Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Seeing the moment

The Washington Post won a Pulitzer in the feature writing category for Gene Weingarten's April 2007 story about this experiment.

A violinist played in a Metro station in Washington DC for 45 minutes on a cold January day in 2007. It was a busy time and possibly several thousand people walked past. Mainly a few younger people stopped and listened but the majority rushed by on their way to other places. He did receive about 32 dollars in donations during that 45 minute performance.
It turns out that the violinist had played six Bach pieces on a 3.5 million dollar violin. The violinist was Joshua Bell, possibly the best violinist in modern times. When he stopped and silence took over no applauds rang out nor did the rush in the station change.
Two days prior to the performance in the subway he had played to a sold out audience in Boston where seats had cost 100 dollars a piece.
This is a fascinating experiment and says a lot about the appreciation of the moment.
We as a people are always in a hurry to get to the next moment and frequently ignore the present moment. This is a paradox since the only real moment that we have is the one we are in. The one in the past is gone and the one in the future may never get here.
Would I have stopped to listen to a violinist in the Metro? I like to think I would have.
I have stopped on the street of cities, listened to guitarists, watched break dancers, listened to singers and watched outdoor theater but I was not in a hurry.
These are the people willing to make the world and each moment more fascinating and just maybe we shouldn't rush by.
We need to understand that each moment is unique and affords us instances of remarkable perspectives. We need to make a real effort to appreciate the environment of each moment and see all of the infinity and beauty contained within.

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