empty spaces, because if you do, you’ll never have to reach back into how you felt in your little room.
