Driving home from work today I had a humorous experience of myself that is worth repeating here.
Navigating the road on a gloomy afternoon, I came upon a metallic grey vehicle that was travelling towards me in the opposite direction.
Blending into the silvery gravel of the road, I struggled to see it clearly as it approached from a distance.
Noticing immediately that the driver did not have on their lights, I thought it best to flash them with my high beams so as to alert them to their oversight.
Feeling like I had performed an important civic duty, I came to a stop at a set of lights that had moments before turned red.
Looking to my dashboard as an afterthought, I observed that my own lights were not activated.
Dumbfounded by this occurrence I moved to turn them on and they readily worked.
Wondering why they had not turned themselves on automatically as they were designed to do, it hit me like a ton of bricks that my lights were not the problem.
Having on my dark tinted sunglasses since I started my journey, I laughed to myself at the joke being on me.
Taking them off my face, everything appeared as normal for that time in the afternoon.
Enlivened by the sun's rays, I looked around at all of the other cars on the road with their lights turned off and felt like a fool for acting so self-righteously.
Attuned to my error, I came to see its inherent value.
Teaching of the wisdom of awareness and humility, I learned a lesson that I needed to be taught at that time.
Paying only the small price of private embarrassment I was very grateful for having escaped from the situation with my dignity intact.
Still laughing about it when I pulled into the driveway at home, I knew that I had to write about it and articulate its meaning for my audience.
So often in life we react quickly without thinking.
Seeing something that we find disagreeable we don't even question the judgment that we have made.
So convinced of our own correctness we move to assert our self-ordained superiority.
Making ourselves heard, the world knows where we stand.
But what happens when we stand in the wrong spot? Like the position that I found myself in, we do not always get it right, despite our best attempts to make sense of the world.
Being only human, we are exposed to be fools when we cannot admit our mistakes to the world.
Presenting a valuable learning experience, this is what we invalidate when we have not the humility to admit to our failures and correct our perceptions.
Admitting to our mistakes is not a sign of weakness but of strength.
Only the strong can look into their perceptions and hold them up to the light of truth.
It seems that so much of the world's hurts are perpetuated by our stubborn insistence on asserting our righteous positions irrespective of their effects on our immediate environment.
Lacking in this fundamental awareness, we are blind motorists that search for a light which we have obscured through our own efforts.
Hypocrisy is a curse that can be broken by awareness.
Allowing the light within to teach us about truth, our integrity becomes a gift that the world can benefit from.
There is no shame in having to take a step back when the situation demands it.
The hollow victory is one that entrenches us in our own ignorance.
The genuine one liberates with honesty that is born of self love.
When was the last time that you said 'I am wrong.
' A statement of freedom, it is in the same breath a pathway to peace that the wise and humble heart is never reluctant to take.