A Sanctuary of Human Qualities
A conversation between us exploring how to grow a quality.
5 mins
Snapshot of a conversation about qualities whilst walking
Clare: Do you believe they are alive, the qualities?
Sally: What are they? What are we talking about when we talk about the qualities? A religious idea, a moral idea? We know they live because we can feel them from another person, or in a place, we can equally register their absence. Do I believe they have independent life…..yes, I do. I believe them to be like living storehouses, banks of Care, of Respect, permanent truths that have perhaps always accompanied human life or been there to draw upon.
Perhaps they alter and update from one millennium to the next, I don’t know. Perhaps they refine and update because that is their nature, perhaps it has something to do with human return to them, that we augment them…..these are questions I don’t entirely know how to answer.
What I can say is, can you imagine human life without them? What sort of cold and unfeeling place would it be within us and without?
And so from there, what I can say is that for me, the stunning fact is the very fact that we can usher more of them into the world, we can make return to them, we can be a facilitator of them. Our lives are mixed up with them and are designed, so it would seem, to have traffic with them, intimately so, personally so.
Sometimes, that just takes my breath away.
Sally: Why are you so drawn to explore the qualities?
Clare: Well, I was thinking about them a while ago and pictures came to me of all the people I had known and have now died. Interestingly, I discovered that what was still in me about them was the qualities each one of them represented and lived whilst alive, and for that I was so thankful.
Sally: Yes, I can see that.
Clare: I asked myself, could it be that growing qualities is part of our human gift and speciality?
I think to grow the qualities of the wise, of a sapient nature, is a personal choice, and a personal sought after position taken.
It is so easy to grow jealousy and greed, for example, by default. It’s all around us every moment of the day.
But to seek to be more kind, to have more care, to have real compassion, is a life-time’s work.
The qualities can become our trusted companions in life, and they can become a beacon of hope for others.