I was standing in a checkout line in Wal-Mart today, yes Wal-Mart. Anyway, so as I'm waiting I'm trying to remember to tell the cashier that no, I don't need a bag, thank you very much. Sometimes this simple statement can be a larger hassle that it should be. For some reason, the insistence that one doesn't need a bag for their items, or that they brought bags to put the items that will soon change ownership from the store to the customer confuses people. Sometimes, I like to think about when I was a cashier and try to remember what it was like and how I would react to someone bringing their own bags or simply saying they didn't need a bag. I hope that I would have been understanding and polite about the whole situation, but I wonder if I too would have been puzzled.
For a few years, I have been becoming more and more aware of my impact on the world, society, the environment, and the communities I have lived in. As I've learned more about myself and my ideas and beliefs, I have also learned more about the world at large and society's agreements or arguments about some of the things I believe in. I have always worked within the system, yes, I recycled, but I never consciously stood in a grocery store and considered one product over another based on whether or not I could recycle the packaging. I never brought bags with me to a store, canvas bags or plastic bags, so I wouldn't be wasting more and more plastic. I never even really thought of it. I would simply bring the bags back to the store to have them recycled and that was that.
So, as I was standing in line at the store, I started thinking about the ideal of doing your part is important, but maybe the most important thing is to do it because you believe in it, not because you're simply supposed to. I like to call this concept Thoughtful Living. Kind Living even. I think its the consciousness in decisions, large and small that make the idea of Kind Living so wonderful. Its the thoughtfulness in everything, every decision, every word, every movement that makes it special.
I was talking to my sister today on the phone, and she was upset because someone was blocking the exit from the bank she had just visited. She was upset and all I could think was to tell her that being upset wouldn't solve anything. It wouldn't make the man move any faster, it would only make her upset and negative, because eventually she would be able to go forward. I understand why she was upset, she was on her lunch break and only had an hour to go to the bank and eat and take a moment to relax. She works at a stressful job as do a lot of other people.
The world is sometimes on a deadline it seems, people rushing here and there and although I live within restraints, breakfast at 6, please be ready to be ready for the morning circle at 7, those are the big deadlines I have to meet. So kind living right now is easier than it will be once I'm out of this community of like minded people. The real test will be to live in the world outside, the one I knew before I came to California and the one I'll know after, and still live kindly.
