The Stranger

“If you search too long, you will search wrong.” An elderly gentleman stopped and said this to me the other day at a store, as I was pondering life while peering down the aisle toward my husband. He didn’t give me a chance to reply. He simply said it and moved on. What did this mean? All weekend I’ve had those words going through my mind. Searching what exactly? My own thoughts, I assume.

I heard once that an “idle mind is the devil’s playground”. When you allow your mind to over-think circumstances, you tend to give room to thoughts that are normally below the surface. We all have them. I would never want to be a mind reader, and would definitely not want others to read mine. Can you imagine if those deep thoughts were suddenly out there for the world to see? I must laugh now as I realize I’m writing this, for the whole world to see. How ironic.

Anyway… back to the stranger at the store. He was right. I was searching for answers. Answers to life – to what I want in life, how I got to where I am and where this life is going to lead. “You will search wrong.” One of my struggles is not allowing myself to give too much thought to the things that bother me about life. When I begin to think of how I want some parts of my life to change, I quickly stuff the thoughts away, out of fear of what will happen if I dwell on them. This is great to some degree, but on the contrary it also keeps me prisoner within myself. It’s a constant struggle between myself and I.

“You will search wrong” – Maybe I should just go with the flow and not fight against the current. Perhaps it’s the day I choose to fight against the current that my search will go wrong.

Was this random old man an angel in disguise, sent to deliver a message to me? It sure seems like it. “If you search too long, you will search wrong.” Thank you, stranger. I will continue to ponder your words.