Training Your Humanity Skills

“The World is full of obvious things which nobody by any chance ever observes.”

Sherlock Holmes, The Hound of the Baskervilles

The world is an eternal showcase of art for humanity to appreciate. If they are willing to observe.

 

 Something is always happening. It's the blanket fort of the universe under which life unfolds. 

Usually those somethings are rather small and insignificant. Like a child stubbing her toe in a doorway, or bumping shoulders with the sardined individuals during rush hour on buses.  

Except that neither of those are small and insignificant. 

Put yourself in those situations and suddenly stubbing your toe or being squashed around many sweaty, tired bodies and their packs and phones and perfumes, is the biggest thing to happen to you in that moment. Simply because it. Happened. To. You.

Sometimes though, things happen which are very large, nebulous and shockwave cities, nations and numerous governements.

A plane disappears over an ocean, a ship sinks and a thousand people die. A shooting occurs in a midnight city street while an earthquake rocks the ground elsewhere.

Media has a large part to play in putting us into those situations. Many of which, 95% of the world might have never known, had we been back a few hundred years, or at the least, most of the world might not have known as quickly as we do now.

Media might be wonderful for how it has connected many people who would not have been connected and how it has allowed us humans of Earth to help each other on a much larger scale than ever before. 

However, media also is largely to blame for the heart of our problems. 

It inspires fear, distrust, judgement and confusion.

All the things which cloud our perspectives from the obvious. 

The obvious, of course being that we are all human. At the centre of things.

Being human means we can relate. If we use a bit of imagination.

But instead of "putting yourself into someone else's shoes" figure out what the heart of the matter is. 

Namely, if an earthquake inspired panic in people. Imagine a time when you felt panicked. 

Yes, your panic is being felt in a completely different context and level than that of people experiencing an earthquake but the basic concept of panic is still there. 

It's not a safe feeling. Obvious right? Wrong. When you drag media into the mix of big situations then you are sparking all sorts of extravagent titles and phrases designed to flash you to death via sensory overload than by allowing you to connect to the cold hard, human emotions. That's why people start getting shocked by such events. The media over does the drama to such an unrealistic degree, that is so far removed from the actual situation that people start to shut down. 

Again, that's not to say the media is bad and needs to be removed or ignored. It's a valuable tool. The problem is just that most people take thing straight up, without observing beyond what they see. 

Like that person you just passed on the street who has a laptop bag smelling of fresh leather. It is slung over one shoulder and a manila folder is clutched tight under one arm. A wrinkle is on the back of one sleeve of their iron-pressed, navy shirt and they are striding to the beat of the peppy music blaring out of their ear buds. Their free hand fiddles with a gum wrapper, which drops to the ground as they pass you.

You might be irritated by the peppy music and think them rude as they brush past you. You might think them to be messy and lazy. But you don't observe beyond that and see the obvious underneath.

Perhaps that individual is new at their job (fresh leather) and slept in, but are concerned about their appearance, hence the rush-job iron. The peppy music is their method of calming themselves and getting pumped for something they are uncomfortable for. The gum, well to freshen their breath and further calm those nerves which sparked the absent littering.

Now, whether or not you are correct with your observations of this individual is irrelevant as the key is always to find the core human emotion. In this case it could be nervousness (but remember there is no right or wrong answer, you just need to find an emotion that pops out for you that you can relate to).

What makes you nervous? Think on that for a moment. You'll find yourself not getting irritated by the loud music of that individual as they passed by, or that perhaps they brushed into you as they moved passed. 

Once a day. Find the humanity in a situation. Imagine your humanity. Make it up if you have to.

After all, nothing good is ever going to get done for that child who stubbed their toe or the families who lost loved ones to that sunken ship if you cannot start by observing another human. You'll find life to be a lot more obvious.

And a lot more fun. (Particularly when it involves finding favourite quotes and finding odd angles by which to examine them which were probably not intended in the first place).

Always watching with a curious perspective.

Moony.

 

The Value of Mundane Activities

I love to imagine all the things the moon sees through windows as it treks the night sky.

 
I always make it a habit to observe people and read their stories.

It makes the time pass, first of all, but even better, it gives me things to use in my writing and a chance to play around with conflicts, characters and dramas in my head.

I've done plenty of lining up, queuing (whatever you want to call it), over the years. Whether it's recently for the reams of paperwork required to get you a job in another country, for a geeky panel at a convention or just to buy the monthly bout of groceries, there is a lot of waiting to be done.

What I've come to learn through all of it has nothing to do with patience, though I will admit I probably have spagetti strings more of it than most people simply because I can occupy myself for hours picking apart people's stories.

What the lesson does have to do with anything, is realizing a great value lies within the mundane. Well, the publicly done mundane things (I have yet to understand the value in laundry or heavy cleaning. The most I get with homey mundane things is baking, because, well, it's a giant learning experiment when you use recipes as guidelines rather than rules. Chemistry is useful for something).

The value of the mundane is this:

If you look at life as a never ending sequence of observational periods and outcomes of experiential learning, or in other words, you look at life as a lesson planned by your universe, then even your grocery trips will never be dull.

There are a million things I've picked up about humanity from observing them during these mundane moments, but seeing as that could take a whole series of books to get through, (I've got notebooks full of odd things), I'll share just a few tidbits right here.

As you stand, waiting for your turn to present your problem, to buy some clothes, hand in a form, you are taught that human nature is full of errors.

It is impatient.

Lines are the best places to discover the rude sides to humans. They bring out the huffy growl of a suit, one ear on a phone conversation, the other on the airport employee warning of the plane's delay in landing, for the fourth time in six hours. They bring out the flowers and lace woman with fifty's style spectacles, who butts in the converged group in a police office (because apparently small towns don't do line ups), when the woman who was unanimously noted as next doesn't realize it was her turn because she was is busy sniffling and staring at the floor mumbling about how an officer had assaulted her the night before.

It is needy.

Lines always make people blab to strangers. I've come down to pinning it on a desire to rant, to compare or just to share because waiting allows for a lot of space for too much thinking, no matter if you're in the line or the one dealing with things at the end of it. That gets exhausting too. This blabbing lands on the grocery clerk in the form of a mother with a baby carrier on one arm, wielding her credit card in another and shouting at her other two children to stop running relay from the end of the check-out to the optometrist store on the opposite end. It comes out in an elderly secretary at the city hall who just dealt with a loud and grumpy couple debating a building permit as she sighs and asks what I'm there for and I land on the receiving end of a tale about her sweet and talented granddaughter who is currently teaching in Dubai, but had spent two years in the UK before that.

But sometimes it is kind.

Waiting for things often inspires a ridiculous amount of opening doors and phrases like "no you go first," "be my guest," or "would you mind watching my stuff?" These are always met with "thank you's" and "certainly's." Also smiles. Lots of smiles. And then no other exchange happens after. It's just too strangers continuing on. Yes, more often than not, this happens in the aftermath of the lines when you leave the buildings you were waiting in, get off the planes or what have you, but sometimes people band together when that same plane takes eight hours to show up before you can get on it, let alone getting off. The best come at conventions, where everyone is there for the same geeky reasons and everyone is waiting in the same long line ups. Which brings me to the next highlight of lines.

It can spark temporary companionship or long friendship.

It has generally only been by waiting at conventions that I've managed to discover people who are now long distance friends, there is plenty of temporary companionship to be had too. Like deep conversations about travel and business dreams bouncing between a ponytail and shorts girl and a young man in a suit jacket and jeans after the he asks if she'd mind watching his stuff while he pops off to grab a snack. They spend the whole eight hour wait for the plane chatting, negotiating seat switches with various people once the plane arrives, chat for the whole flight and they walk off together after landing. A deep discussion over the merits of coconut yogurt versus Greek yogurt gets volleyed back and forth between a dreadlocked university student and a guy still in a construction vest for the five minutes of a grocery line. They end, shaking hands and wishing the other a good day, going off to separate lives with their respective grocery bags.

I cannot say enough how fascinating watching people can be and how much you can learn from it. Plus, there are often times when you are just confused by it and you save the bits you pick up for later use or mulling over of.

I got on a bus once, most of the seats were full but nobody was having to stand yet and a scraggly bearded man with a toque and a box still covered in post stampage and tape kept muttering "nine-hundred and ninety nine stars. The sun is burning." Over and over and over. He sat there muttering this for the ten minutes I was on until he got off at his stop, walking as straight as anyone.

Other times I've been witness to hushed phone arguments between couples, or the excitable hand-waving of tourists from the top bus window who thought double deckers only existed in England.

The next time you are waiting for something. Watch the people around you. You might learn something about humanity, or yourself, or pick up a fun conversation starter, or writing prompt. You don't even have to wait to do so. Find a busy spot like a food court, a harbour, a tourist area, bus stops, ferry terminals, airports, parks, beaches or even wandering the streets and drink in it and all the people, with all your senses.

You might just be surprised with how fast the time flies.

Always observing from corners and high perches.
Moony.