I had to change a washer on the kitchen tap the other day because it had been leaking for weeks. I’m generally straight onto these sorts of jobs, but I had been really busy (or lazy). We must have wasted a lot of water in that period of time and I couldn’t help but wonder if I had been bothered to change the washer earlier would I have the guilty conscience I was not feeling on realising how wasteful I had been?
That conscience was enough to make me ride up to a friends house to get the spanners to fix it and finally get some relief from that guilt that had welled up.
When I took the tap apart it turned into a nightmare. There was the original building then fifty years of additional plumbing, with bits and pieces leading and collaborating into a big confusing mess of pipes. I couldn’t help but think that was like my life. My soul had so much garbage and attachments over the top that I could barely remember what my soul was, where it was or how it felt anymore.
All of a sudden it was really hard to concentrate and stay focused on what I was doing. I’m more of an idea’s man, so getting things done isn’t my strong point. Having the question of ‘what has happened to my soul’ in the front of my mind was really distracting and uncomfortable (not to mention the guilty conscience that had started the whole job off in the first place).
Who wants to think about your conscience or your soul when it makes you feel so bad? The problem is if you let your conscience out of the bag those are the sort of things that you start to think about.
As I pondered, spanner in hand, I started to see how everything had its place. All the pipes and washers, tap parts and nuts alhthough appearing a mess did actually work together to make the plumbing sound. They all belonged somewhere, and nothing would work without the other parts. It was very comforting, just as quickly as I had felt uncomfortable when I started thinking about my own soul or conscience, I now I started to feel like I had my place, that I must belong somewhere.
With that in mind the rest of the day was a bit of a blur and I was really inspired. I made my way back over to my mates house to appreciately return the tools I had borrowed and we talked about conscious and soul and after a few beers even the meaning of life. As the beer flowed more freely so did our thoughts and soon we were disucssing how to save the world!