The Briar Philosopher - A Matter of Perspective

A Matter of Perspective

As those of you who’ve been reading this column regularly know, I am, according to family legend, part Native American. I’ve embraced that aspect of my ancestry and, at one time, I carried a medicine pouch with me at all times. Many of you already know what a medicine pouch is. You’ve seen them in the movies, I’m sure, if not anywhere else. A medicine pouch is simply a small bag, usually made of leather, that contains items of personal importance – items that reflect our strengths or weaknesses, remind us of what our purpose is, and of what we hold sacred. Traditionally, an individual does not reveal to anyone else what items are contained in their medicine pouch. I have decided, however, in light of some of the situations I have found myself in of late, to share with you the contents of my own personal medicine pouch.

It contained only one thing, and it is a beautiful thing. I’ll have to tell the story of how it came to be there to make its beauty clear.

Some 35 odd years ago my old medicine pouch, the one I’d had since childhood, had worn out and I needed a new one. I also felt that I had outgrown the items it contained. Though they were important to a child’s path, I had embarked on the path of an adult and needed something that would reflect where I wanted to go and what I wanted to be. I couldn’t find anything that represented to me what I wanted my life’s purpose to be, so I had not made a new pouch.

One night, I was taking a walk in the park. The moon was bright, the evening warm, and the trees beautiful. As I walked, something under a nearby hickory tree caught my eye. It was a beautiful shell. The way it caught the moonlight made a rainbow of colors dance around it. I wanted it. I had no thought of putting in my medicine pouch at the time. I did think it would make a wonderful necklace. I walked over to the tree and picked it up. Something didn’t feel right, so I carried it over to a street light to get a better look.

What I held in my hand was not a shell at all. It was a crushed bottle cap. My first reaction was disappointment. My second was laughter. My third reaction was an understanding of what had just happened to me. I took the bottle cap home, fashioned my medicine pouch, and placed it inside. I carried that “shell” for a good 20 years.

There is a teaching, an “object” lesson of sorts, which is used in Native American circles to teach the nature of the truth –vs- the perspective of the individual. In this lesson, several people are asked to gather in a circle. A stone is then placed in the center of the circle, and each person is asked to describe the object in the center. As would be expected, each description is different because the appearance of the stone varies depending on where a person is standing. The circle then turns, and again each person is asked to describe the central object. The description, of course, changes. This teaches that what a thing appears to be depends on how we look at it. There are those who say that there is no truth – only perspective. But the stone remains the stone, regardless of how we see it, and the truth remains the truth. Its nature must be thoroughly examined in the light to be known and understood.

It was this lesson that I finally learned from the bottle cap. At one time, I believed it to be a thing of beauty. Did it become less beautiful once its true nature was revealed? NO. In fact, just the opposite happened. It was not a bottle cap I carried with me. It was and is the TRUTH I carry with me. It is the truth I try to keep at the center of all that I do. And the TRUTH, y’all, even when it is not what we wished it to be, even when it does not serve our purposes, even when it is hard to bear – The TRUTH is a beautiful thing.

“And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” -John 8:32