We belong to each other

If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten we belong to each other. Mother Teresa

We are painting our new home. M. is a gifted artist and painter. He has completed my daughter's bedroom, C.C.'s son's room as well as the downstairs and stairwell to the main floor. He's working on our bedroom now.

It's a slow process. But then, rebuilding lives is always a slow process.

After a week of turning up every day, M. disappeared. When I caught up with him on the second floor day area of the shelter where I work, he looked ragged, hung-over.

"I don't feel well," he told me, his chin nodding against his chest, his eyes red and bleary. "I can't come today."

He didn't turn up for the rest of that week.

M. is homeless. I first met him two and a half years ago when I started the art program at the shelter where I work. He was a water colour artist. On Saturday's he'd come into the room, sit in a corner by himself and paint. Sometimes, he'd chat. Not often. The space we were using was on the sixth floor of the shelter, overlooking the river valley and the hillside dotted with trees and apartment condos on the other side. M. would paint the view. He'd paint from photos he found in magazines. Slowly. Methodically, the process as important as the outcome. Each stroke connected to the last. Each stroke smoothing the way for the next.

He's like that painting walls. The process of what he's doing is as important as the outcome. We're using a clay based paint. He talks about the benefits of the paint. It's ability to cover space, smoothly, evenly, cleanly. It's lack of HVCs. It's environmental friendliness. He talks about its viscosity. It's depth. He seldom talks about himself.

A few weeks ago M. went to his niece's wedding. He had a photo taken of himself with his five siblings. He's framed it and put it on the table where he works in the art studio. On the weekend, after getting paid for his painting work last week, M. bought four plants for his 'corner of the world' in the studio. Three of them sit on the window ledge, one hangs in the corner above him.

"They change the air around me," he told me on Monday when I commented on the greenery around him. "They change the energy."

Norman Vincent Peale said, "The more you lose yourself in something bigger than yourself, the more energy you will have."

M. is losing himself in his art. Painting at our house, he's losing himself into his craft and refocusing his sights on something bigger than himself.

I am focusing my thoughts on something bigger than painting our house. At first, when M. didn't turn up after being on a bender, I was angry. Disappointed. Frustrated. I wanted the job done. I wanted it finished. I thought about hiring someone else. C.C. and I talked about it. He left it up to my decision. He was okay however we did it.

In my 'damn it, why can't he just turn up' attitude, I was willing to let go of the possibility of something bigger happening. I was willing to give into my need to have it my way. I was forgetting that we all belong to each other.

Sure, it was wrong of M. to go off and tie one on to the point that he could not work. But, that is M's life. It is his pattern -- and I knew that before we hired him. Naively, or perhaps more appropriately, selfishly and stubbornly, I wanted M to be different for me.

The real change comes when M does it differently for himself. Since coming up to art.works two+ years ago, the frequency of M's benders has lessened. He's spending more time closer to sobriety than he is time immersed in its cloudy visions. He's cleaned himself up -- a lot. He's taking better care. He's beginning to care.

M is teaching me the meaning of having peace in my life. I am not responsible for M's choices. I am responsible for how I connect to him and with him.

It would be easy to go out and hire painters to come in and get the job done in a few days. It would be easy but not as meaningful nor as beneficial to me.

I am learning patience. And, I am learning how to be present in the moment, without fear of the outcome.

M. is a superb painter. Every stroke is filled with his love of the craft and his commitment to doing the job to perfection.

Every stroke is filled with his gifts as he gracefully moves through the room, the paint laden roller following his every movement.

I thought it was the other way around. I thought I was giving M. the gift of being able to make some money, do some work. And I am. And that's important.

But the real gift is in M himself and what he is teaching me. Patience. Humility. Wonder. The understanding that I am responsible for my part of our relationship. I am part of the rebuilding of his life, just as he is part of what I am building in my life too.

M is teaching me to honour my role as a human being doing the best job I can at being connected to the world around me with love, humility, integrity and justice.

Yup. Would have been easier to hire some unknown painting crew to swoop in, get the job done and disappear.

M's presence will be with us forever. With each brushstroke he is creating the opportunity for change to appear, on the walls of our home, and in the corners of his life, as well as our life. He is a part of our world.

What a wondrous gift to see this morning. To be part of. To be party to. The knowledge that peace comes when I honour the connection that joins me to my fellow human being.

The question is: Are you honouring your connections to the people around you? Are you connecting through belonging to each other, or are you resisting the connection, going it alone without letting yourself find peace in the spaces connecting you?

Thank you CW for the quote. Thank you for inspiring me to be the peace in my world.