On the Kindness of Things by John Tuite

• Kindness Blog

“Treat objects as if they had nervous systems.” Bruce Fertman.

the kindness of thingsThere’s an old porcelain telephone on the stage. It’s only there because in the second act it is written that a character answers the phone to hear news of an arrest. After this single moment the telephone plays no more role, contributes nothing to the on-going drama. It’s forgotten by audience and actors alike. Its existence fades.

We tend to treat most objects like they are minor props in a play. They are only real when, and in so far as, they have use to us and the plot we are enacting. They have no voice of their own, no ‘life’ other than that contained in our script. They are not even background.

If we can give up this idea we realise that the simplest of objects offers us a more interesting possibility. Each has a dual existence, like light which is simultaneously both wave and particle. Firstly, objects are entirely, indifferently themselves, their fundamental nature un-impacted by our dramas and projections. My glasses case does not change in the slightest degree according to my mood or the injustices that have been done to me. And yet they also reflect back to us precisely and unselfishly our own mode of being in the world. In each of these expressions they render us service.

There is, for example, a quality of calmness in the way a book simply rests upright, snug with others, on the horizontal shelf. We can interrupt and lose this quality when we grab for it, or share in and imbibe it as we pick the book up. There is a generous willingness to be used in the warm swell of a pot and the gleam of a tea cup. And a sharp knife will offer us in each cut a lesson in ease and gracefulness should we cooperate with it. The table settles firmly on the floor before us in order to support our work, the bicycle asks to be used, and the sword or the paintbrush or handsaw whispers a language full of texture and resonance to the firm hand that also has the space to listen.

If this is so, even more so with living ‘objects’.

Walk in the woods. Run by the lake. Observe the ordinary grass. Look with humility. Nature can be abundant and overflowing, yet it rarely crowds, or finds itself untidy, because it understands the private yearning at the heart of every thing reaching for a certain relationship and space. Because it feels the kernel of each seed wanting to mingle the rich dark ground with the splendid breeze and sunlight; the horizontal and vertical, the down and the up, the single place and the movement.

How do we humans make things so untidy? How do we get things so out of place?

the kindness of thingsBecause we are so busy we ignore the quiet murmur of each thing for place, connection and scope, and we have allowed those who are the most busy this way to have so much power.

We fail to see relationship between things. Because we manipulate rather than touch, we grasp rather than hold, we reach forward with the hand while we shrink back with our awareness, handling the world for ends that we have only thought about, not felt. Because we accumulate, accumulate and forget to experience.

We have an idea of things. We may separate the cup from the table, but we collapse every cup into this broad notion of cup-ness. We miss the felt experience of this unique cup and the way it sits up so perky on the grainy table surface, gleaming just like so in the 3pm sunlight of this autumn day. Our idea of it eclipses it.

Things speak to us of their own history. Particularly if they are made by us, they speak of the quality of care that went into their own making. The faulty and imperfect asymmetry of a hand-made pendant, or a repaired pot, can breath more balance into our system than the perfect symmetry of a factory product. The smoothest pebble weighted in the hand can be more interesting to the touch than the curves and sophisticated ridges of mass produced plastic. When we surround ourselves with such ill-made products we create a muted environment, that leaves us numb and seeking satisfaction somewhere else. Always somewhere else.

The relative silence of such indifferently made things actually speaks to us of a deprivation and our own carelessness, like the brooding sulk of a neglected child at the table. Yet even they would warm up and speak if we shifted. If we paid attention.

the kindness of thingsPick up the pen in front of you now as if it has a nervous system. Or another small object. It doesn’t matter if it is humble and cheap, or fancy and expensive. Pick it up gently, yet with precision and it will find and communicate its own tiny dignity. Pick it up as if you would leave an un-smudged fingerprint for posterity. Be sensitive to the exact balance of firmness and care that such a little object asks of you. Pay attention to the particular dexterity it calls forth in you. Feel its coolness and its density. Let its balance and the small mercury gleam on the nib enter your awareness. Notice when you do this how a little more aliveness soaks up your wrist into your forearm and beyond, as if inspired in through the fingertips. Breath softly. Feed your heart with it. Allow yourself to be very simple for this moment.

Where does the world of objects start and stop? Where does an ‘it’ start becoming a ‘you’ or a ‘me’. This is not clear, for the world of objects has no stable borders, and in actual practice includes much of what should be a ‘you’ or even an ‘I’.

Whenever we ‘lose touch’, we make objects of our children, our partners, our friends, our work colleagues. We also make objects of our selves, particularly our bodies, but also our particular forms of neurosis, which we want to push away. We treat them as if they are not a strand of our living substance, integral to a rich, embodied and complex subjectivity, but as a thing, to be manipulated and trained, grasped or pushed away.

So when we practice paying respectful attention to the world of ‘its” around us, when we imaginatively invest them with an element of “you”, strangely we find the by-product is that we also reinvest our own bodies with our own subjectivity. We reclaim our own I-ness from the it we abandoned it to. We take care of the scarf around our neck as we place it, and find that it offers us so much more than a barrier against the cold; the chance to reoccupy our bodies with loving attention.

Who would have known that the door to self-care is entered not through self-obsession, but through care of the world!

When I listen to the news it is easy to despair. There seems so little kindness, sense or intelligence in our story as human beings. Where can we turn to? Each other, certainly. But there is also an unflagging kindness, a willingness to help, in every ‘thing’ around us, easily offered if we should only pay gentle, respectful attention. This is a form of basic goodness in the world. An inexhaustible generosity that exists everywhere, dependent only on our skill with awareness, awaiting our arrival in the place we already live in.

In some ways this is a companion piece to Touch as Nutrition.

With thanks to Bruce Fertman, and his practice with scarves, which you can see by clicking on the link.

John TuiteJohn Tuite founded The Centre for Embodied Wisdom and Clearcircle. He now works as a leadership and life coach, and consultant. He is a qualified Leadership Embodiment teacher and a continuing student of Wendy Palmer, founder of Leadership Embodiment. He also teaches a range of embodiment skills from breath work to mindfulness and energy work/qi-kung.

Before this, John taught in London for 18 years, serving on the leadership teams in four challenging schools. He was an Advanced Skills Teacher for Westminster. Prior to this he has worked as a builder, an arborist and a councilor.

He is also a Senior Instructor of Grandmaster Han Kim Sen of Southern Shaolin Five Ancestor, a centuries old martial art born in the Buddhist temples of China, integrating all aspects of mind and body work. He has practiced within this tradition since 1974. He lives in London with his partner and three children.

 

108 thoughts on “On the Kindness of Things by John Tuite”

  1. This speaks directly to my heart. All to often I forget this reverence for all “things”. It really does change our life and perspective completely when we practice honoring all experiences, including things, that come into our life. May I add an additional dimension to this thought process that has been meaningful to me? In order to connect the item to an even more expansive energy, I like to think of all the people that brought it into being….inventors, manufacturers, truckers, merchants, salesclerks, packagers…the list goes on….It’s really not the actual list that is meaningful, it’s realizing how connected we are to people we have never met, people from other times and places, people just like us….sharing the Light of Oneness. Great post!

    Liked by 9 people

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  3. Thanks for the kind response. I particularly like the addition of tracing the roots and origin of articles. It’s a great practice.

    When I was a secondary school English teacher I used to spend more time than I should doing exactly that in lessons…especially if a kid threw away a piece of paper, they would invoke the ‘paper lesson’! In this we traced back all the people, machinery, resources, transportation systems, natural preconditions, … Well you get the idea. On a good day we would get back to the Big Bang! Years later the class would see someone throw away a piece of paper, see that I saw it, and go “oh no! Take it back, or he will do the paper lesson!!”

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    2. Hi John,
      Thank you once again for sharing your warmth through your thoughtful and enjoyable reply!

      Incidentally, I have been teaching English and Literature in secondary schools as well and it was fun to imagine how your classroom scenarios must have played out. While I love how you encouraged your students to think of the inexhaustible amount of effort and resources that went into every sheet of paper, I guess I managed a wee bit of something similar by getting them to be thankful for those who contributed in its creation and sharing every time anyone seemed dismissive of the resources available in class, too. 🙂

      I concur that sharing the origins of articles lends to acknowledging and affirming the effort of those who lent their hearts and minds to the work we enjoy and it feels like the right thing to do.
      Do take care and have a wonderful Christmas and New Year, too. Best wishes!

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  21. Your perspective is deep and unique. I don’t think I will ever take “things” for granted in my life again…though of course I will and must. But what a beautiful reminder at this time of year where consumption reigns.

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  28. This post reminded me so much of a poem I read a while ago called, “Everything is Waiting for You” by David Whyte. I love the idea of being more mindful and placing a greater importance on all things. One reason why, I think, people can become so cold and disconnected is attributed to a conditional numbness. People cannot acquire empathy for certain things that fall below a particular importance level, and thus, they cease to feel for things. I’ve recently begin to place a bit more sacredness on the small things in life. Slowly. Just the catching spiders in cups and letting them go outside instead of killing them sorta things. And it’s definitely been worth all the while so far. I feel more peaceful, more gentle, more connected. Another good poem that relates to that idea is “Are You Okay?” by Mary Oliver.

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  29. Your wonderful and thought provoking piece brings back a memory long buried but never forgotten… I attended a Catholic High School on Long Island. Our freshman year class was on a field trip led by our Biology teacher who also happened to be a nun. Her name was Sister Hyacinth. As we walked by some shrubbery a fellow classmate carelessly pulled a leaf off a bush as he passed and tossed it in the air. After watching the act, Sister Hyacinth slowly stopped our group and glared at the perpetrator, deadpan. “What if someone walked up to you and simply pulled your arm off!!!? How would you feel?” Dejected and shamed the boy apologized and we continued on. However, I never forgot her point that every object living or not deserves respect. Merry Christmas to you!

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  30. “We accumulate and forget to experience” I love these words. I like to encourage people to just stop, and experience now, appreciate now. A very experienced, intelligent writer and blog but written in a down to earth manner. Very interesting.

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  35. Christmas love
    spreads joyfully to
    friends, new and old, as
    natural as mountain streams
    flow under

    ice and snow
    still moving, to join.
    Harmony
    comes from sharing a
    round table. Buddha

    Mohammad,
    Jesus, Confucius,
    Abraham, Gandhi
    and Luther invite a pope
    to break bread

    under one God
    that all pray to here
    in Gwangju,
    there in Amsterdam,
    and Davao, where the

    hunt for food
    and water reverts to old
    ways, not the
    usual Christmas,
    but children scramble

    for goodies
    like coconuts, fruit, rare meat
    while we feast
    on turkey, baked so
    well, spring rolls folded

    and rolled by
    hands so delicate you can’t
    imagine
    what they’ve done. Merry
    Christmas everyone.

    Liked by 1 person

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  41. Reblogged this on My Soul and Similar Nonsense and commented:
    This is a wonderfully worded piece that looks at a perspective I try to think about often: an interactive world, where your behaviour is reflected in what you surround yourself with, and the world around you influences most things about you. It’s a lovely post that makes a journey, bringing you back to where you started with a new seed in your brain. Enjoy.

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  42. As I was writing my blog post for today about Christmas yesterday, I kept thinking back to this post of yours, and I couldnt wait to come back and read it again. It is a perspective that I share with you so profoundly. Not all “stuff” is just “stuff,” even when it is “stuff.” This year for Christmas, I was able to give my brother a gift that made him happier than any other gift I’d seen him receive in a long time. I think that some objects do have “feelings,” (in a strange, not-weird way) and that some things actually belong with some people. I love finding other people who feel the same way that I do!
    This is my post about a plate from McDonalds in 1977: http://adventuresofthecrazytrain.com/2014/12/26/huntsville-texas-and-the-greatest-christmas-gift-in-the-history-of-ever/
    -J
    adventuresofthecrazytrain.com

    Liked by 1 person

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  49. Books do seem snug on a bookshelf, they make the bookshelf whole as they are apart of the bigger picture. Everydays objects often due to get ignored as we misuse or ignore their involvement in our every day lives.

    Liked by 1 person

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