“We rush through our days in such stress and intensity, as if we were here to stay and the serious project of the world depended on us. We worry and grow anxious; we magnify trivia until they become important enough to control our lives. Yet all the time, we have forgotten that we are but temporary sojourners on the surface of a strange planet spinning slowly in the infinite night of the cosmos.”
John O’Donohue, Eternal Echoes
4 Comments
Earl
I certainly agree with the philosophy of the John O’Donohue quote, however, I’m not sure some of today’s events could be considered as trivia…a pandemic, massive social changes driven by racial injustice, global recession, market instability, massive unemployment, and threats to our very democracy. I would welcome the trivia I use to magnify. Haha!
But perhaps in the universal scheme, O’Donohue speaks of, it is still all trivia. For sure it is what it is. You do get some wonderful warm morning light, Monte. Have a good upcoming weekend.
Monte Stevens
I agree with you, everything you mentioned are not trivial in our world today. One of the things I get from his quote is how I have taken and made trivial things in my life into much larger things. I have worried and grown anxious over things I have had no control of, control of other people and their views and other stuff. I also “would welcome the trivia I use to magnify.”
Hope you and Bonnie have a great weekend. You can get a head start on the to-do list she is gonna make for you to pay for that new Sony! And, that may not be trivial! 😃
Tom Dills
I think there is a subtle but important difference between the way O’Donohue uses the word “trivia” and the idea of “trivializing” current events. In my mind, and the way I see the use of the term, anything not directly and immediately impacting me and the things I care about are “trivial,” as in they are not something I need to think or worry about unless I choose to. Current events are important, certainly. But (a) they aren’t directly threatening me or my family, and (b) ain’t nothing I can do to change them. That makes them “trivial” in the context that I think O’Donohue intended.
Love the photo!
Monte Stevens
His keyword to me is control our lives. When I can’t sleep then it’s no longer trivia. This would be one of those times I’d like to be sitting at an Irish coffee/tea house and talking with him.