Direction

I rarely head into the wilderness without my GPS unit.  Depending on the length of my journey, the technology requires that I also carry extra batteries.  My ability to return home to my wife in a timely manner requires that I subscribe to the ever present power of the Energizer Bunny.  More times than I'd like to admit the screen has gone blank, only to find me reaching into my day pack to grab a set of replacement power.  Digger, why would you not want to admit that?  Perhaps it is because the set that I so proudly pull out are occasionally the same set I put in the pack LAST time the unit went blank and forgot to replace them with fresh batteries.

I was recently re-reading Walking, by H.D. Thoreau; it had been years since I had blown the dust off that book.  I've been a Thoreau fan since high school; just one within the plethora of others that cut their teeth in a desire to embrace simplicity.  I found I had forgotten the quote that began to shape my life for the next 40 years.  Over time it morphed into "flying by the seat of my britches." <----This phrase became the manifestation, separated from its' initial cause.  I began my separation, or forced individuality, from my abode of my youth with a specific direction in my mind.  It was like looking at a map and measuring the distance between two points ("as the crow flies") and believing that is the true distance between them.  Come to find out, I didn't know how to fly; so getting between any two points wasn't as direct as I thought it would be.  I should have recalled the quote at that time.  It would have made the next 40 years much easier to chart.  The quote...as simple as only my friend Henry could have made it..."My needle is slow to settle...but it always settles...".

Anyone that has used a compass has noticed how the needle respond to the earths magnetic field.  It takes time for it to calm, line up with the power of the field, and point in one ultimate direction.  The needle will always settle given time,  buy it is the degree of measure off this true direction that sends us on our path.  But FIRST we must have a true direction.  If we fail to let the needle settle our course could be way off over the course of our journey.  A needle that fails to settle means there is some interference.  It is important, if not necessary, to find out what the source of this interference might be, then establish direction.  To not rid ourselves of the interference could cost us our journey.  On the other hand...there is nothing in error with traveling in a general direction, without waiting for the settle.  But there will come a time, or several times, when a more exact path will be needed and the settling of the needle is a necessity.  I think that is one of the hardest lessons to learn.  In my youth there were times when my impatience did not wait for the needle to settle, in my older age waiting wasted valuable time when I should have been moving forward.  Not to mention the times I just had a "gut" feeling on my direction and did not want to pull the compass out.  That compass can be different for every individual, maybe even different for each circumstance in our lives.  What ever the compass is, the important part is to at least stop long enough to consult the compass.

What did this have to do with a GPS from the first paragraph?  There is nothing wrong with having the tools to direct us along the best or shortest route, or to be able to backtrack our path if it becomes impassible.  But a GPS unit triangulates our position from satellites hundreds of miles above us, focusing to a benign apex on the ground that is us.  I think there are times when it might have been better to take the time to triangulate myself using the landmarks around me...and identify my position in life first.  Then use the natural field, energy, or atman inside me to patiently let the needle of my life settle and chart my course a little at a time; taking the time to plot my position along the way from my level as often as I see necessary.