Mindfulness is in vogue – living in the moment – revering and reveling in the present. But what about awareness?
Awareness is knowledge or perception of a situation or fact – concern or well-informed interest – consciousness, recognition, and/or attention.
The opposite of awareness is disregard, ignorance, insensitivity, neglect, misunderstanding, unfamiliarity, and/or unconsciousness.
I’m finding that I’m pretty unaware.
For instance: my husband and I meet a cousin for dinner when we are visiting our hometown. She leans in close and excitedly relates that at age seventy-three, she is becoming a grandmother in July for the very first time. Of course, both my husband and I are thrilled for her and express our delight by hugging her tight and raising our wine glasses to toast the upcoming bundle of joy.
Truthfully, though my happiness for her is genuine, I would have probably forgotten all about it – either until I circuitously heard about the birth from other cousins or she whipped out pictures of her grandchild the next time we met. That to me is displaying disregard for my cousin’s news. So instead, when I got back home, I jotted a note in my calendar to touch-base with her in mid-July for an update. That is recognition of the importance of the event to her.
There is a lovely middle-aged woman who does day work in one of my son’s homes. I have known her for about five years. She has a cheerful disposition and consistently treats my grandchildren with kindness and consideration. We always talked about my son’s family, but I knew little about her. I asked her one day if she had any children. “Yes,” she replied, warmly, “a son, who is twenty-one years old.”
“Was he a handful to raise – like my kids were?” I jokingly inquired. A cloud of pain blew across her face. “I actually didn’t have the opportunity to raise him,” she confessed.
She was a US citizen, married to someone who was in our country on a work visa. She chose to give birth to their son in Guatemala so she could be near her husband’s family. Big mistake. Her son was not automatically granted US citizenship.
Her choices:
She could stay in Guatemala and raise her son – recognizing her reduced wages would not enable her to be able to give her child a good standard of living.
She could leave her only child with her husband’s parents, return to the US to work and send money back to Guatemala to ensure her son got a good education.
She chose the latter.
“Afterwards, I was very depressed for a long time, but I talked to him daily, my in-laws always kept in close contact with me about his behavior and school progress and I believe I made the right decision,” she related to me.
Thirty minutes later, I knew the intimate details of her haunting tale – exacerbated by vague laws, ever-changing immigration statutes and bungling bureaucrats. I had been ignorant of her situation. I now have great appreciation for her challenges.
Recently we had an unveiling for my mother. In the Jewish religion, a year after the death of a loved one, close family members gather to uncover the stone monument and say some prayers and share thoughts. Quite a few of my friends texted me that morning to convey healing messages and warm thoughts – choosing not to neglectme on this solemn day and displaying understanding and attention.
When we raise our awareness,
When we listen to other people’s stories,
When we become a gatherer of information,
When we make the extra effort to tune-in and be present,
our own lives become richer, as do those whose lives intersect with our own.
Keep Persevering Your Bloom,
Iris Ruth Pastor