Friday, March 21, 2008

An analogy

Here I go with a deep thought...
A few weeks ago I felt that I had spent way too much time inside for the past couple months and decided to go on a mid-day hike. I hiked down to a creek in Cucamonga Canyon to let my feet and water bottle cool down and enjoy the peacefulness of my surroundings. For much of my hike I could hear the crescendoing turbulance of the creek as I got closer to it. I realized something as I was jumping around from boulder to boulder in the creek. When I casually listen to the creek, even from a short distance, all I hear is the turbulent noise, like static on a television (back in the day before the satellite dish). But if I listened to the water flow over an individual rock, it had its own sound or pitch. It was actually kind of calming, like one of those aesthetic fountains. The rock next to it had a different pitch in its sound, being higher or lower. A few rocks could create a chorus of dissonance or maybe even a harmonious chord. Nature had created its own choir. Each rock is different, each with its own sound.

And here is one of my analogies to this experience. Water is often metaphorically used to symbolize life. Rocks in our life are usually what stirs things up, changes our direction, impacts our flow, gives beauty, and sometimes causes us to get wet, embarrassed, and uncomfortable when we stumble upon one that is more slippery than we thought. Some of these rocks include school, work, family, church responsibilities, and social relationships. When we are stressed, we often hear only the dissonance or turbulence of life. Everything seems loud, overwhelming, and uncomfortable. We wish that life could flow smoother. This is when we overlook the simple harmonies that are present. The dissonance will resolve into a beautiful and harmonious chord eventually, but it does make things a little more interesting and colorful for the moment. We need to appreciate each rock and the contribution of its individual tone to the symphony of our lives.

That's enough serious thinking for now... "Rock" on!!!

2 comments:

Nicole said...

Gorgeous analogy. I should listen more closely to the water over the rocks.

Ms. Liz said...

dude - Jennetty,
You missed your calling, you should have joined the literature geek squad with Brett and I! This is marvelous.

One of the coolest people I've ever chatted up in a Jiffy Lube waiting room was a waterfall designer and he went on for all 20 minutes about the density of rocks and how that creates different harmonics when water hits them so designing waterfalls is like composing music almost. This rock can't be next to this one but need to be this far from the other. And each combination of rocks has different harmonics and thus different emotional effects on the people that hear the waterfall. It was fascinating.

I'm so amazed you found all this out it on your own, but not amazed at the same time. You're amazing