A story about choices, death, and new life.
Everyday my job is to innovate, teach people to innovate and to continuously look at problems in new ways. I’m coming close to 7,000 hours of solely thinking out of the box for hundreds of problems, yet I’m still nowhere near as creative as these people…
I was at work the other day and I happen to be sitting by the window. We are on the 4th floor of a building that is in the shape of a U and the window was on the inner part of U. It over looks the other arm of the U and there is a pit at the bottom where another building caps off the open side of the U shape.
While speaking to my coworker I just happen to see something come off the neighboring buildings roof and go down in the pit. It was some kind of a white flash and it distracted me. (I would of made a terrible fish. I would of been caught immediately upon hatching. Shiny Object!!! Gulp.) I was so curious at what I saw. What was it? Was it some kind of animal thing? Was it just a plastic bag? I thought somebody had thrown something, but we’re too high for that. My coworker immediately said, “It’s just a bird.” I said, “Are you sure it was just a bird? It didn’t fall like a bird.” Then she blew my mind.
She said, “Yeah, it was just a bird. It didn’t want to be a bird anymore. It wanted to be a cat. So it jumped.”
Mind blown! I had never thought about death in that way. Of course you’re saying, “Duh, haven’t you heard of reincarnation?” Yes! I have, but it never occurred to me that if reincarnation was a phase of life it would or even could be a choice. It always seemed like it would be a random type of thing or God making the choice because of the planets needs. For instance, the world needs more manatees and then all of a sudden you’re eating lettuce. It’s probably not like that at all, but either way it was in the casualness of how she said it. “It wanted to a be cat”.
My brain felt like it was dipped in Sprite…..cold and refreshing bath of thought.
I hadn’t felt that way in such a long time. Having a new way of looking at life or hearing a fresh perspective. It felt great, as if I had just heard my newest favorite song that wasn’t anything else like I currently listen to.
I asked her how she just came up with that. She said, “I didn’t. My 5 year old says that all the time.” I immediately got excited to have kids.
Metric - “Artificial Nocturne”
Originally published on Medium, October 13, 2014.