My wife and I moved to Boston in 1989 so I could attend law school. Driving in Boston is an adventure.
One day when we were still new to the area, we got lost driving around the city. Ok, I got lost. We were at an intersection where six streets converged. This is not uncommon for Boston, and some would even say it adds to the charm. While I was completely lost, I had an idea of which way to go.
So we set off in one direction. Fifteen minutes later we pulled up to another intersection, and I finally knew where we were. I announced this to my wife, playing up my mad Magellan-like navigational skills.
She just laughed.
“Rob, you realize we are at the exact same intersection we were at 15 minutes ago,” she said. “You’ve just come from a different direction.”
I looked around like I’d just come out of a dark room and it was taking my eyes a few seconds to adjust. She was right, of course.
How we see things matters. We can look at the same old thing from a different angle and see it fresh for the first time.
Or as T.S. Eliot put it–
We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.