Heroes Not Zombies

This is one of the most unusual windows I’ve ever seen. I spotted it during a trip to Segovia, Spain a few years ago.
Have you ever looked through a window which has really old glass in it? The glass has structure and shape. It often has twists, curls or waves in it, so that whatever you are looking at through the window is completely changed by the window itself.

We are used to having factory produced smooth, “flawless” glass in our windows. It’s so unobtrusive that we don’t even really notice it at all. In fact, some places put red discs, or notices on the glass to stop people from trying to walk through it. But I like that older, hand-fashioned glass. Those patterns and shapes don’t seem like flaws to me, and I rather enjoy seeing the results of the creative fusion of whatever is on the other side of the glass, the glass itself, and my own act of observation. It reminds me just how actively creative perception is. Other wise I tend to think of it like a camera lens with the image of the “outside” cast precisely onto the screen after flipping upside down twice, once as it goes through the lens, then a second time, to “correct” it, as it passes through a prism. See, even that apparently more direct way of seeing, isn’t as direct as we first think, is it?

As well as reminding me of the active creative processes involved in perception, because it makes me more aware of myself as the viewing “subject”, I’m also reminded of how every one of us experiences the universe from our own unique perspective.

This particular window magnifies that idea for me. You could imagine that each of these circles is a unique lens through which a different person sees and experiences the world. Each one a bit different from the others. But, actually, all of the circles are connected……you see those connecting lines in the glass?

Because that’s a bit like how it is for us, isn’t it?

I view the world from this place of a “self”, whatever that is, this particular place which I cannot share with any other living being. No two of have identical experiences of what we perceive. We bring our unique memories, values, beliefs and imaginings to bear on it all. But that doesn’t mean we are completely separate looking at totally different worlds. We share a lot….we share a lot of atoms and molecules, we share time and space, we share stories, beliefs and traditions…..whatever we see and experience is not entirely disconnected from what others see, experience and feel, after all.

It’s a tricky one, that. It’s a constant dynamic balance, an integration of what’s different and what’s shared. Pretty amazing, huh?