I decided to start my weekend with a long run across the city. Few kilometres into the run I came across a part covered with trees and grassland around. It had rained just a couple of hours before and the pathways were still wet. The birds chirped around merrily and the squirrels bounced around from one tree branch to another.
And then my eyes caught the attention of a sparkling sphere about 15 feet ahead of me, on the pathway. Without taking my eyes off the sphere, I continued running towards it. A second later I recognised that it was a snail with a majestic, shining round shell, just beginning to cross the path. Carefully avoiding the snail but running across it, I said to myself, “…this special-looking Ms Magnifico shell-snail has just begun to cross the pathway. Let’s see if I can make it back before Ms Magnifico can make it across to the other side. That way I’ll also get a good pace for today’s run…”
I made it back within 20 mins of running, not necessarily thinking only about the snail but definitely had it at the back of my mind. On arriving at the scene, I was able to recognize a familiar shine on the pathway. But just as I was about to be elated, I recognized that something had changed. The majestic round crystal shell was instead a cluster of small shiny fragments.
The snail had been crushed to scores of pieces by someone or something. It had crossed merely a foot from where I had seen it before. Sad, but only for a moment, I continued jogging along to complete my run.
Post-run meditation brought several thoughts rushing through my mind – “Well, in the end, I will never find out if I had been fast enough to make it back before the snail had made it across… But wait, why did I assume that the snail would make it across without any trouble?” Not a difficult question – I took it for granted.
Well, of course, a snail getting crushed doesn’t change my realities a lot; but could there be some other snails taken for granted? Some work, some relationships, and some responsibilities that I am putting off for now assuming that there would be enough time to tend to them when I return.
While this certainly upped the ante within my mind, I was hit by another string of thoughts – “What if I was the snail in some other jogger’s path? Crawling my way across – hoping for attention, being taken for granted that I will always be found trailing somewhere near a track. Or else I was creeping around assuming my shiny shell would always stay intact for eternity, forget across a simple path.”
Both perspectives opened up my mind to a whole new way of looking inward but both subtly hinted at one overlapping similarity – the urgency of action—the urgency of action in reflecting on people, relations, responsibilities and my dreams. And on the other hand, having a sense of urgency in addressing my role in organizations and people’s lives, knowing that my time (magnificent shiny shell) will not last forever.
We do this so often, don’t we? Assuming that we’ve all the time in the world, we put off ourselves as well as things to do on hold. There is merit in acting up promptly on something we’ve planned to do (note that this is the opposite of acting on impulse). Once the shell is crushed, the pain of regrets is typically stinging and prolonged and the time lost forever.
Can you identify your snails in life? Are you a snail in someone’s timeline? Time to address it, eh?
