We’ve all heard the advice “Keep an open mind.” But when we try to imagine what that actually means, we see that it’s a rather vague idea. Perhaps we’re a little more tolerant of other people’s opinions, perhaps we admit there’s a possibility—if we’re honest, we think of it as a only a very slight possibility—that we might be wrong. But the word “open” implies much more than that. Not just open a tiny crack, not just a sliver, but really open. So we try to open more, but it’s hard to get a handle on. We try to imagine looking at things from another view—perhaps a radically different view of reality, not just politics or social movements, but the possibility of the truly miraculous.
An easier way is to just say “maybe.” Whatever we think is so, whatever we think might happen in the future, however we interpret what happened in the past, just add a “maybe” after the thought. Just let it soften a little. Just let the “maybe” leave room so that other possibilities can enter of their own accord. And who knows what those other possibilities might be?
When we try to imagine looking at things a different way, our imagination starts from where we already are, from the lens with which we see. The very place we are starting from puts boundaries on what we’re able to consider, and we only see extrapolations and permutations based on what we already know. We only see the view from where we are standing.
We tend to go through life constantly evaluating, filled with ideas about what’s possible and what isn’t, what’s real and what’s imaginary, what other people might be thinking and feeling. We judge things as good or bad, pleasant or unpleasant, fortunate or unfortunate. One evaluation after another. Always evaluating, trying to come to a conclusion. We want to get beyond what’s uncomfortable and find the comfortable. But it’s like writing on water, everything floats downstream and something new always comes along, and we never get to rest where we are, there’s never open space to just relax and be truly open to what is.
An open mind doesn’t have pre-set conclusions, it doesn’t have an agenda. An open mind is open right now, not looking for a way to open in the future or trying to find a different lens to look through. Yes, it can be very valuable to find a better set of ideas, a better lens, a truer perspective, and that’s part of the process of maturing personally and spiritually. Yet “open” is even broader, wider, more far-reaching than that. Wherever we stand, whatever thoughts we have, even while still being true to ourselves and how we actually feel, we can always add “maybe.” Maybe this will turn out the way we think, and maybe it won’t. Maybe reality is the way we think it is, and maybe not. As Shunryu Suzuki says, “Not always so.” Just maybe.
We’ve all had the experience of going through something extremely difficult, perhaps something that made us feel terrible, and then later recognizing how valuable it was, how much we gained, how much we grew from that experience. Or of losing something—an opportunity, a job, a life situation—and finding a year or two later that things have changed for the better because of the new directions that loss made possible. And we’ve all had the experience of changing our opinions and views. Of changing our preferences. Of looking back at our lives and recognizing how much our ideas and opinions have changed over time. Seeing all this, perhaps “maybe” is the logical way to go.
Maybe we can just say maybe.
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My thoughts on this topic have been directly influenced by Bodhisattva Shree Swami Premodaya, and in particular the guided meditation “Finding Inner Peace.”
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At Ryoan-ji in Kyoto there is a famous rock garden.
Wherever in it a person stands, one of the fifteen rocks cannot be seen.
The garden reminds that always something unknowable is present,
just beyond what can be perceived or comprehended –
and that something is as much part of the real as any other stone amid the raked gravel.
Jane Hirshfield
https://mindfulbalance.org/2017/04/19/beyond-what-can-be-seen/
