LOST Lessons

Okay, now don't tease me, but Tom and I love the tv series, LOST. Only yesterday did we finally finish watching the first season on DVD--we've been borrowing the DVD's the last few weeks from the video store because we missed the shows when they first aired. Back then, we'd watch the commercials advertising LOST and think, "Eh, we don't like Survivor so we probably wouldn't like LOST, either." (Sigh. When will we finally learn to watch something before we criticize it??)

Well, anyway, we've watched the second season and have loved it so we thought it might be nice to see how it all began.

Tom and I both agree--LOST is incredible! How cool to find a tv series about adventure and mystery instead of all about s-e-x (she says, blushing) or crude humor aimed at the 5th grade mind.

So, like, what is LOST teaching me? Many things, but here's my favorite lesson: there are always reasons why people do what they do and why they are the way they are. It's reminding me that too often I have judged people without taking the time to understand their past--where they are coming from. Or 'the why behind the what' as my favorite teacher says.

Much of each episode is shown in flashbacks depicting one or two of the stranded islanders' past. And in each flashback we come to understand the characters better by the things they have suffered because of their own sins and mistakes, or because of the sins and mistakes of others. But either way, those flashbacks bring insight into why the characters now act as they do and a new understanding of each person's heart and motives.

And through this new understanding, we come to love each islander better, too, flaws and all. With understanding comes an empathy, with empathy comes compassion, and with compassion comes forgiveness.

Hmmm... Maybe Real Life would be easier, better, if we each came equipped with a small tv screen on which played the flashbacks of our past for all to view. Maybe if we could watch that screen, first, instead of criticizing and judging that which we, ourselves, have never seen or experienced, well, maybe we'd be a more compassionate group of people.

Or maybe if, right now without the screens, we could just listen to one another and realize we're each shaped by our past and present, too, well, maybe we could act in love instead of in ignorance.

And maybe love could pave the way for people to open their scarred hearts to the Healer and Lover of hearts damaged by a harsh, harsh world.




******

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing." 1 Corinthians 13:1-3