Being Part of the Human Puzzle

“Differing points of view.”

Being Part of the Human Puzzle

You know what a puzzle is.  I think most of us have put a puzzle together at one time or another.  When my children were young they loved going to visit their grandparents and would sit for hours putting puzzles together.  It wasn’t that their “Grands” had a large assortment of puzzles, but my kids liked taking the pieces and forming a picture with them; even if they had completed the puzzle hundreds of times they still felt a sense of satisfaction from taking small pieces and placing them in a position to create a beautiful picture.  Now that my children are grown they face the same puzzle of being human that all of us face.

All people exist as individual pieces of the great Human Being Puzzle.  I am one and I am also always one of many.  This creates some very interesting conflicts of interest in our lives.  It forces us to make decisions; we constantly have to weigh the benefits to us personally against the benefits to those we share our lives with.  These choices are often mutually exclusive; what is good for me isn’t necessarily good for the other.  This can cause anxiety and can weigh heavily upon our individual consciences as we make decisions.  Such was the case for me in dealing with one of my neighbors recently.

I live in a community governed by restrictive covenants.  These are rules that all of the property owners in the community have agreed to uphold and live by when they purchase their property.  I have a new neighbor who recently purchased the home next to me.  They bought the property for a particular purpose not allowed by the covenants and began to work with the County to get a “conditional use” approval to do so.  Since their purpose is opposed to what is allowed in the covenants, and my best interest, I had a choice to make.

If I did not voice my opposition I would remain on friendly terms with them.  If I became a voice of resistance to their plan I would most likely destroy our good relations forever.  It was a very difficult choice for me!  I finally had to break down the problem into small “puzzle” pieces so I could see what the whole picture would look like with each decision.  In the end, I learned that there are lots of ways to put individual pieces together and that the larger picture can be changed based on the pieces we select!

That’s much different from being able to look at the outside of a box and then finding the pieces that fit together to form that picture!  It is a much more challenging process and, it also offers a wonderful opportunity.

It means that as each person learns and grows in the process of putting their Human Being Puzzle together they can create differing and ever changing outcomes!  In the challenge faced with my neighbor I learned that I could look out for my own best interest as well as the best interest of lots of other people.  In the end, lots of people aligned their personal pieces for a similarly shared vision.  It’s true that there is one piece missing, but in a huge picture one small piece won’t ruin the whole depiction!  Sad to be sure, but as I’ve lived, I’ve learned that everyone will not always agree about everything.

Disagreement doesn’t have to be a bad thing.  If you use it as a way to expand our view of the world it will be a great benefit to us; we will see things we would never otherwise see and become more than we would have been.  I like to think of disagreement as a mechanism for creating a never-ending supply of puzzle pieces that will help me create new masterpieces with others.  Viewing it in this way removes lots of conscience stretching stress.  It doesn’t mean I have to believe or accept every other point of view offered to me.  But, it does mean that I give others the chance to deliver their message to me.  In the end, you and I get to choose what pieces of the puzzle we keep and use and which ones we will throw away.

You and I have completed hundreds of puzzles during our lives and we can still feel joy and satisfaction from taking small pieces and placing them in a position to create a beautiful picture.  There are millions of new masterpieces yet to be created.  Use your piece in combination with others to build lives of beauty.