The privilege of an overview

Recently I returned to my homeland, New Zealand, for a friend's milestone birthday.

I had the most wonderful time, both with her and her family and friends and with my own group of beloved people.

Taking off from Melbourne, I did what I always do and said a prayer for all the ground staff, the pilot and co-pilot, the cabin crew and all the other people on the plane. I prayed for the plane from tip to toe, especially the engines, wings and landing gear. I also prayed for a successful trip, from taxying towards the runway to take off. From being in the air to landing to the final taxi to our terminal and disembarkation point.

Although my spiritual alignment these days is more nominal Buddhist with a hint of Pagan, it is something I have done all my life that helps me feel better when in the air. Entrusting my life to a pilot who deals with the complicated physics of flying is still a big deal and my "prayers" help, even though statistically speaking, flying is safer than driving a car.

Anyway, once the immense forces of takeoff have been dispensed with and we are climbing gently, I feel better. When we rise above the fluffy cumulus nimbus clouds and I see them blanketed below it provides a unique overview. Flying kilometres above familiar oceans and land masses makes me look at the world and my life from a different perspective.

In the first instance, I feel a sense of immense privilege. It's embedded in the way I get to live my life. I’m truly lucky to be able to skip back and forward across the Tasman Sea and fly to other places for holidays. It’s not something everybody gets to do. I'm also truly blessed to be in regular contact with a family I love and enjoy being around. This is not something everybody gets to feel.

Secondly, I feel a sense of immense good fortune at simply being alive. My life and it's continuance was recently brought into sharp contrast with the life of Sinead O'Connor's when she died on July 26th of this year.

Born on December 8th, 1966, O'Connor was six days younger than I am.

She was a Sagittarius Fire Horse like me and I'd always felt she blazed a path through life and the music industry. I truly admired her ripping up the image of the Pope on live television, protesting the sexual abuse of Irish children at the hands of the clergy. This happened more than a decade before the issue was exposed in the US, Canada, Australia and other locations around the world. Her chanted words of hope in the triumph of good over evil and her cry of "Fight the real enemy!" pierced my heart.

She was so beautiful, so vibrant and so fierce in her convictions, I admired her. I envied her. The fact that she'd had the guts to not only make such a statement to an international audience but even that she'd got out there and created a career in the music industry showed it was possible to grab life by the short and curlies. It told me you could do more than just be one more gorgeous, well produced, well packaged artist. You could truly make a difference.

Now the envy is gone. Turns out Sinead herself suffered brutal abuse at the hands of those who should have nurtured her. Turns out she fought demons every day of her life until the day she died, way too young. She’s no longer here to continue the good fight. Once again, it's a sense of privilege I feel when I think of my beautiful daughter, alive and well, compared to O'Connor who suffered that most unimaginable of horrors, the death of her child.

In the words of Alexander Chalmers all human beings need is something to do, someone to love and something to look forward to. Poor Sinead lost her someone to love when her child ended his life. And perhaps when that happened, she no longer wanted to do anything, she felt there was nothing to look forward to, ever again.

My heart goes out to her. I remember the times in my life when I felt that alone, that despairing, that helpless at the hands of abusers. I nearly ended it too but not quite.

Life is a gauntlet and some of us fall to it much sooner than others. However, if somehow you are able to find the cracks of light, the patches of daffodils in all the chaos, it helps you stick around. Then you get to see the good bits.

Now, in contrast, I have Chalmers' three things in spades. So from my perspective high in the sky as I flew to my dear friend's birthday, I determined that the best thing to do was to create that environment for others, as much as I am able to.

I determined I will reach out to those friends in my life I know are lonely. Show them I love them and get together, creating sunspots in their lives as well as in mine.

I will continue to work with kids who have obstacles to overcome and help them do just that. Because when their faces light up in triumph so does my heart.

I will fight the good fight to honour people like Sinead, I will stand up when I see an injustice and not let the moment slip by without protest or even a comment.

I will ferret out all the stories I am entranced by, I will let my brain percolate on its own stories then tell them, with honesty, courage and compassion, just as Sinead did.

I will persist, despite the rejections and the setbacks. Because in those setbacks, true growth lies, if I'm brave enough to ask why they occurred and what I can do better.

Finally, and I think most importantly, I will be supremely grateful every day that I am alive. That I continue to be able to journey through this particular space-time continuum charting my unique path and experiencing such an amazing ride in this human body.

Rest In peace, Sinead. Thank you for all you did and all you overcame.

And to everyone else, I wish you daffodils.