Paying Attention

I heard this on NPR and was impressed that it speaks to our need to pay attention, "to see the sacred in the mundane and the profound in the prosaic."

This is the first in a series of commentaries by Adam on the theme of "How To See The World In A Grain Of Sand." Stay tuned to All Things Considered and 13.7 for future installments!
More than two centuries ago, the great poet William Blake offered the world the most extraordinary of possibilities:

To see a world in a grain of sand
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
and eternity in an hour.

Yeah, that would be nice.

Unfortunately, most of us don't know how to hold eternity in the palm of our hands. In fact, most of us feel lucky if we can just hold it together until the end of the day. The problem, of course, is that mostly we've lost our minds. And I mean that literally. Our attention is endlessly lost in the endless blur of appointments, to-do lists, worry, concern and agitation that makes up modern life.

Sometimes, however, for the briefest moment, we do pick up a scent that there is something more going on than this daily round of survival. But those moments pass and waves of mundane urgency swallow us again. Tumbling through the chaos of our day-to-days, we wonder if Blake's vision of a broader, more expansive experience is nothing more than a poet's fancy. Can we really see the Universe in a grain of sand, even as we slog through traffic? Can we really hold infinity in our hands, even as we drop off the kids to violin practice?

The answer, I believe, is "yes." In fact I am sure of the answer is yes. The connection between the everyday reality we experience and boundless landscapes of cosmic beauty, inspiration and joy is actually so close, so present for us. It's there in the dust on your car, the mess on your desk and the swirling water in your sink.

How do I know this? Because I am a scientist dammit and I know that Science — under all its theories equations, experiments and data — is really trying to teach us to see the sacred in the mundane and the profound in the prosaic.

The trick is in the noticing and that happens by unpacking the question hidden in Blake's poem.

Can we really see the whole world in a grain of sand?

Through the lens of science we can see how even the smallest thing can be a gateway to an experience of the extraordinary, if only we can practice noticing.

We walk past a thousand, thousand natural miracles everyday, from the sun climbing in the sky to the arc of birds seen out our windows. Those miracles are there waiting for us to see them, to notice them and, most importantly, to find our delight in theirs.

You want some transcendence? I got if for ya. Let's start with that grain of sand.

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