New songs, for the listening…

Posted April 1, 2011 at 4:49 am by

It's little things, little joys, we're missing, most days....

Some days, do you get the feeling you’re missing something?

This is a story a friend of mine told me:

I was walking down the sidewalk on a busy New York City day with a friend who lives in the forests of Brazil. He stopped, cocked his head & said, “Listen! I think that’s a robin.” And sure enough, we looked up and there was a bird on the sign above us. I said, “Wow, how could you hear that, with all the city noise here?” My friend said, “You hear what you are trained to hear,” and took a handful of change from his pocket and scattered it on the concrete at our feet. Immediately, people turned and stared, and bent over and started picking it up; the sound was not even as loud as the bird’s song in the city din. “See?” he said. “You hear what you hear.” He smiled.

Seems to me there are plenty of songs going on around me, that I miss because I listen for coins, not bird songs. Sometime the song is a smile from a friend that I miss because I’m too worried about something; sometimes it’s something blooming on the bush when I’m walking & thinking deep thoughts about things that aren’t blooming; often I miss a song from today because I’m focused on something that happened in the past.

The guy in the story above says, “You hear what you are trained to hear,” and I think it’s possible for us to re-train ourselves. This week I’ve looked for & found a new song each day – something I hadn’t noticed that is right around me, but that I couldn’t hear or see or taste or smell or feel because of the head-din in the city of my mind. I stop, I breathe, I listen, and there are new things all around.

And it makes each day new.

Try it & let me know how it goes for you. 🙂

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Categories: Around Here
2 comments:

2 comments...

  1. After two days of wind, I heard a \new\ bird song overhead, up north here in Minnesota. I spotted the bright blue of two little blue birds, home again for the summer. Your story helped me decide to make a real effort to learn the songs of my local avian beauties. Thanks for the article!

    Comment by Pat on April 3, 2011 at 3:14 pm
  2. Truly beautiful! You’ve inspired me to not only to hear the sounds but also to see, to look and feel nature (God) all around us. The abundance of life is calling! Thank you!

    Comment by Suzy Pierce on April 4, 2011 at 9:39 pm

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