Greatness knows not of size

When we try to express 'great' without using words, we tend to use our hands, to create an expansive arm movement, as if to encompass an outburst of whatever. We also tend to finish in a certain double-shake, as if implying gravity, a solid weight, were part and parcel of greatness.

But Greatness is so much more, how can we limit it to size, to stature, to weight, to dimension?

Take, for example, the phrase 'a great person'. Does a great person need to be tall, heavy, and generally imposing? Nah, not really. If that were the case, people such as Mahatma Gandhi would not deserve the adjective. Same goes for people like Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Jesus Christ, or Socrates, to mention but a few.

Another example: what do you have to do to have 'a great time'? Little, really. Mostly it's a matter of spending time with people you love, doing things you enjoy despite the economic or social impact they may have, and generally enjoying life for and as it is. You can have a great time going for a walk in the park, having friends over for a BBQ, or merely watching a film while holding hands with one you love.

So it is with most things in life. In fact, Life is Great, all on its own, and so are each and every one of its parts. Sure, some bits are more awe-inspiring than others (the Northern Lights, a volcano erupting, a tiger springing from the fronds by the path,...) but, when we look closely... How great is an embryo? How great for a mother to feel the tiny first flutter of movement within her body? How great all the tiny fingers and toes of a newborn? How great is the possibility of life in every shoot in spring? How great and heartwarming the shrill chirping of tiny chicks following their parents, daring to explore an amazingly huge word?

We are all Great, for every aspect of us is miraculous, courageous, creative, unscripted as yet. That we decide to measure ourselves and find ourselves lacking is all due to that misunderstanding of what 'great' really means. It is only natural that we will be displeased, for how can we become 'great' if we are aiming for something totally unlike it? We aim to have weight in society, to stand tall, to stand out!, to control large amounts of (fill in the blank), to own ample space and call it 'my house'. All these are very desirable, indeed, but none is great. For they all require a scale to compare it to something else, which is by definition unlike Greatness.

Greatness is Being, because we were all born as a result of that miracle that is Life. All we have to do is Live fully... and have a whole lot of laughs on the way!

Home

We all know what 'to feel at home' means. What is less clear is what 'home' really is.
For some, home is where the heart is; for others, wherever they lay their hats; of maybe it's sweet Alabama; for Jack, it's probably the house he built; and so on.

What, and/or where, is your home? And mine?

I've just spent a few days back in the city where I grew up, back in the flats where, all in all, I've lived most of my life - or for the longest stretches, at least. It was thus bittersweet to realise that, at no point in that visit, did I feel 'home'. I certainly felt loved, welcome, comfortable, all the while happy not to suffer the pangs of homesickness. I knew where things were, and the people and animals showed their love (if in my family/friends circle) or kindness (if not in it).

Still, I felt 'alien', a mere tourist to those spaces. Why?

For one thing, it's become obvious that, for me, home is not a matter of people. As I've said, the ones I've been with are all family and dear friends - whom I also consider family. Even their company, the community they mean, warm, generous and beneficial as it is, was unable to create 'home' for me. Not even my cat's cuddles managed it!

Home is also clearly not a place, for that city and those flats, where I spent my childhood, late teens and late twenties; where I got my basic education, my first graduate job, my lovely long leather coat and first tattoo; where my love for books and trees first revealed themselves and were allowed to develop;... all those were not enough to bring me 'home'. Of course, the people and places were 'home' during certain periods in my life. And the same can be said for any, and every, people and places who have become part of my history.

What, then, is 'home', and when does it stop being it?

To begin with, I believe that 'home' is not a feeling, a place, a concept, but rather a state of being. It is at home here you can experiment, develop, bare and observe your soul. It is at home where you can be and become more 'you', and less what the world thinks of you. And, as any state, it is transient, mutable, unselfish. Home will be where, with whomever, whenever you need it to be in order for you to achieve that 'you-ness' - so that you may go on and explore, develop, bare and observe other facets of your soul; so that, once it's achieved, you can move on, and on, and on.

Home is where the soul earns its uniqueness; where soul becomes Soul.

Welcome home, wherever you are.

Why you can't buy love

I do not believe in capitalism. In fact, although I understand the logic behind using money, we have made such a horror off it, than I would rather see it disappear so we could try and manage without it. Tough, but fair - real need for real need, and all within our means.

Now, one of the things that put me on the trail of the horror of money is the concept of meanness, and of showing love. And, as any horror, it could be a story...

Once upon a time, people realised they had different gifts and values. Of course, there was the lordship and the church, but they were not people. People were the ones who worked, who produced, who knew the value of things: one bushel of barley = x hours of backbreaking work in the fields; one dress = y hours of blinding weaving and sewing; and so on. Most of all, they knew the value of family, of children, of neighbour.
These people were not necessarily nice,  mind you. Sometimes they fought, they hurt each other, they could be violent and criminal. Yet, because they knew the value of things, they understood the value of gifts.

These people knew, for example, how hard it was to grow fruit, and how many lemons went into a glass of lemonade. As a result, they would leave the lemonade-drinking to days of merriment, and praise the lemonade-makers for their effort and generosity. A glass of lemonade, refreshing and full of vitamins, was a gift fit for a king (in fact, oranges were only available to a few until less than a hundred years ago - mull on that for a bit)! The ability of a household to economise and organise its resources wisely to last was its greatest wealth. Thus, old clothes were handed down and reused,donated or recycled into patchwork items, and lastly used as rags. Similarly, food was purchased according to need, not whim, when it was not foraged or grown at home. Even more careful was the acquisition of houses, furniture or household goods: there were few, though built to last and be bequeathed to future generations.

Then, slowly, wicked forces made the people forget the worth of things. They grew distant from the value of the labour and came to believe that bits of metal, then colourful paper, and finally numbers on a screen (mere pulses of light, after all) could equate that value. But in their heart, they knew better, and so they recognised that never mind how many numbers you used to buy stuff, they could not cover the worth of the object, let alone the recipient.

Parents started working more and more hours, trying to accumulate more and more numbers, in order to use those numbers to get something for their kids, to show them the worth of their love. Lovers became convinced that only through using numbers to get things to give their beloved could they really show how great their love was. Friends began fretting, for the items their other friends had given them (for Xmas, say, or their Bday), had to be matched for a new item of equal 'numberness' on the tag, lest they be proven unworthy.

Then, one day, one of the people, exhausted of trying to match numbers (which, after all, never did exist), gave up. S/he got together friends and family and confessed that s/he had nothing more to give. And the friends and family, who loved the one very much, decided that it was OK. They decided, from then on, to make - not buy - their presents. But they did not know anymore how to produce things of value, they did not know how to value things. So they decided to ask one another 'What do you need, that I can give you?' One said a hug, the other a favourite book in another's collection, yet another asked for some delicious homemade pie... And they were happy sharing like that.Soon, the people around all cottoned on, and unlearned to misunderstand worth. Some of the number handlers were mad, but they soon forgot. After all, the numbers never did exist, but in bits of light.

So now it's our turn, to ask one another, 'What do you need, that I can give you?'