This is a truth to which I can personally attest:  when you have damaged legs or feet – for whatever reason – and you’re trying to regain your walking skills, you tend to watch your feet all the time.  Or at least you watch the ground around them.  Tripping and falling is such a dread that you constantly look down before you take a step.  Even with the help of a cane or walking sticks or even the hand of a friend, you can’t help but keep your gaze scanning your path for awkward stones and uneven places.

I suspect too many of us walk through life this way – even after we’ve mended, perhaps even when we’ve never been physically impaired.  We focus downward, keeping our eyes only on what we fear might hurt us.

Lately, I’ve become particularly aware of how limiting this view can be.  And I am determined to lift up my eyes.  

I suspect I have been inspired to do this over the past few weeks by all those who have knocked on my door with offers of post-storm assistance.  Because only with lifted eyes did my neighbors and passersby notice the downed trees and limbs on my property.  They saw the tangle of growth that blocked access down my driveway.  With lifted eyes they saw me stumping around with a cane on unsure legs.

With lifted eyes they saw no lights on in other houses that needed power – and they brought food to their doors, and water and ice, and they stretched power cords out their own windows to give them a source of connection.

Only when we lift up our eyes can we see the faces of kind strangers and all those who come running to help when we need them the most (“look for the helpers,” Mr. Rogers wisely advised us).  Only with lifted eyes can we can see where we are needed and who we can help ourselves.  

Only when we lift up our eyes can we see the blue of the sky breaking through storm clouds and find hope in the clarity of sunrises.  Only lifted eyes can be guided by stars and find random flowers among the rubble; or find lost cats or see children playing on cleared streets.  

When toddlers are beginning to walk they focus on the whole world in front of them – on places to go and things to see, the intrigue of things to come.  On unsteady legs they wobble and trip their way through a maze of toys and furniture, rugs and tufted grass, odd steps and uneven edges of sidewalks.  And in our adult wisdom, we tell them to watch out and look where they are stepping, as they occasionally trip over the dog and plop to the ground.  Perhaps they shouldn’t listen to us.  Perhaps then they’d grow up always lifting their eyes.  And I suspect that’s where all the good things are to be seen.