Have you ever wondered what it would be like to turn off, well, everything? Have you ever wondered what the wind sounds like or are you too intent on looking at your phone? I have stated in the past that I wonder what would happen if we lost all power, all electronics. Yes, it would be devastating on so many levels, medical equipment, elevators, heat etc. etc. etc. but what if?

In my past I have spent days, many days in the wilderness where there is no electricity. You get up with the dawn and you go to sleep by fire light. The sky is breathtaking in its majesty, sound is magnified but harmonious, there are no screeching cars here, everything is more . . .  present. You can’t see things like that in the city because of light pollution. So much pollution.  But it exists.

I have always found the first night to be a little, awkward. It took me a while to get used to the, not silence, but the gentle background sounds that were often difficult to identify. There was a gentle rustle of the leaves and grasses. The unknown bird or animal squawking, whether as predator or prey was unclear. I could feel the wind on my face and smell the earthy scents of honesty. Because that is what it was, it wasn’t adulterated or modified or improved upon. It was reality in its truest sense of the word.

In our busy lives we rarely have time to sit back and unplug. We should. Would you take a few minutes every day and just turn everything off? Phones, computers, tablets and radios and TVs and, and, and. Now just listen. What do you hear? Yes, I am sitting in front of my computer writing this but I’m also listening and what I hear is fascinating. I can hear cars in the distance, not loud. Oh, I just heard a bird cry. I wonder if it is in anticipation or in fear. I’ll never know. I can hear people talking but I can’t make out what they’re saying. A car door slams. I am in a town, a downtown area. But it is surprisingly quiet. I listen. I can hear a clock ticking in my background, it’s in the other room. If I stop talking, I can just make out the refrigerator, I think. It’s quietly humming. I can hear a very faint roaring sound and it takes me a minute to realize that it’s the sound the car tires make as they travel over the roads. Interesting. I never thought of it before. We take so many sounds for granted but we never actually realize what we’re listening to. Much like talking to each other or listening to strangers. Do we really hear what they’re saying? I wonder.

Take a minute to unplug and see what you can hear…

I have always considered myself a bright child but a slow learner. I could usually pick up on what needed to be learned but I didn’t want do the work to get there. I am by nature lazy unless I get excited about something and then I’m a Pitbull. I am a woman of contradictions, but then… so are you. We are never exactly what we appear to be to others and that is not always a bad thing. Every book has a cover that entices you either by the words used or the picture it portrays. It’s what is inside that matters.

And the same is true with people. We portray an image to the world that is expected. We follow the rules and do as we are told. But we often let our hair down when the world is not looking and that’s when life gets interesting. But sometimes we need to learn our lessons the hard way. I occasionally need to run over my own foot before I realize I shouldn’t be doing that. I might do it once more just to be sure. But those lessons do get learned, eventually.

In school I was an average student. I excelled at the studies I enjoyed and I squeaked by in the ones I did not enjoy. I would study at the last minute or do my essay the night before and sometimes I got away with it brilliantly. Annoying to some of my friends.  I once wrote an essay, literally the night before and the morning of. When it was handed in, I was quite pleased with myself but I figured it was probably just average. When we got the essays back a week later the teacher stood up in front of the class held a paper up and said that this was a student who took the time to do the research and to do it well. That we should take note and realize that things didn’t always come easy, we had to work at it. My friend looked at me and quietly mouth a bad word. It was my paper. I never told the teacher the truth. But some things came easily to me and those are the ones I enjoyed doing. I loved to write those essays because I loved to write. I didn’t need to do a lot of work and that meant the lessons I needed to learn weren’t learned.  I was OK being average.

There is a part of me that wonders how well I would have done had I applied myself and then I realize that I had a wonderful life, I still am. I don’t look back with regret but I think I would have regrets had I spent the time worrying about things that were ultimately unimportant. I might have missed a great deal of enjoyment.  I got the work done. I learned the important lessons. And I made use of the world in front of me. That is a lesson we all need to take to heart.