Hi, it’s Brilliant.
Last year I spent a night on the floor of the Honolulu airport.
I was flying home with my wife and daughter, connecting in Honolulu. I’d booked the two legs on separate airlines to save a few dollars, which meant I had to get our checked bag off the carousel and recheck it, and the connection was already tight.
I left my wife and daughter in the terminal, just in case, and went out for the bag alone. It was slow coming out. By the time I got to the counter I knew I wasn’t going to make it.
Sure enough. I called and told them to board without me. One of us on the airport floor was better than three. They boarded. The next flight was seven or eight hours away.
The gate agent had done everything he could. I’ve watched plenty of people lose it on gate agents, and I didn’t want to be that person, so I thanked him and walked away. This one was on me. A few dollars saved, my natural optimism, and a propensity for risk.
I walked back toward security with my head down, looking at the floor, stewing. I just wanted to be home.
I’ve made the decision to be happy no matter what. I know Viktor Frankl’s line about the last of the human freedoms—to choose your attitude in any set of circumstances. I believe it. I know I’m responsible for my own state. But knowing that and shifting it are two different things, and I find it much harder to shift when I’m worn out. I was worn out. Thinking my way to a more empowering state wasn’t working.
Then I heard a gruff voice: “Hey, brother.”
It took me a second to realize someone was talking to me. A TSA agent, a guy in his fifties with a white beard of his own, was calling over to me. “Nice beard, brother.” He held out his fist and I bumped it. I couldn’t help smiling. I thanked him and told him his beard was pretty awesome too.
That was the whole interaction, maybe a second and a half, and it completely broke my state. I wasn’t faking it, either. I would still rather have been on that plane with my family, but the stewing was over, and it didn’t come back the rest of the night.
I don’t know if he saw I was down, or if he was bored, or if he sensed something. It doesn’t matter. He called out, and it made a huge difference for me.
Sometimes we can think our way out of a disempowering state. Sometimes we can’t, and someone else gets us there, or at least gets us started. I don’t think that lets me off the hook. I think being responsible includes letting people help, and staying open enough to notice when they’re trying. He held out his fist. It was up to me to bump it.
We can be that for someone else, too. I’m not talking about hunting for sad people to cheer up. I’m talking about keeping your head up. Noticing who’s near you. Saying the thing you’d normally keep to yourself.
Every moment is a chance to put a little good into the world, and most of the time it doesn’t take much.
From the Commonplace Book
“Sometimes our light goes out, but is blown again into flame by an encounter with another human being. Each of us owes the deepest thanks to those who have rekindled this inner light.”
—Albert Schweitzer, Memoirs of Childhood and Youth
Further Down the Rabbit Hole
teamLab, Kyoto
I may be the last person to find out about teamLab, a Japanese art collective of artists, programmers, engineers, animators, mathematicians, and architects who build rooms you walk into: light, water, flowers that bloom and scatter as you move through them. On a recent trip to Japan I went to all three of their museums there, two in Tokyo and one in Kyoto. I’ve never experienced art, or creativity, or whatever it is, quite that way. If you’re ever in Japan, it’s worth the trip.
Wishing you every good thing,
Brilliant