Sharing the Journey

 General manager of the universe

This is a popular position we’re all busy filling; or so it seems.

As general manager of the universe you get to call the shots, arrange things to suit your agenda, and take the credit when things turn out. You also get to dish out the blame when things do not go according to plan.

It must be a pretty stressful job, going by all the angst and anxiety you can see on display wherever people are involved in relationships. I’m not just talking about personal relationships. Business relationships, employment relationships, political relationships, and international relationships are also part of the game. Need a few examples? Check out what’s going on in Syria or Washington. Look around your workplace. You get the picture. People acting and reacting to the notion that they should be in charge or control or calling the shots.

Just imagine what state the world could be in if governments or terrorists didn’t feel the need to interfere in the affairs of nations with different priorities or a different world view. 

Let’s move the focus a little closer to home, and consider all the relationships in your web of connections. I chose the word ‘web’ deliberately. Picture yourself as a spider in the centre of a web of fine strands, linking you to everyone and everything in your life. Yes, we have relationships with things. All those things we attach the possessive adjective ‘my’ to: my car, my house, my job, my business, my iPhone. Some of us extend this same sense of possessiveness to my wife, my husband, my child, as if we owned people the same way we own cars and books.

Like the spider we try to control the web. We’re the one doing the spinning, keeping the strands both tight and sticky so that no-one, and no thing, escapes from our control or influence. Think of all that energy you invest in having your lover, your children – even when those children are now adults themselves, your family, your workmates, your friends, and the world in general behave according to your grand plan. Exhausting isn’t it?

Just image what state your life could be in if you could stop interfering in the lives of others.