Winter at the University of Healing
 

Sylvia M Enz - Summer 2013 Issue

Reflections

An Easy Five Bucks      

 

An empty page of my blessing book stares at me as if saying, "Come on, fill me, surely some blessing must have come your way today."

"Yes," I speak back, "Yes, I just do not really know how to start."

"How about at the beginning?"

It is my weekly shopping day in town. As I wait in line at the checkout at Trader Joe’s, I watch a young mother, holding a tiny baby in her arms. "Three days old!" she tells me with pride. It is so blissfully and peacefully asleep as if it had just descended from heaven—which of course, it symbolically just did! As I look at it I feel the blessing of its peacefulness as a gentle reminder of my true inner being. I could have just stood there and watched that little face forever, but life around catches up with me and turning back to my shopping, I slide my credit card and silently bless the little newcomer to this world, thanking him for the blessing of his presence.

At Sprouts, I open a bulk bin to scoop up some Chia seeds, when a dark haired, distinguished looking lady starts a conversation about using Chia seeds most beneficially. "I attended a lecture, that’s why I know all that stuff," she explains with a smile. "Thank you, I learned a lot," I smile back, finally getting to scoop up some of the valuable seeds with a new appreciation. I haven’t finished, when a handsome young man stops next to the Chia seed barrel asking with curiosity, "How do you use that stuff?" "Uhmm let me see! I put it in my yogurt at breakfast, put a tablespoon into a smoothie, make pudding and jam with it, and I sprinkle it on just about everything I eat!"

"Wow!" he looks very impressed, "Thanks, that was really helpful." Making a knot on my bag I decide with a joyful grin, "Yes, I am having fun!"

My last stop is the gasoline station. When I see the low cash price I decide to spend my last 14 dollars cash on gasoline. When the pump clicks off, I see 19 dollars on the display instead of the 14 I had asked for. For a moment I feel frustrated because I have spent my last cash. While walking over to the office I think to myself that it actually is the mistake of the attendant and that it would have been easy to just drive away with an easily earned five dollars. I tell the clerk that I owe him 5 dollars because I had given him only 14 dollars, but pumped gasoline for 19 dollars. For a moment he looks puzzled, but then goes on to explain that I had given him not 14 dollars, but 34 dollars as a twenty dollar bill had been clinging to the 10 dollar on the bottom of the pile. So, he concluded, "I owe You 15 dollars."

Reflecting on my earned 15 dollars I literally understood what my mother used to say, "It pays to be honest!"

Honesty, I thought, is a reflection of the integrity which is inherent to my divine being, and I like the fact that I get reminded of it by looking at the blissful face of a newborn, sharing smiles and vibrations of caring with strangers—or by facing the temptation of making and easy 5 bucks.

- Sylvia M Enz